ECOVIEW
No. 6
Green Things and Things that Move
Not your usual
neighborhood
art show!!
Carl Lahser
ECOVIEW
No. 6
Green Things and Things that Move
Not your usual
neighborhood
art show!!
Carl Lahser
Copyright © 1996 by Carl Lahser. All rights reserved. If you must copy any part of this work please give the author appropriate credit.
Published by: Pretense Press
6102 Royal Breeze
San Antonio, TX 78239
Other books by the author:
San Antonio Wildflowers by the Month
Hong Kong 1979
Panama Cruise
Snapshots of the North
Teacher, Leaves Don’t Change Color
Forty Years of Fishing
Cryptic Romance
Weather watching
Chasing the Enterprise
Searching for the Phantom Crown
Cross-section through a Rainbow
Flowers of the Air
Backdoor to the Yukon
Ecoview 1 - Not Your Usual Neighborhood
Ecoview 2 - Texas
Ecoview 3 - D.C.
Ecoview 4 - St Louis to Minneapolis
Ecoview 5 - Southwest
Ecoview 6 - Green Things
Summers End
Hey Momma, When we Goin Again
Bigfooting Around
Under the Southern Cross (Under Clouds)
Alamo Road
Texas to Alaska
Mr. Cuul in Yucatan
Thinking of Flying
Do Bears do it in the Woods
Traffic Games
Tyndall Beach
All titles are available from Pretense Press. Booksellers
are encouraged to write for seller’s information.
Printed in USA.
Table of Contents
Fossils
Fossil Mind 1
Invertebrates
Mosquitoes in my Motel Room 2
Heliconian Night 3
Urban Lighning Bug 4
Termite Swarm 4
Banana Slug 4
Army Ants 5
‘96 Monarch Kill 5
Crown of Thorns I 6
Crown of Thorns II 6
Deer Flies, Daughters of Mars 7
Birds
Shrikes Courting 8
The Cozumel Banaquit 9
The Tropicbird and the Moon 9
Washington Doves 1 10
Peregrine Falcon in Canyon of Glass 10
Five Egrets 11
Betherda Spring 11
Crows on Whiteflint Hill 12
Lucky Worm 13
Milwaukee Hotel Swimming Pool 13
Forgiven or Forgotten 14
Downtown Geese 15
Animals
Moose Passing 16
Sealion Pup 17
Roosevelt Elk 17
Mt. St Helens Bulls 17
Do Bears do it in the Woods? 18
Plants
Lawns and Biodiversity 19
Fall Colors 20
Maple Leaf in November 21
Sidewalk Images 21
Smoky Mountain Backroads 22
Forest Glen in the Fall 23
Wooded Wetland 24
ECOVIEW No. 6 contains personal glimpses of plants, birds, insects and other invertebrates at different times of the year in various parts of the world over the past fifty years. I hope these pictures are informative, enlightening, entertaining and generate a feeling of reverence for nature.
Fossils
Fossil Mind
I sit in the midst of a Cretaceous fossil bed,
A hillside of marine animals
50 million years dead.
A submerged reef of oysters turned to stone
now lies exposed to the western sun.
Time has flown
and the sea has gone. The shells remain
mute evidence that nothing is permanent
but change.
+++++
Invertebrates
Mosquitoes in My Motel Room
When I opened the door and turned on the light
mosquitoes were lurking just waiting to bite.
I swatted and squashed for a minute or two
and they disappeared right into the blue.
I turned on the sink and flushed out a couple
and one from the overflow compounded my trouble.
I turned on the tub and three more were washed out
then two more flew out of the drain with a pout.
They hid in the drapes and under the chairs
and hummed about blood that soon would be theirs.
Stop! I can't take any more.
I threw on some clothes and ran out the door
to find a bug bomb
to kill these blood sucking ladies and even their mom.
I sprayed half a can. There. That should be enough
that is, if these swamp ladies were not super tough.
I backed out the door to wait 'til they died
but out in the courtyard was one I could ride
so I ran for the car and left the same night
straight back to West Texas where tall tales don't bite.
+++++
Heliconian Night
A tropical Florida hammock sits
surrounded by sawgrass and ankle-deep water.
Soil piled a foot above the water
supports satinwood, cherry laurel,
two large manchineel and several gumbo limbos.
The hammock’s outer edge is festooned
with the vines of Dodder and Passion flower.
Black and yellow striped Heliconian butterflies
float slowly in the still humid air.
Evening falls swiftly and the Heliconian butterflies
begin to gather on a dead branch
of a Eugenia inside the hammock.
