Street Smart Naturalist

Visitors to the Ballard Locks this week have been treated to an unusual scene: three cranes in the bottom of the big lock. One had a reddish body and an extended arm, one had a blue arm and gray body, and the third was gray and white. The arms of the latter two were folded tightly into their bodies. None of the trio were moving, though all had wheels. Near to them were several large storage bins, a dumpster, two huge water tanks, and a forklift-like vehicle. Yes, it’s the annual cleaning and maintenance of the big lock. In 2016, while researching a book on the history of the Lake Washington Ship Canal and Hiram M. Chittenden Locks, I had the pleasure of descending into the empty lock chamber during the yearly cleansing. It was one of the cooler things I have had the privilege to do because of my writing.We began by descending 55 feet on stairs embraced by scaffolding. Those who know me, know that I am heights wimp, but I managed. I was overjoyed that I didn’t have to enter/exit the big chamber as workers did in the past. Back in the day they used a ladder built into the side of the locks, which as you can see in the photo is covered in barnacles. Plus, it is super rusty and rickety looking and no place for one like me. Down in the locks all was revealed. At the eastern end was the saltwater incursion prevention wall. One of early concerns of locks builders was that salt water, which is denser than freshwater, would flow as a bottom layer from Puget Sound and enter Salmon Bay during locks operation. Studies showed that this wasn’t a concern, until the 1960s, when increased boat traffic and lockages led to salt migrating into the freshwater bay. In response, the Army Corps of Engineers built (1966) an 18-foot-tall wall that can be raised or lowered to block the saltwater wedge. The wall remains upright unless a deep draft ship enters the locks. To move between the two lock chambers that comprise the big lock we followed the path of water: Culverts on either side of the locks. Measuring 14 feet tall by 8 feet wide in the large lock and 6 feet by 2 feet in the smaller one, these conduits facilitate the filling of the lock chambers; water enters at the upper, or Salmon Bay side of the culvert, and flows into the locks via drains on each side of the chamber. We had to be careful and not touch the walls, which were encrusted in barnacles. A main purpose of the annual cleaning is to remove these spiky invertebrates, which can shred juvenile salmon who often passport through the locks via the conduits. (The cleaning also provides an opportunity to pick up dropped cell phones, glasses, and other Oops-items. Workers have also found a six-foot long sturgeon; no one knows how long the big fish was trapped.)Standing at the base of the lock doors, or gates, reveals how big they are, especially considering how little of them you can see from above. The tallest doors—of the 18 total, twelve in the bigger and six in the smaller lock—are 55 feet high and weigh 480,000 pounds. All of the gates were made at the Penn Bridge Company of Beaver Falls, Pennsylvania, and were assembled on site.They are known as mitering gates, so called because the doors, or leaves, meet at an angle facing upstream and resemble a miter joint. (The design is based on the gates at the Panama Canal.) Each leaf is hollow and consists of a series of stacked layers of steel framing surrounded by a waterproof skin, also of steel. At the base, I can see the gates’ unusual pivot point, known as a pintle hinge. It consists of an upright metal hemisphere that fits into a bushing, or socket, on the bottom of the leaf. Because the doors aren’t anchored into the hinge, they are able to float, which seems pretty darned nifty, and logical. My favorite part of the locks was at the western end. Down at the base, a host of organisms had made the lock chamber their home. Crabs and fish twiddled in a few small pools. Barnacles and mussels hugged the walls, along with a crow or two seeking a meal. Two types of annelids worms—parchment and Serpulid—have also found a fine environment to live, along with several species of sea anemones and a sea cucumber. (On field trip in middle school, we had the opportunity to eat a sea cucumber; I did and wished I hadn’t. Oh well.) Seeing this riot of life was unexpected, mind opening, and beautiful; give an invertebrate an opening and someone will rush in (or whatever speed they move) and claim a foot-, toe-, or other-body-part-hold. As we got ready to ascend the scaffolding stairs at this end of the locks, I realized that rising above me on the other side of the lock gate was Puget Sound, which was at high tide, so the water rose most of the way up the gate. All that separated me from the sea was that century old door of steel. It was a sobering realization not only for my immediate fate but also for the locks themselves. Fortunately, the big gates continue to do their job successfully. The big lock will remain empty of water until November 20. If you have a chance to go see it, it’s worthwhile even if you cannot descend into the heart of the system.Still busy with events, south to north.November 12 – Island Books – Mercer Island – 6:00 PM – co-sponsored by Mercer Island Historical Society – In conversation with KUOW co-host Katy Sewall about In the Range of Fire and Ice. Event Link.November 17 – Browsers Books – Olympia, WA – 6:00 P.M. In conversation with Evergreen College ecologist Dylan Fischer for In the Range of Fire and Ice. Link to event.November 18 – Ridgecrest Books – 7:00 P.M. – I will be in conversation with my good friend and wonderful author David Laskin discussing In the Range of Fire and Ice. Link to event.November 19 – Port Townsend Library – 6:00 P.M. - In conversation with the Poet Laureate of Port Townsend Conner Bouchard-Roberts for In the Range of Fire and Ice. Link to the event.November 21 – Quimper Geological Society – Port Townsend – 4:00 PM – I will be discussing In the Range of Fire and Ice. Link to event. Get full access to Street Smart Naturalist: Explorations of the Urban Kind at streetsmartnaturalist.substack.com/subscribe

For too many years, too many people thought that the Native people of the Pacific Northwest didn’t venture into the mountains. This idea wasn’t just a trope of settlers and other newcomers, who often employed the concept as a means to justify making mining claims, harvesting trees, or taking land. So ingrained was this characterization of the Native people’s avoidance of the high country that historians, ethnologists, and archaeologists failed to even look to the mountains as landscapes valued and visited by the area’s long term residents. And, yet Indigenous people who lived in the vicinity of these mountains have incorporated their presence into their culture since time immemorial. Or as Rick McClure, a retired United States Forest Service (USFS) archaeologist, and Nathan Reynolds, formerly an ethnoecologist with the Cowlitz Indian Tribe, have written, stories centered on the Cascades run through people’s veins. In a scholarly article, they posit that stories help teach life lessons not only between people but also between people and the spiritual forces they share their home with.1 The volcanoes link past and present, myth time and daily life, landscape and spirituality. They are more than just physical features; they are members of the community, living entities that impact people’s lives. One way these relationships manifest themselves is in the many names by which the volcanoes are known. For example, a recent analysis by Puyallup Tribal language consultant Zalmai ʔəswəli Zahir, listed twenty different names for what is known as Mount Rainier, such as dəxʷwak’ʷ (Twana) and taqʷuʔman (Puyallup).2 The names of other volcanoes