“What more could anyone ask from a new year
than the promise –or just the hope—of renewal?” Margaret Renkl.
I dare say that hope is not enough. Hope is
in desperate need of awareness, reflection and inspiration to make sustainable,
empathic choices.
I was
drawn into Margaret Renkl’s world when I learned about her interest in rescueing a
sick fox. Margaret Renkl lives in Nashville, Tennessee, where she has formed a
close bond with the wildlife on her backyard by observing her surroundings.
The
sick fox was probably suffering from mange. Margaret explains that mange is
common in suburban foxes because the “manicured” gardens deprive foxes of the
sources of food they need to survive. Under normal, healthy conditions foxes’
immune systems may be able to fight off the mites that cause mange, but suburban
foxes suffer the consequences of the use of poisons that people use in their
gardens. “Manicured” lawns use different poisons, and Margaret Renkl elucidates
it in simple terms:
“Homeowners set out poisons that keep seeds of
weeds from germinating. Then they spray a different poison that kills any
plants that germinate anyway. Still another poison kills the insects that eat
the “desirable” plants. Yet another kills the field mice trying to survive in a
place without fields.
“And those
poisons end up in the air and the water. They end up in our bodies, linked to
asthma, Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, autism, and several cancers.”
She is distraught to watch the consequences of bluebirds ingesting poisoned
insects, and Cooper’s hawks eating those bluebirds.
I am thankful for this book, for it conveys
the information that can make a difference in our communities.
Over
the years I've tried to communicate her message in several ways to different people,
but to no avail. I witnessed a massive increase in the use of pesticides
and herbicides recently.
I used
to relish the visit of various kinds of bees on the wildflowers in my
pollinator garden, and I wrote about bees a few times here. Then in the year
2024 I hardly saw any bees in my garden. It was a lonely experience.
I contacted a professor of entomology from a
reputable university. I was sent multiple scientific papers, which validate
my concerns and support the content of My Writing life blog. I have used
several books at My Writing Life blog: Awareness, reflection, Inspiration to
motivate people to do the right thing, but it has not been enough.
I
still come across the fake “pollinator gardens” with pesticides on the lawn. It
is necessary to communicate the message with clarity: a pollinator garden with
pesticides on its lawn is NOT a pollinator garden. Pesticides take a toll on
the health of pollinators, so let people know that by using pesticides on
their lawn they are not creating a pollinator garden. They are doing just the
opposite.
What is not to like about the graceful flight of a monarch butterfly visiting our backyards?
I am thrilled when I come across a toad in the safe haven of our garden. We don’t spray herbicides and pesticides in our yard. In refraining
from spraying poisons, we create a little forest of hope in our tiny corner of
Mother Earth.
I could spend hours appreciating the
masterpiece of patterns and colors that Mother Nature put together in this
toad’s skin…I had never seen a toad like this one before, so I took this photo.
Strangely enough, this toad has the smooth skin of a frog. I am enchanted by
the beauty and mystery of this amphibian.
Did you know that toads can feed on thousands
of mosquitoes every summer? Yes, they do eat a variety of insects, and
mosquitoes are included in their menu. We don’t have to poison the toads. They
are very sensitive to the chemicals humans use in their gardens. We need the
toads to do what they are expected to do in maintaining the integrity of the
ecosystems where we can all thrive without poisoning our water, air and
soil.
With climate change getting worse, no
repellent will be able to deal with the consequences of the proliferation of mosquitoes.
Diseases such as Dengue and West Nile encephalitis, which are transmitted by mosquitoes, are rising steadily.
Mosquitoes are part of the source of food
for toads and spiders, and we need toads and spiders in the web of life,
but the use of pesticides and herbicides are destroying their lives, and, in
the process, we are suffering the consequences of this lack of judgment. The
bats are also in need of protection, and I explained this before here.
The gist of The Comfort of Crows
The Comfort of Crows is akin to a
personal journal in which Margaret Renkl shares her connection with wildlife
and her concerns over what we humans are doing to the environment and to
ourselves. There are threads of her personal life interwoven into her narrative,
but the charm of her book lies in her observations of wildlife and her response
to her setting. In other words, she shares her poetical musings and the
practical ways in which she tries to support what remains amid the destruction
caused by irrationality, denial and neglect.
The
limitations of her actions did not stop Margaret Renkl from making choices that
leave sparks of hope for the reader.
She contemplates the wonders of the four
seasons, marveling at the lives of the creatures that surround her. She also shares
the grief that emerges from watching nature closely. The effects of climate
change and the multiple poisons that people use in their “manicured” gardens are
evident.