Half a hundred are settled for the night
as the full moon rises out of the marsh.
About three hours up, the moon finds a hole
in the foliage and a shaft of moonlight
strikes the butterflies like a blow.
They chitter softly and disperse like
confetti falling upward.
They settle on another branch
softly, creaking softly as the settle down.
+++++
Urban Lightning Bug
A lightning bug winking a cool green light
flew down the sidewalk
in Bethesda Maryland
landed on the hand of an entomologist.
Lightning bugs and entomologist
are both rare in the city.
+++++
Termite Swarm
An Amazon termite swarm filled the night.
At dawn they had shed their wings of flight
and several large queens ran about the deck
each with several males in tow
like a convoy of 18 wheelers on a trek
+++++
Banana Slug
Along a trail through
the Olympic rain forest
a banana slug blocked my path.
Yellow with large black spots,
an imposing three inch presence.
+++++
Army Ants
I had heard stories of Army Ants
charging through the jungle
devouring everything in their path.
A gross exaggeration
but they are vicious.
Their three inch trail disappears
into the undergrowth within a few feet both ways.
A misstep on the trail
resulted in three quick bites
and quick forays by the ants
to see if I was anything to eat.
+++++
'96 MONARCH KILL
What irony, to fly 3000 miles
to escape the cold and snow
but die in a freak snow storm
in the mountains of Mexico.
Six thousand square miles in Michoacan state
protect the orange and black butterfly,
but the jet stream dropped south
and the cold and snow
caused 20 million Monarchs to die.
A ’92 storm killed half a billion Monarchs.
From this they can recover
but not from cutting and burning the forest.
Our children may see them never.
+++++
CROWN OF THORNS I
Crown of Thorns!
Acanthaster!
Reefs all gone.
Man cries, "Disaster!"
"Not to worry," sings the sea.
"No hurry, time is the Master."
CROWN OF THORNS II
Crown of Thorns.
Typhoon spawned and
nurtured by high island rains
it vanishes into the reef.
After five years of growth in seclusion
it bursts onto the scene
en masse to devour its coral home
and disappear again.
Pacific atolls have the Crown of Thorns
but not the typhoon-fed periodic blight
that devours a dozen species of coral
around high islands.
A dead white reef of stony coral
is not a pleasant sight.
Inspection reveals only a few species dominated
and this forced recolonization
restores biodiversity
and health to the reef.
*****
Deer Flies, Daughters of Mars
Like small vicious hawks
deer flies attacked anything that moved
like moose and man and bear.
Females of the genus Chry'sops
bit out chunks of flesh and drank blood
like a party animal drinks beer.
These pretty colored biting flies
ran caribou crazy on warm windless afternoons.
Moose cows submerged to escape the bites.
The moose bulls, fed up, crashed through
arctic willow and beaked hazel brush
with all their frantic might.
We cast our favorite wet flies
dressed in a head net, long sleeves and gloves.
Lunch of beans and trout remained untouched
but we crudely ate lunch with our gloves on
cause exposed skin received vicious bites.
Deer flies were almost too much.
A vector for rabbit fever
and a bane of the arctic realm
these flies disappeared with the setting sun.
Supper should have been no problem
except that at twilight
mosquitoes began having their fun.
The arctic adventure was over
but my wrists had a number of scars.
I miss the trout and the caribou
but not those colorful daughters of Mars.
+++++
BIRDS
Shrikes Courting
A masked female Loggerhead Shrike
(Lanius ludovicianus)
lands on the top wire of a barbed wire fence.
A male soon lands beside her
with a gift in his beak,
a really nice stick for building a nest.
She ignores him.
He flies off and shortly returns
with an outstanding piece of twine
which she also rejects.
Undaunted he leaves again
and returns with a small lizard,
an Anole (Anolis carolinensis)
hanging limply from his beak
which she accepts.
She disembowels the Anole
and devours parts of it
while the male looks on apprehensively.
Sated, she impales the remainder of the Anole
on a barb and flies off
followed closely by the lucky male,
the perfect cold-blooded couple.
+++++
The Cozumel Bananaquit
We just arrived at Chankanab Park on Cozumel
when a little bird landed in a coconut tree.
Black striped head and a white throat,
the Cozumel Bananaquit nibbled
coconut flowers and posed for me.
+++++
The Tropicbird and the Moon
The
afternoon
moon
was two days from full and three hours out of the sea
when a Tropicbird
with long, forked tail
and coal black wings
gliding,
gliding,
flew over
the moon.