include kweq’ smánit (Nooksack) and kwelshán (Lummi) for Mount Baker; tda-ko-buh-ba (Sauk-Suiattle) for Glacier Peak; pátu (Cowlitz and Yakama) for Mount Adams; and lawetlat’la (Cowlitz and Yakama) for Mount St. Helens. On so many levels, it’s clear that the region’s long term residents have long visited and explored the Cascades.Ironically, it appears that non-Native people were the ones who weren’t visiting the Cascades. Or, they weren’t very good observers of the mountains, at least as illustrated by early maps. Consider the state’s five volcanoes. In 1792, when George Vancouver sailed into the Whulge, or what he called Puget Sound, he saw three of the five. He named them Mount Baker, Mount Rainier, and Mount St. Helens, which led to their subsequent placement on virtually every map to follow. Such was not the case with Glacier Peak or Mount Adams, which took decades for early explorers and cartographers apparently to notice and to place on their maps. The name Mount Adams wasn’t coined until 1839, when an energetic and enthusiastic promoter of Oregon, Hall Jackson Kelley, proposed that the Cascades should be known as the President’s Range. With their bold summits rising thousands of feet, the mountains are topped by “barren sides in the naked deformity of rock, lava, cinders, or whatever else might have come glowing…from the deep-caverned volcanic cauldrons below,” wrote Kelley in a Memoir he sent to the US Congress. Kelley gave little reasoning for his choice though it’s an obvious attention getter and one designed to appeal to politicians.Perhaps, in an attempt to make his names stand out and give them precedence over other names, Kelley substituted Adams for the long standing name of Mt. Hood in Oregon. Further illustrating the lack of geographic knowledge about Adams, other writers and travelers moved Adams north and applied it to Mount St. Helens, though only in written descriptions and not on maps. Not until 1853 does Adams begin to show up on a map (and most subsequent ones) and claim its place as the fourth volcano in the state. In particular, the Pacific Railroad survey—under the leadership of Isaac I. Stevens and with information provided by my pal George B. McClellan—produced one of the more detailed maps to include Adams. The map, however, put Adams 20 miles east of where it actually exists. Glacier Peak presented a far greater challenge to settlers, miners, and explorers, none of whom mention it in 19th century journals or notes. Either they didn’t see the great volcano or didn’t deem it worthy of mentioning. The name does not appear in print until 1880 when an unnamed reporter for the Columbia Twice-a-Week Chronicle (Dayton, WA) wrote on September 11 that a group of hunters and prospectors were heading up toward Glacier Peak. “This peak is comparatively unknown even to the people of the state in which it lies.” August 31, 1890, Fairhaven Herald The name would not appear again in the newspaper until 1889, followed again the next year. Published in the Fairhaven Herald on August 31, 1890, the story mentions a F. I. Dunham, who was seeking out a low pass for the Great Northern RR. Dunham didn’t reach the summit but did report on the peak’s volcanic origins, as illustrated by “ancient lava beds” he saw. The article further noted that Dunham and his partner Tompkins were assisted by a Native guide “who was familiar with all the places through which the Indians were in the habit of bringing their ponies.” Intriguingly, Glacier Peak, with the modifier Great, appeared on a map in 1874. How the mapmakers got that information and why the name didn’t spread is unknown: the name wouldn’t appear again on a map until 1892, in W.H. Pumphrey’s Map of Western Washington. One reason the new name may have begun to spread can be seen on Pumphrey’s map. Just below Glacier Peak is the Monte Cristo mining district, which in the early 1890s was entering its heyday as the most famous mining area in the state. The name Glacier Peak eventually became widespread but maps as late as 1904 were still omitting it and some cartographers grappled with the spelling, such as Glazier Peak.Mr. Dunham’s recognition of the volcanic origin of Glacier Peak is notable because geologists didn’t report that it was a volcano until 1900. Two reasons contributed to the lack of understanding: the first was that Glacier lacked the classic volcanic cones of Rainier, Adams, Baker, and St. Helens. Nor had it erupted in the time when non-Native people explored and lived in the region. Glacier did, though, erupt between 1700 and 1800 and produced pumice and ash, along with lahars but geologists didn’t find the evidence until the 1980s. “The mountains at present active are Baker, St. Helens and as it has recently been ascertained Mt. Hood and probably Mt. Rainier also, though to a degree hardly perceptible from below. The Indians on Puget Sound state that another smaller peak to the north of Mount Rainier once smoked.” Report of George Gibbs Upon the Geology of the Central Portion of Washington Territory May 1, 1854From myth time to modern time, volcanoes have been central to the residents of this region. The mountains have shaped landscape and culture. They have inspired us and they have scared us. Esteemed for their permanence yet also prone to self-destruction, Washington’s volcanoes are our state’s quintessential symbols, and with that comes a rich history of connection to their human… Get full access to Street Smart Naturalist: Explorations of the Urban Kind at streetsmartnaturalist.substack.com/subscribe

The summit of Darland Mountain is nothing special compared to other classic Cascades’ peaks. No crags, cliffs, or steep rocky parts, it’s flat and open and hard to distinguish the actual high point. You can reach it by hiking or cross country skiing but when I visited it, on a warm September day, I arrived in a truck, bouncing along a 4wd road that crossed over Darland. The road, at least, is unusual because it’s the second highest in the state, reaching to 6,981 feet.I first learned about Darland from its biggest fan, the late Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas. (He referred to it as Darling though no one knows why the name changed.) As a young man in the 1910s, Douglas hiked and camped throughout this part of the Cascades, east of Yakima, where he grew up. In his splendid memoir, Of Men and Mountains, he wrote of the summit of Darland: “This is without a doubt the most commanding view in the Cascades.” Heady words for such a low-key summit but as Douglas pointed out, to the east lay the golden brown valleys around Yakima; to the south, in Oregon, Mount Jefferson and Mount Hood; to the west, rose Mount Adams and Mount St. Helens, in Douglas’ day, a perfectly conical peak; and north of Adams, the jagged Goat Rocks and mighty Rainier. Growing on the slopes of Darland, wrote Douglas, were rich gardens of plants: lupine, penstemon, scarlet gilia, saxifrage, gentian, larkspur, mission bells, tiger lily, monkshood, arnica, Jacobs-ladder, St. Johns wort, wallflower, mallow, paintbrush, valerian, cinquefoil, and a “host of others.” On the summit, he found his favorite, the splendid avalanche lily; “it’s stimulus is the raw wind, cold thin earth, chill nights, and icy waters of the Cascades.”After reading Douglas’ book I had wanted to see the summit and had the opportunity when I tagged along with two researchers from Central Washington University, Dr. Ali Scoville and her student Jenna Chapman. They were here to study Clark’s Nutcrackers, a handsome gray bird with black wings and prominent bill. Well known to many visitors to the Cascades as camp robbers, the birds are smart, resourceful, and inquisitive, and central to one of the most enduring and important ecological relationships in