Nature Connection: Let’s Not Turn Back The Clock On Conservation

 It’s almost time to turn back our clocks. This means we will lose some light in the afternoon, something many don’t enjoy. Although there have been almost yearly attempts to change this yearly task, the clocks still get turned back. For most of us this is a bit of an inconvenience, but we adjust quickly and life goes on. 

Soon we have an opportunity to vote, to consider whether we want to turn back the clocks on rights that took decades, even centuries, to achieve, or to push forward into a better time for all. This is no small matter, and hopefully people are being thoughtful and inclusive in their choices.

Earlier this week I watched a young osprey desperately trying to figure out its next move. It had spent hours on top of a post in a beach parking lot calling plaintively, occasionally lifting into the air to circle out over the water before returning to its perch. It was the last osprey in the area, and every day I hoped it would realize it needed to fly south, but I also worried about whether or not it was feeding itself adequately.

I remember when seeing an osprey was a dream, not a reality. Back in the late 1960s and early ‘70s ospreys, bald eagles, and peregrine falcons were all suffering from the buildup of DDT, a pesticide, in their systems. Meant to kill bugs eating crops, DDT had made its way through the food chain and was causing the eggshells of these birds to collapse in the nest. This meant that reproduction had basically come to a halt and the extinction of these magnificent birds of prey seemed imminent. As a young person who loved nature, I was sure I’d never see any of those birds.

Scientists had issued alarms before, but it wasn’t until Rachel Carson wrote “Silent Spring” that the American public became aware of the dangers of these poisons in the environment. Like it or not, we are also part of the food chain affected by toxins such as DDT, something manufacturers of these toxins like to ignore or cover up. 

Laws were passed to protect the environment, and birds like the ospreys, eagles, and peregrine falcons recovered enough that today we have all three species nesting on Cape Cod, something many of us never thought we’d see.

The environmental laws passed back in the late 1900s are under constant and imminent attack by those that wish to encourage more fossil fuel mining and get rid of pesky regulations. Pollution laws that helped clean up air and water are threatened as are those that protect our food sources. Many voters alive today don’t remember how bad the pollution was, and those of us who were alive hopefully don’t want to turn back time to once again experience that. These are not imaginary threats, and one candidate has promised to turn back these laws as soon as possible.

Several days after I saw the young osprey I returned to the area and the bird was nowhere to be seen or heard. I searched the area that day and the next and still no sign of it, so I hope it was able to launch into its migration and that it has a successful trip south. 

On my way home from the last foray I saw an immature bald eagle overhead and smiled. When I was a young woman just starting out, I would have thought it impossible to see such a thing here, and yet this young bird was probably born not far from where I saw it as there has been a successful nest there.

Next week we have a choice, to move forward and protect our health and the health of our place and our planet or to join in the degradation and destruction of it in the name of greed. If you care about this, please vote accordingly. If you don’t see the sense in this, there’s not much I can say that is polite.

We need sanity more than ever right now. The world is erupting with craziness everywhere we turn. There’s a lot we take for granted here on Cape Cod. We feel safe, but safety is a tentative, fragile thing. Ask the people of Asheville, the people in the ways of wildfires, floods, war, and total disruption. Safety is not guaranteed.

We have a choice to make, a big one. I hope with all my heart that you will join me and vote for the environment. Without a safe and healthy environment, we have nothing, no economy, no safety, nothing we have come to think of as normal. It’s that simple.

It was a week full of fall color, birds on wires, cranberries everywhere, and lots of costumes and decorations in spite of all the dire and depressing news from around the world. 

A walk along an isolated dune area turned up the usual horned larks, newly arrived snow buntings, and an immature northern harrier soaring over the dunes. We must remember that these things are not promised to us, that they are living, breathing parts of our home landscape. It is up to us whether we honor and preserve them or offer them up as chattel in exchange for satisfying greed.

Vote wisely, my friends. The future depends on it.