I think we should start calling them gardens
of death or doom instead of using the word “manicured” gardens to refer to the
abuse of such chemicals.
It was also
heartbreaking to read about the loss of some of the trees in her own garden,
which took place after the happily married couple next to her backyard died. The
builders came with their equipment and harmed the roots of her own old trees.
As you know, the roots of trees do not
understand anything about property lines, so the parts of the roots that were
harmed in her neighbors’ home killed her trees altogether.
The thoughtless actions of these builders
could be used as a metaphor and a symbol of the lack of awareness and empathy
in certain human behaviors.
Trees are
not just trees
Trees provide the oxygen we need to survive.
They provide relief from the intense summer heat and protect the soil from
erosion. Trees are not just trees, but they are also the organisms that live in
them. Furthermore, trees supply the dead leaves that feed the soil, the leaves
that form the shelter on the ground to various living beings belonging to
complex ecosystems that support our own life on earth, and all these creatures
play necessary roles in the precious web of life. You may not see them, but
they are there and they need those dead leaves on the ground.
Using
mathematics to spark awareness
You will encounter people who don’t understand
that destroying the environment is bad for the economy. I come across them
often. We are responsible for helping them understand that supporting the
health of ecosystems makes our economies stronger, and we have to make clear
that destroying ecosystems is shattering economies across the world. To do
so, we can use the power of mathematics. I can give a few examples here:
A single bat can eat 3,000 insects in one
night. Bats contribute one million dollars a year to Thailand’s economy by
helping to reduce the loss of rice crops. In the United States of America,
bats save three billion dollars every year by protecting corn and cotton crops.
In addition to being pollinators, bats’ droppings are effective fertilizers.
Poisoning their sources of food is a very bad idea.
More
than 80 percent of the leading 115 major crop species worldwide depend on or
partially benefit from floral visitation by animal pollinators. Pollination by animals
contribute to an estimated 35 percent of global total crop production.
Globally, the animal value of insect pollination of plants was estimated
to be around 190.5 billion U.S. dollars.
In addition to addressing the massive use of
pesticides and herbicides, we have to acknowledge and tackle the climate crisis.
Climate change will continue to increase the price of food. In 2023 extreme
weather events such as heat waves, droughts and floods were the main disruptors
of food prices, even though the mainstream media has failed to report this
critical issue consistently. These events caused widespread damage to crops and
livestock globally.
Rice, for example, cannot get efficiently
self-pollinated in hotter temperatures. Extreme heat degrades the grain quality
and reduces its yield.
Severe weather patterns degrade the quality of
our produce. Heat waves scorch fruits and vegetables. Furthermore, an excess
of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere affects the micronutrient content of produce.
The elevated levels of carbon dioxide led
to a decrease in the root uptake of nutrients by the plants according to
research. A decline in the content of minerals in the plants, such as
zinc, potassium, nitrogen, calcium, magnesium, phosphorus, iron and copper due
to high levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has been well documented.
Severe weather events are expensive reasons
for crop loss: for example, 118.7 billion dollars in 2021-2022 were lost in
crops value.
In the
year 2024, 500 billion dollars were lost in damages in the United States of America due to extreme weather events according to a report by AccuWeather. To understand how disaster events are on
the rise, it may be helpful to check the graph from this link of Yale Connections:
I have shared some of the delightful artworks
included in the book. The artist who created the masterpieces is Billy Renkl, Margaret’s
brother.
I will close this post with a quote by
Margaret Renkl, because it summarizes what she tries to communicate in The Comfort of Crows:
“I
rejoice in what is eternal, even as I force myself to face what is not, to let
my heart be broken again and again and again. The very least I owe my wild
neighbors is a willingness to witness their struggle, to compensate for their
losses in every way I can, and to speak on their behalf about all the ways I
can’t.”
Here’s a
video about the differences between toads and frogs and how you can protect
them:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IF0EWfbevrM
Feel free to share this blog post with your
friends. Let’s create ripples of hope and positive changes for the New Year.
Relevant
links:
https://xerces.org/press/new-report-finds-that-bumble-bees-have-undergone-dramatic-declines
https://yaleclimateconnections.org/2024/03/we-need-to-talk-about-food-prices/
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8803495/
If you
enjoyed this blog post, feel free to check my writing on the following books:
What a Bee Knows by Stephen Buchmann
Hurricane Lizards and Plastic Squid by Thor Hanson
Volcanic Adventures in Tonga by Ann Goth
Addendum: after consulting an expert in amphibians, I learned that my photo shows a Gray Treefrog. (I suspected it could be a kind of frog and I was correct).
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