the CascadesAs Douglas noted from his time on Darland, nutcrackers relish the nuts of the summit’s most distinctive tree, whitebark pine. The nutcrackers were “feverishly tearing the cones apart for the seed…work[ing] the tops of the trees.” The pines reminded him of “the wind-blown trees that the Knights of the Round Table, according to Tennyson, looked for among the crags.” I know not of what these fine, medieval gentlemen sought but think that whitebarks are one of the loveliest trees in the Cascades. They are also one of the most overlooked, losing out to the big trees below, which grab all the attention and far more of the visitors.But those who venture higher are rewarded in seeing what ecologists such as Ali call a keystone and a foundational species of the heights. By providing food, water, and nesting sites for other species, the impact of whitebark pines is essential to the community health of the ecosystem. Because of them, numerous plants and animals have been able to colonize and thrive, often after the ecosystem has been disturbed. Without whitebark pines, the high elevations of the Cascades, particularly east of the divide—as well as large swaths of the Rocky Mountains—would be far less diverse, and because this ecosystem crowns the mountains, the effects spread down mountain multiplying the importance of the trees.We first encountered whitebarks about 2,000 feet lower, as we ascended the Middle Fork Ahtanum Creek valley. I was immediately taken with the architecture of multiple arms, skirting up to form a broad crown, so unlike the surrounding subalpine firs and their classic arrowhead shape. The arms mimicked the base of many whitebarks, which consisted of several trunks sprouting next to each other, like what happens in a garden when you sew too many seeds together. In fact, this is what occurs with whitebark pines.Not only do Clark’s Nutcracker relish whitebark cones, but they are also the principal disperser of the trees’ nuts, or seeds, which is the key to the relationship between the species. After harvesting nuts, which they store in a pouch under their tongue, the birds fly (hundreds of yards up to 18 miles) from their source and bury, or plant, the seeds. They do so by excavating a shallow trench with a side-to-side bill sweep, depositing the nuts, and then covering the trench with pebble, twigs, and other debris. A typical cache contains one to five seeds. When the seeds germinate, they often do so en masse and generate several, close-growing, fused or contiguous trunks, again so different from the typical shape of most other Cascade trees.At the summit, the whitebark pine further stood out, primarily because a lightning strike-caused fire burned 4,000 acres on the top of Darland in August 2009. The trees’ multiple stems and many branches, crisp, bleached, and stark, created a forest of ghosts, beautiful yet ominous against the crystalline blue sky and backdrop of Mt. Adams. Unfortunately, wholesale deaths such as this might be the future for whitebark pines, in part because of fire but also because of disease, the outbreak of mountain pine beetles, and climate change. If whitebark populations continue to suffer, the effects will also spread to Clark’s nutcrackers, resulting in the complete rejiggering of this high-altitude ecosystem. “If we can understand why this change is occurring, then maybe we can do something about it,” says Ali.Ali’s words exemplify one of the central themes of my book In the Range of Fire and Ice: the importance of research and better understanding the life histories of the plants and animals of the Cascades and how this can lead to better management. This stands out most clearly with Mount St. Helens where the concepts of ecological succession—the process of plants and animals replacing another species over time, such as in a disturbed habitat—were completely rewritten. This in turn has had significant implications for land management around the globe, all due to what scientists learned at the volcano. Other areas in which more research is helping include management of fire (on both sides of the Cascades), carnivores, such as wolverines and wolves, and whitebark pines. Not only do many of these studies rely on new research but also on what is known as TEK, or Traditional Ecological Knowledge. This is knowledge obtained through observation and experience gleaned from living on and in place for generations. Such knowledge, practices, and beliefs may be held in stories, legends, myth, and place names, as well as simply being passed down from elders. Long disparaged by non-Native scientists, TEK is becoming more and more widely accepted by researchers, who have begun to realize the limitations of what is often described as Western science and to acknowledge that there is more than one way to learn about and from plants and animals.None of the new and shared knowledge guarantees either good management or long term stewardship but it does, at least, point in a better direction and a way to a better future for humans and the more-than-human world. I can only hope that such ideas continue to spread as more and more people continue to take a saner, long term, science-based approach to preserving, conserving, and managing the precious ecosystems that we call home. November 5, 2026 - Kingfisher Books - Coupeville, Whidbey Island - 5:30 PM - I will be discussing In the Range of Fire and Ice. RSVP for event. Get full access to Street Smart Naturalist: Explorations of the Urban Kind at streetsmartnaturalist.substack.com/subscribe

Marjorie and I had a lovely trip up into the Cascades this past weekend, the highlights of which were pikas, a mountain goat, and the Milky Way. We were backpacking just past the Kendall Katwalk—the famous ledge of rock blasted into a shear rock face in 1975—and spent the night near Ridge Lake., about eight miles from Snoqualmie Pass. PikaI don’t think we have heard or seen as many pikas on any recent hike as we did on this one. They seemed to be everywhere they were supposed to be, that is amid the fields of scree (which would be a great name for a rock band!). We saw many sprinting across their home landscape quickly and agilely as if they were on a flat level surface instead of one laced with pitfalls and boulders that dwarfed their fist-sized bodies. Below, I note the phenomenal all-terrain abilities of mountain goats, but pikas rival their larger alpine dwellers in their adroit movements across a challenging, uneven landscape and surely deserve more respect than they get. We also had the joy of being serenaded by pika eenks as we fell asleep, one of the most defining sounds of the higher mountain communities. Most were their typical single-call notes but occasionally one of them had what pikaologists describe as a “long call.” It consisted of call notes, either singular or a up to three, strung together for a few to 10 or 15 seconds. Males typically produce this sound whilst pursuing a mate though both sexes produce these long calls in autumn, often in territorial issues. No matter why my little pals were making such noises, they were a true pleasure to hear.Mountain GoatsAs we settled into our camp, I was looking at a steep cliff glowing in the sunset light when I noticed a brilliant white blob amidst the fall foliage. I suspected it was a mountain goat and confirmed it with my camera. Goatologists refer to topography such as this as escape terrain, which I like to think of as steep and fractured craggy cliffs where I would be unhappy, being the wimp that I am. (Depending on the study you read, escape terrain slope ranges from greater than 25° to up to 80°.) As the name implies, it’s the area where mountain goats go to get away from predators, and new research shows that having access to it may be essential in areas where predation risk is high.Short, stocky, and heavily muscled, mountain goats excel at moving through their rocky, cliff-studded landscape. They have a relatively light skull, at least compared to bighorn sheep, and narrow bodies, both of which aid in balance. When mountain goats climb not only do their legs aid in propelling them up, but they also use their massive neck muscles and a sort of “locked” humerus to help pull themselves up a cliff. But their greatest asset is the one with the most contact with the ground. Each of their four hooves has two, pointed toes made of hard keratin wrapped at the base in a pliant, coarse pad that extends beyond the keratin. This combination of pointed, hard, and textured acts like Velcro, providing traction on a variety of surfaces. In addition, mountain goats can spread their toes and grip uneven terrain, sort of like a wrench. It’s a bit of a stretch but mountain goats could be called a well-muscled mountain octopus equipped with eight clinging devices, a superb sense of balance, and low center of gravity. In his excellent book on mountain goats, Douglas Chadwick called them “possibly the best and most complete mountaineer that ever existed on any continent.”Milky WayOne of the advantages of an autumnal camping trip is an early sunset. Not only did the 6:20 disappearance of the sun mean darkness at a sane hour, as well as many hours of dark, it also meant getting up several times in the night, thus giving us several opportunities to revel in the Milky Way. Although not as bright and brilliant as we had seen it earlier in the summer in New Mexico, when the Milky Way was truly milky, this weekend’s hazy band of galaxies still thrilled us. When I see the Milky Way, I can’t help but feeling an atavistic, and jealous, reminder of our ancestor’s night skies, along with wonder and awe inspired by the countless particles of space, many with the potential for life such as on our planet. More than these deep senses though, seeing the Milky Way lets me know that I have reached a place of quiet darkness where I can experience the profound beauty of the cosmos. Doing so always makes Marjorie and me joyous and content.October 27 - Red Barn - Wenatchee River Institute - Leavenworth - I have the honor and joy to be in conversation with the wonderful writer Ana Maria Spagna. It should be fun and perhaps a bit funny. By the way, here’s a link to a little article in the Leavenworth newspaper about the book. Word of the Week - Kendall Katwalk - For several decades the Pacific Crest Trail lacked its namesake crest for the 50 miles between Snoqualmie Pass and Deception Pass. Then in 1975, legendary trail builder Elmo Warren and his team completed what is now known as the Kendall Katwalk, which Warren called “the hardest piece of trail ever built.” The route follows the proposed Cascade Crest Trail, which was planned in 1935 but never built, most likely due to money and safety issues. To build the walkway, Warren’s team used gas-driven Pionjar drills and dynamite to blast the 6-foot-wide trail into what was known as The Comb. They followed a route of red paint that had been dropped on the rock from a helicopter; the paint had been contained in beer bottles. According to one article, this 600 foot section cost $10,000 for foot to build,1 whereas another article stated the entire 51 mile section between Snoqualmie and Deception cost $800,000.2 I have not been able to determine who Kendall was though the peak name has existed since at least 1894, when it appears on a King County map. No one died or was injured during construction of the Katwalk though two people were injured, and one died blasting the sections to the north to Ridge Lake. Curiously, the name Kendall Katwalk does not start to appear in print until 1995. References:* Michael Egan, “The Kendall Katwalk," Columbia: The Magazine of the Northwest History, Winter 2005-06, pg. 38-42.* William Longwell, Jr., “North from Snoqualmie on the new Pacific Crest Trail,” The Mountaineer, 1977, published in July 1978, pg. 11-22. Get full access to Street Smart Naturalist: Explorations of the Urban Kind at streetsmartnaturalist.substack.com/subscribe

If you don’t mind, here’s a bit of a deviation from my normal writing. Readers often wonder about the writing life, and what authors do after a book is finished. I do a lot of promotion, as I care about getting the book into reader's hands. It would be nice to have help sometimes. Many writers must feel the same way, because there is an ongoing wave of scams seeking to capitalize on the innocent author who wants to meet with a book club or get some marketing help. Let me give you an insider's view of the smarmy messages I've been getting and my journey from feeling flattered to annoyed.Few things in life should make a writer happier than receiving an adulatory email from a book club with a 4.9-rated experience. Or so I think I am supposed to think. Recently such an email bearing this information arrived in my inbox. The author was Sneha, who not only merits just a single name but also organizes the Berlin International Book Club, notable for a membership that tops 1,079 people. Truly cosmopolitan, the club embarks on literary journeys from around the globe, guided, of course, by the “strong ripple effect of discovery and conversation” of “passionate readers.”Sneha had sought me out regarding my first book, A Naturalist’s Guide to Canyon Country (2000). A traditional field guide, the book has long gotten favorable reviews such as “all pages of the book have a slick feel and would probably handle outdoor use much better than most ordinary books.” As you might imagine, I had been rather thrilled to receive such high praise but now it seemed I had jumped to the big time, with interest from 4.9-rated-German bibliophiles.With piercing, multi-syllabic insight, Sneha was sure that my book would help readers address questions such as: “How does a deep geological and naturalist framework strip away the static, commercialized veneer of iconic desert landscapes to reveal a living, fragile repository of ancient time?” Nothing was more central to my mind when I wrote my book, and I certainly hoped that an answer to a question such as this would be within the grasp of the Berlin book gang.But I worried how such a discriminating group would react. Would they be concerned about the lack of narrative arc and dialogue or the descriptions of kinky sex rituals, such as female black widow spiders eating their post-coital mate?Alas, the note from Sneha was a scam. If I had accepted her offer of sharing the wonders of my writing, all I’d have to do was cough up a nominal fee and A Naturalist’s Guide to Canyon Country would be on its way to fame and unimaginable sales. Suffice it to say, reader, I did not respond to Sneha.In the months since she wrote, I have received dozens of similar solicitations, becoming more frequent with the recent publication of my newest book. Every one of the email writers flatters me and my prose and offers trenchant, sesquipedalian analysis focused directly on the book’s subject matter. With their repetitious paraphrasing of passages from the book, droll content analysis, and attention to useless details, it is clear that all were written by AI, though none of them had the grace to mention the quality of the paper in the bookInitially, the emails were like Sneha’s, noting a book club’s interest in my “brilliant book.” Next came marketers, who let me know they had unique ideas that would propel my book to the upper ranks of Amazon, followed by agents, who would jump start my career to new, unimaginable levels. Recently, the newest scammers feel that my book would be great topic for their podcast, radio, or TV show. What makes the b******t AI worse is that many of the emailers are masquerading as legitimate people who actually do have real shows. For example, one claimed to be Katie Campbell of KUOW, here in Seattle. Katie has heard from more than 40 people who received “her” invite, one of whom shelled out $250 before realizing the scam.As a regional writer with a limited audience, I am surprised at how many of these solicitations I am getting. Do they really think I have the money to pony up for their services? Afterall, I am the type of writer who has gotten royalty statements with $1.52 in earnings, and that’s based on a year of sales! (I think my mom bought that one book.)I may be trying to make light of these solicitations, but they are becoming a huge problem for authors, agents, publishers, and the real people who are being impersonated. As I told the real Katie Campbell when I spoke to her: “ For those of us, like yourself and me, who worked really hard to create something that we're really proud of, and to have it sort of thrown back at you with that purely syrupy, saccharine, sycophantic s**t is not really good.” In fact, these scams are horrible and offensive and yet another pernicious influence of AI. Have these people no shame?October 27 - 7:00 PM - I’ll be back out on the road headed east to Leavenworth at the Wenatchee River Institute’s Red Barn. I will be in conversation with author and naturalist Ana Maria Spagna. Hope to see you there. RSVP link. Get full access to Street Smart Naturalist: Explorations of the Urban Kind at streetsmartnaturalist.substack.com/subscribe

Canada Geese graced my morning run the other day. A flight of the big honkers was skimming the sky, heeding the call of the seasons and traveling south. As usually happens, the birds’ conversations of honks and cackles initially attracted my attention. Looking up I saw about 20 birds in their classic V-formation, black and gray wings flapping with distinct whooshes of air. Their majestic arrows of flight are one of my favorite natural features of autumn and an eloquent reminder that cool weather is coming. (I cannot resist a bad attempt at humor. Q: Why is one side of the V longer than the other? A: There are more birds in it. Remember, I said it wasn’t good.) As ornithologist Arthur Cleveland Bent wrote of Canada Geese in Life Histories of North American Wild Fowl. “What man is so busy that he will not pause and look upward at the serried ranks of our grandest waterfowl, as their well-known honking notes announce their coming and their going, he knows not whence or whither?” Mr. Bent is correct. Tis indeed sad that so many men and women are, in fact, too busy or unaware to notice these spectacular birds as they herald the seasonal change.Hearing the chatter above, I often wonder what the geese are discussing. I assume that they are conversing about the weather, where’s a good place to stop and poop and eat, and which route they should take. Occasionally just one goose is speaking, perhaps a storyteller sharing a tale with her or his cohorts. But I base these ideas on my naive human-centric focus and there’s just as likely a chance that geese hold more complicated discussions. They could be addressing the complex physics of upwash and vortices and how the additional lift and reduced drag created by the V-formation benefits the birds’ ability to fly; or maybe commenting on the curious land-based creatures below. More likely is that the birds are less concerned about where they are headed and how to get there and are more focused on not being killed by a predator and are simply alerting others to potential issues.I also had the pleasure this weekend of seeing another flock of birds flying in formation. Marjorie and I were on top of Mount Defiance, about 40 miles east of Seattle above Interstate 90. Looking across the serrated ridges of peaks, we noticed shards of white light moving against the forested green hillsides. At first, we couldn’t figure out what was going on but then realized we were seeing dozens upon dozens of birds, their white wings and bodies reflecting the sunlight.With my binoculars, I discerned a couple hundred individuals, constantly shifting dabs of white swirling from group to group. They seemed to be seeking optimal wind though just as likely their movements could have reflected their shear pleasure of flight. Periodically, the birds vanished, as if they had entered a hole in the sky, but it was more simple; the groups were turning just enough to prevent the light from reflecting off of the birds’ white feathers and their dark silhouettes blended with the dark forest behind them.Later in the day, after hiking down from the summit, we were sitting at a lake when I heard light conks and honks above us: a V of birds was passing overhead. Now, I could confirm what we suspected atop Mount Defiance. We were seeing migrating Snow Geese, clearly indicated by their black wing tips. I don’t know if they were headed south or merely circling around and possibly headed to the Skagit River valley, where tens of thousands annually overwinter. (I have seen Snow Geese many times up there but never had seen them soaring in such a lovely setting as from Mount Defiance.) No matter where they were headed, their flight was one of the more ethereal views I have seen in the Cascades.By the way, geese are somewhat unusual, or perhaps it is we humans who are odd, in that a group of geese on the ground and a group of geese in the air are labeled differently. Those in the air are known as a flock or skein, whereas walking geese are a gaggle. Skein comes from a French term referencing yarn or thread, certainly a fine description of the strung out lines of flying geese. Not surprisingly, gaggle derives from the sounds that geese make; it has been applied to the birds since the 1400s.Geese also have merited another lexicological curiosity. We have bestowed upon the males of the species the term gander, an appellation of Old English origin from the Germanic. But we have not done the same with the females. By the way, a locally famous birder told me that ganders are also known as dudes, but I think that just may be her secret language of birds. Still, I thought some of you might like to know how some ornithologists see the world.For some not clearly defined reason, people have long had less-than-favorable opinions of geese. Consider Samuel Johnson’s A Dictionary of the English Language (1755) and his definition of a goose: “A large waterfowl proverbially noted, I know not why, for foolishness.” We also have the phrase “a silly goose.” Even less kind is how many modern people see the birds, as a no good problem whose main attribute is pooping on grass, often in our carefully tended yards and parks. I have been annoyed by and have stepped in my fair share of goose poop, but I forgive the birds their digestive attributes. After all they are simply exploiting a resource that we have created and doing what comes naturally to them. Plus, whenever I see Canada Geese flying overhead, I cannot help but rejoice in their beauty and grace and celebrate the wildness they represent.October 14 - Third Place Books, Lake Forest Park, 7PM - Last minute. I have the honor of interviewing Lyanda Lynn Haupt and artist Justin Gibbens about their new book, Among the Birds: Field Notes from Cascadia. To register, click here. Get full access to Street Smart Naturalist: Explorations of the Urban Kind at streetsmartnaturalist.substack.com/subscribe

Originally posted in October 2021 and still relevant as this seems to be a good mast year.Over the past few weeks, I have been enjoying the acorns along Ravenna Boulevard, near our neighborhood. I first noticed them crunching under my tires as I rode along the road. Up to an inch long, the acorns were also abundant on the grass under the trees. Most lacked their handsome, little beret-like cupule but were still quite wonderful to behold and gather; I often see people harvesting acorns along the boulevard. Loaded with carbohydrates, proteins, and fat, acorns are a splendid food source for people as well as for animals, ranging from mice to black bears. In Lynda Mapes’ wonderful Witness Tree, she writes that the scientific name for oaks Quercus could be derived from the Greek “choiros,” or pig, an animal well-known for relishing acorns.Taking their relationship further, some animals convert the acorn’s hard shell into home. When I lived in Boston, one of my favorite “discoveries” was a colony of wee pismires inhabiting an acorn. Unlike many ants, which build their own nest, this species (Leptothorax longispinosus) is an opportunist moving into a prefab-site such as an acorn, rolled-up leaf, or grass stem. In an acorn, the ants usually are the second shell-exploiters, coming after beetle larvae or millipedes that had bored a hole through the shell and eaten the energy-rich acorn meat. After their fellow acornophiles exit, ants move in, clean out the debris (usually frass), and create a little condo of their own.Sadly, I don’t know of any acorn-dwelling ants in Washington, most likely because the state has only one native oak, the Garry, or Oregon, white oak. David Douglas bestowed the scientific name, Quercus garryana, to honor Nicholas Garry, secretary and later deputy governor of the Hudson Bay Company. More common south of Tacoma, particularly on the prairies around Nisqually and Ft. Lewis, Garry white oaks prefer sunny, open, well-drained sites. In Seattle one can find large Garry white oaks at Seward Park, Oak Manor, and Martha Washington Park. (Two street names, Oaklawn Place and Oakhurst Street (hurst is an ancient word meaning grove of trees), indicate that oaks were common or unusual enough to merit street name recognition near Seward Park.)Edward Curtis wrote in The North American Indians that Indigenous people from around Puget Sound would canoe down to the Nisqually plains and collect hundreds of bushels of acorns, which they roasted, ate raw, and used for bread making. Harvesting these delicacies involved active management of the land. Using fire, the Native people killed Douglas fir seedlings, which grow faster, eventually shade out oaks, and can take over an oak prairie, if not prevented so by fire, a process now occurring around Ft. Lewis and on the Mima Mounds, south of Olympia.Piqued by seeing the acorns along Ravenna, I have continued to seek out oaks and acorns around Seattle; they are everywhere. It’s not clear why the Ravenna oaks (which appear to be English oaks) are having a mast year. Masting, or mast seeding, is a synchronized production of seeds, often by an entire population of a single species. Scientists don’t fully understand why or how trees accomplish these coordinated boom and bust cycles but know that it is irregular and has a dramatic impact on a biotic community.Whatever triggered this year’s masting seems to have affected many of the city’s oak species as I have found many other locations with acorns. They come from one of the more than 44 oak species and cultivars in Seattle. (Worldwide there are more than 500 oak species; many are notorious for their promiscuous interbreeding, but I won’t dwell on such naughty, or evolutionarily adaptive, trees.) One notable location with acorn bearing oaks is near what used to be Oak Hill School, in northeast Seattle, which was built near Oak Lake, named for the Garry white oaks that formerly grew there. As Lynda writes in her book, oaks have long been intertwined with people. The Druids worshipped and whooped under oaks; the Vikings sacked and terrified in their ships of oak; and King Arthur and his pals discussed the great ideas of the day around their circular table of oak. And, of course, all species of oak are beautiful and inspiring, especially in fall as their leaves turn russet and red. The PNW is justifiably famous for our conifers, but we also have lovely deciduous trees, many, such as oak, which are just beginning to showcase their fall colors. Such trees are one advantage of living in a city with its diverse population of trees from around the world.I wanted to add that I have discovered another fine aspect of our local oak. The local distillery, Westland Distillery, makes a wonderful whiskey, which they age in Quercus garryana casks. I have had the good fortune to try this whiskey and it’s quite splendid. Next week is a bit nutty with talks. Don’t be shy about sharing this information with everyone you know! Thanks,October 4 – Cascade Forest Conservancy – Portland, Oregon – 4:00 to 7:00 PM – I have the honor to discuss In the Range of Fire and Ice at the Forest Fest benefit for the Cascade Forest Conservancy. To register.October 7 - Darvill’s Books - Orcas Island Public Library — 6:00 PM – In conversation with Amy Frost, former Executive Director of the Lopez Island Historical Society, for In the Range of Fire and Ice.October 8, 2026 – Village Books – Bellingham – 6:00 PM – In conversation with the co-founder of the North Cascades Institute Saul Weisberg for In the Range of Fire and Ice. RSVP for event. Get full access to Street Smart Naturalist: Explorations of the Urban Kind at streetsmartnaturalist.substack.com/subscribe

Alas for coyotes, they face one serious issue in Seattle; no roadrunners grace the wilds of my fair city. But perhaps this may be a saving grace. Instead of focusing their formidable skills on the pursuit of the legendary avian speedster, God’s dog, as some call coyotes, can concentrate on more attainable prey. A recently published study, based on 687 coyote scats collected from Seattle parks, found that coyotes rarely caught birds, roadrunner or otherwise, and instead focus on fruit and small critters.Samantha Kreling, lead author of the study in the September 2026 issue of People and Nature, and her colleagues discovered that the most frequently eaten items in a Seattle coyote’s diet were apples, plums, and cherries; rabbits (non-native Eastern cottontails, here due to our propensity to let our former pets out in the city); chickens (from chicken found in garbage and not backyard chickens); cats (though the latter is likely overestimated by the methods used as the same cat will often be detected multiple times); mice; and rats. The key, noted Sam, was that coyotes exploited our habits. “If trash is unsecured, compost is open, and picnic sites (or the like) are not cleaned up urban wildlife including coyotes will capitalize on them,” she said. In total, coyotes ate food from 65 families (24 plant, 41 vertebrate).As Sam told me, coyotes are incredibly opportunistic. If an easy meal becomes available, they will take it. For example, illegal dumping and poorly covered trash lead to coyotes taking pest rodents and human-generated food such as chicken, pig, and cow, whereas population density (people not coyotes) results in greater consumption of garden fruits, as well as rodents. The study further found that greener areas (with more tree canopy cover) support less diverse, non-anthropogenic diets and that in areas of lower household income and less tree canopy, coyotes eat more berries, particularly Himalayan blackberry.Not that we will be able to control what a wily animal like a coyote eats but we can at least be better neighbors, as well as more tolerant. Coyotes probably help to control rodent populations, particularly in areas rife with illegal dumping and poorly covered trash. They also help spread seeds of native plants and reduce those often-despised, vegetable-garden pests: rabbits. Nor are coyotes marauding carnivores, only eating our precious cats and dogs; they may pick off the occasional pet but rarely ones on leash or in fenced yards. Sam was also involved in another study of coyotes in Seattle. Using scat again, she and her colleagues compared coyote populations in rural and urban settings. Amazingly, Seattle hosts a population density nine times greater than found in wilder and rural settings. Estimated density in Seattle was .98/square mile or around 83 coyotes within city limits. “That might surprise people who think of coyotes as afraid of humans, but I think it just shows how ideal the urban setting is for coyotes,” said Laura Prugh, lead author of the study in Environmental Research: Ecology. Of particular interest is what affects coyote numbers and what doesn’t affect them. Researchers had hypothesized that the luxury effect—with wealthier neighborhoods having more tree cover and biodiversity—might lead to greater coyote density, but this was not the case. Conversely, impervious surfaces and pollution, which tend to lead to more dead coyotes, didn’t reduce the density. Human population density was the only factor that significantly influenced coyote density. More people equals fewer coyotes so why are there more coyotes in Seattle than in rural and wilder parts of the state?Urban coyotes benefit in several ways, in particular, the absence of two primary means of death. A coyote may have a greater chance of being killed by a vehicle in Seattle than in a rural counterpart, but that same coyote isn’t going to be shot or caught. Our species has long been instrumental in controlling, or at least attempting to control, coyote populations via hunting and trapping. A review study of 31 studies estimated that an urban coyote had a 41% greater annual survival compared to one in rural or natural areas; humans caused 77% of deaths across all studies. Food, either finding it or not being it, also contributes to the success of urban coyotes. Sam’s study showed that the cityscape led to dietary diversity twice as high compared to wilder locations. Plus, the absence of predators such as wolves and mountain lions, meant that coyotes were rarely eaten by anyone. Without these big competitors, coyotes are in essence the top dog and more able to exploit a wide variety of food resources. One part of the coyote story that the UW scientists do not know is the long term population dynamics. With just a single year, single season estimate, researchers cannot generalize if the number of coyotes in Seattle is growing or stabilized. Also uncertain is if their numbers trend with bunny abundance, as happens in many natural areas. Sam told me that it’s hard to predict what will happen here. Coyotes are relatively newcomers (arrival unknown but perhaps in the 1920s/30s); tend to have larger litters in cities; and have plenty of food and few means of death, so their population has the potential to continue to grow, but that is speculation and could change with changing conditions. She also stressed that Seattle has lot fewer coyotes than other urban environments. The reason is tolerance, or intolerance. We human residents are generally receptive to coyotes but not when a coyote acts in a manner we do not like, such as bothering our pets and eating garbage. We are incredibly fortunate that coyotes grace Seattle—even without access to Acme products or roadrunners—but if we want to keep it that way, we may want to become a bit more proactive in how we manage our pets and our garbage, as well as be more tolerant of such wildness in our midst. Saturday, September 26 - 11:30 AM - Eagle Harbor Congregational Church - I am excited to be part of the Bainbridge Island Book Festival. I will be sharing the stage with the eminent guidebook author Craig Romano. We’ll be interviewed by author and carnivore biologist Paula MacKay. October 4 – Cascade Forest Conservancy – Portland, Oregon – 4:00 to 7:00 PM – I have the honor to discuss In the Range of Fire and Ice at the Forest Fest benefit for the Cascade Forest Conservancy. To register. October 7 - Darvill’s Books - Orcas Island Public Library — 6:00 PM – In conversation with Amy Frost, former Executive Director of the Lopez Island Historical Society, for In the Range of Fire and Ice.October 8, 2026 – Village Books – Bellingham – 6:00 PM – In conversation with the co-founder of the North Cascades Institute Saul Weisberg for In the Range of Fire and Ice. RSVP for event. Get full access to Street Smart Naturalist: Explorations of the Urban Kind at streetsmartnaturalist.substack.com/subscribe

Marjorie reminded me that I hadn’t written about poop in a while. Sadly, that is correct, so I thought I’d remedy the situation. Her comment came when we were walking along an ocean beach and observed a small outcrop of rock covered in generations of deposits by the residents. In this case, the producers were primarily Brown Pelicans and Brandt’s Cormorants though I suspect that various species of gulls and perhaps a crow or two also contributed to the whitewashing of the islet.I have seen and smelled (particularly below the visitor center at Cape Disappointment where the aroma of fishy poop is quite spectacular), similar guanoified rocks on many, if not, most coasts I have visited. Sometimes the splatters cover rocks such as I saw—merely a simple pimple of land—but at other times, the poop covers islands big enough to merit a name. Perhaps the most common, officially recognized moniker for these seabird-poop-covered locations is Bird Island. The name can refer to the nesters and/or to their coprogenic products, but I have come across other modifiers, or middle names if you will, between the first name and surname. I am sure that you can imagine the terminology and will not belabor the point. By the way, cairns are another location preferred by birds as landing and depositing points. Birds may rest, preen themselves, stand and scan the terrain, or dine. When birds consistently perch on a cairn, their depositional habits can also have a quite cheery effect on the landscape. Droppings add nutrients that several species of ornithocoprophilous, or bird-dung loving, lichen exploit. The elegant sunburst lichen (Xanthoria elegans), a name derived from their resplendent yellow and orange coloring, is often encountered on cairns at higher elevations and higher latitudes. When you see this sunny patch of color on a cairn, you can feel confident that some bird, or some mammal, such as a marmot or pika, spent some quality time high above his or her surroundings.I have not read of ornithocoprophilous lichens exploiting bird poop on oceanic rocks but do know of another species that relishes said guano. That species is Homo sapiens, and we have sought out these deposits for thousands of years. Like lichens, we wanted the nutrients, in particular nitrogen to use as a fertilizer. In contrast to humans, who produce water-soluble urea that we pee out to eliminate excess nitrogen, birds produce uric acid, which is insoluble and mixed with feces to generate the white paste found on the rocks I saw.Few groups of birds are better at creating Bird Islands than cormorants and pelicans. Both birds, of which there are quite a few species, are colonial, gregarious, and piscivorous, a trifecta of attributes that results in them nesting and resting together, sometimes in great quantities, and often generation after generation. As a result, they have created guano sites long utilized by people. Not surprisingly, our species’ penchant for poop has had significant negative consequences, ecologically and politically. In 2024, Mauricio Betancourt, an environmental sociologist, published a paper titled “Guano and the Rise of the American Empire.” His aim was to “expand on ecological imperialism theory by showing the centrality of guano for the origin and development of the U.S. empire.” Right now, we are in a rising tide of crap, so it seems fitting to discuss the connections between s**t and the United States. Dr. Betancourt’s focus is the guano on Peru’s Chincha Islands. Some of the best and largest in the world, the islands’ deposits totaled 15 million tons, about as much feces as modern residents of New York city would produce in 37 years. Beginning in 1845, the US started to exploit the poop. Over the next decade “guano mania,” and guano, spread across the country, particularly in states planting tobacco and cotton. In that ten year period, the US imported twice as much guano as coffee and five times more than tea.So valuable was the white gold that President Franklin Pierce signed the Guano Islands Act in August 1856. The GIA eventually led to the US claiming about 70 islands, mostly in the Pacific Ocean. Still on the books, the law states that “if a U.S. citizen finds guano on a territory not within the jurisdiction of another nation and claims it, it may be considered U.S. soil.” As the demand for guano heated up, it led to warfare, labor exploitation, and abuse of power. (I know, gentle reader, that you are shocked by this.) Extraction also destroyed habitat for birds, prevented uncountable numbers of birds from nesting, removed an important nesting material, and led to the “wanton killing” of birds. Similar to birds, our species eventually figured out a way to produce tidy packets of nitrogen and we no longer rely on guano. Unfortunately, we now produce so much excess nitrogen that it is causing new environmental problems. But back to the poop. Now that we no longer value the white gold, these guano islands are the domains of birds, who can live their lives and defecate in peace, and naturalists and birders, who can admire the birds. Long may they poop.Word of the week - Guano - Originally from Quecha huanu, which referred to any form of manure used as agricultural fertilizer. Guano first appeared in English in The Naturall and Morall Historie of the East and West Indies (1604), by Joseph Acosta, Translated by E.G. He wrote in reference to islands off of Peru: “And this dung is so commodious and profitable as it makes the earth yeelde great aboundance of fruite. They cal this dung Guano….”There are still tickets left for my talk tonight in Edmonds. I will be in conversation with journalist Teresa Wippel at 6:30 PM at the Edmonds Waterfront Center. Get full access to Street Smart Naturalist: Explorations of the Urban Kind at streetsmartnaturalist.substack.com/subscribe

In June 1982, ecologists Charlie Crisafulli and Jim McMahon were surveying the Pumice Plain at Mount St. Helens. Traveling by helicopter, they were seeking out life on the area most devastated by the 1980 eruption. Not surprisingly little stirred in the moonscape, but then they landed and came across a dab of purple and green, as if paint splotches had splattered across an endless field of grey. The stunning and surprising color was a flowering lupine, the first plant they’d seen for miles. Surrounded by a ring of seedlings, the plant had to be at least a year old, in order to produce the seedlings.Crisafulli, who eventually spent four decades studying the ecological recovery at the volcano, established a 200-square-yard study plot around that pioneering plant. Within four years, he counted 16,000 lupines in the plot; three years later, 35,000. “People sometimes ask me how I can go back and study the exact same place year after year,” he says. “I always tell them it’s never the same.”How had life found a way back? The deep ash and pumice held few nutrients, but lupines, like other plants in the pea family, have a special trick up their branches, or in this case, actually down their roots. Lupines have the ability to fix, or convert, inert atmospheric nitrogen into a usable form, which allows the species to thrive in environments inhospitable to most other plants. Technically, lupines don’t actually fix the nitrogen; they outsource that skill to bacteria, which do their good deed in nodules on the plant’s roots. Once the lupines enriched the soil with nitrogen, adding organic material to it when they died, other plants and then animals soon followed. Within a decade of the eruption, Crisafulli had documented more than 27 plant species in the study plot. A large patch of strawberries sprang up just outside it, probably from a single seed deposited in bird or mammal feces. Crisafulli eventually trapped a variety of small mammals on the Pumice Plain, including ground squirrels, mice, and shrews. Each has sped up the area’s recovery by caching seeds, burrowing through soil, and luring predators such as raptors and weasels.Lupines are one of the great stories of Mount St. Helens but that is not the only place they thrive. I have seen them throughout the Cascades and Olympics, on beaches, in the desert, in the tundra, and in cities. I cannot think of a habitat where I haven’t seen them and would argue that they are one of the more ubiquitous plants out there. Thankfully, as they are lovely. Lupines are primarily in the blue shades but also tint over to magentas and purplish with a few species dialing over to yellows. They range in size from low in stature to ones that top out at four to five feet tall.I am enchanted by the flowers, especially when they blue a hillside, as you’ll see is something that appealed to Mr. Henry David Thoreau, but what I like most are the leaves. With their palmate leaves (with 5 to 12 leaflets), they are particularly easy to distinguish. The structure, like our own palms, is perfect for catching water and I am always pleased to see how the leaves form a cup of a single droplet of water. The little aqueous orbs seem to be almost otherworldly in their ability to harvest light, as if the droplet is glowing from within.By the way, lupine originates in ancient Rome. Only a handful of lupine species (around a dozen) grow in the Old World, whereas more than 250 occur in North and South America. According to the great 19th century botanist Asa Gray, the scientific name (all species are Lupinus sp.) derives from the Latin term for wolf, because lupines “were thought to devour the fertility of the soil.” His contemporary Henry David Thoreau found this preposterous and wrote “this is scurrilous,” in June 1852. He was correct, considering lupines perform the exact opposite behavior by feeding the soil with nitrogen.Like many, Mr. Thoreau was quite smitten with the flowers. “It paints a whole hill-side with its blue, making such a field (if not meadow) as Proserpine might have wandered in. Its leaf was made to be covered with dew-drops. I am quite excited by this prospect of blue flowers in clumps, with narrow intervals, such a profusion of the heavenly, the Elysian color, as if these were the Elysian Fields. . . . That is the value of the lupine. The earth is blued with it.” What else needs to be said? Nice work Henry.Wow, thanks to all subscribers who came out to my book launch at Third Place Books last week. I was humbled and honored that there were 450 people who registered for the talk! About 350 showed up and bought 120 copies. Golly ned.If you missed the launch, I have two more talks this upcoming week.Sept. 16 - Burke Museum – 6:30 PM – In conversation with the great book reviewer Mary Ann Gwinn for In the Range of Fire and Ice. RSVP for event.Sept. 17 – Edmonds Bookshop – Edmonds Waterfront Event Center – 6:30 PM – In conversation with Teresa Wippel of myedmondsnews.com for In the Range of Fire and Ice. RSVP for event.I also had the pleasure to be on New Day NW on King 5 for a little chat about In the Range of Fire and Ice. Here’s a link. Get full access to Street Smart Naturalist: Explorations of the Urban Kind at streetsmartnaturalist.substack.com/subscribe