+++++
Washington Doves
On the cold, wet morn of the first day of spring
a pair of whitewing doves
pick at the litter in the gutter
for food and nesting material.
A few miles away another dove picks
at the defense budget to feather his nest
with the support of protestors
who shun the Viet Nam Memorial.
+++++
PEREGRINE FALCON
IN A CANYON OF GLASS
Look down Marquette Street in Minneapolis
and up at building of steel
and mirrored blue and green glass
It looks surrealistic,
a cold canyon of blue sky and ice.
A pair of Peregrine Falcons appear.
One stoops
and takes an unwary pigeon
the scene reflected
In cold green glass.
The tough survive.
+++++
Five Egrets
It was evening by the pool
at the Cancun Clipper Club and
a full moon claimed the sky.
Pool and hotel lights
softly lit the scene with flitting reflections.
Five white egrets spooked from the lagoon
flew over the pool white against the black sky
challenging the moon.
+++++
Bethesda Spring
Caw!
The call pierces the cold mist.
Caw!
A black shadow glides past
denuded oak and beech trees.
Caw!
A black omen circles and lands.
Ensconced, it surveys the gray mist
from a high, bare branch
Caw! Caw!
The trees are ready to burst forth
in leaf and flower
the first warm day.
Caw! Spring! Caw! Caw!
+++++
Crows on Whiteflint Hill
Its a cold sinking sun
as the crows come home
to tall oak and beech trees
on Whiteflint Hill.
The sky is dark with crows.
The tree limbs are breaking with crows.
A cacophony of ten thousand crows
declaims like wives coming home from work.
Home from a long day down in the dump
feeding and loafing at the local landfills
they are settling as darkness falls
and the street lights sputter and glow.
With occasional forays into the dark sky
when sleep is disturbed
they restlessly wait for the faint glow of dawn
to leave this sylvan rookery
and return to the landfill.
+++++
A Lucky Worm
A January Robin with a bright orange breast
lands in the wet Florida grass
and sits flicking his wings.
He drops his wings to see and hear better
flicking his tail side to side
hoping to scare up breakfast.
A lucky cold earthworm does not move
and the robin hops away
looking for more lively prey.
+++++
Milwaukee Hotel Swimming Pool
May is still spring cool but
the willows are in leaf and
buds on other trees are breaking.
Bluegrass turf is ready to mow.
Tulips and hyacinths are blooming.
Whitewing doves, already paired,
are looking for nesting sites.
The hotel pool is empty
but for a pair of mallards
sitting in the shallow end.
Will they share with the other guests
when the water comes?
+++++
Forgiven or Forgotten
A rocky rookery of black and white
Murres and Turres is relatively quiet.
Parents with bulging crops
are returning from the sea
to disgorge half digested fish
into their waiting chicks
and relieve nest-weary mates.
An ominous shadow glides over the colony and
everything freezes except one lost chick.
A gull-like Skua lands nearby.
It strides up and devours the chick
as parents mutter and squawk and
peck ceremoniously.
The ogre, who ignores these paper tigers, leaves and normality returns.
Forgiven or forgotten?
+++++
Downtown Geese
Downtown Anchorage projects upwards
as a dozen twenty story buildings.
Geese, forming up to fly south,
navigate through
and around
these obstacles
at the ten-story level
in long, honking Vees.
They circle
and turn southward
in the late September sun.
+++++
ANIMALS
Moose Passing
Snow.
White.
Glaring
in the sun.
Squawking
as we walk.
Moose tracks!
They lead through
closely cropped willows.
Two dozen light weight
moose pellets
and a still steaming
patch of yellow snow.
Snow.
Drifting over our tracks
and the evidence
of the passing moose.
+++++
Sea Lion Pup
On the dark rocky beach at La Push
lay a four month old sea lion pup,
forty pounds of dirty white fur
with black spots and large dreamy eyes.
She helplessly watched the beach
waiting for night, the tide and Momma
to return.
+++++
Roosevelt Elk
Along the road near the Queets River
An elk stepped into the road
crossed and quickly disappeared into the forest.
Another follows and, likewise, quickly disappeared.
A third elk stops in full profile and looks directly at me
then regally steps behind the curtain of trees
but the play continues.
+++++
Mount St. Helens Bulls
The old herd died in the blast
but a new herd has taken its place.
A hundred bull elk lay
in the sun in the gray ash
along the Toutle River
waiting patiently for green grass
and the fall rutting season.
+++++
Do Bears do it in the Woods?
In an aspen grove
in Canada
in June
Bear tracks.
Toes pointing towards me.
We didn't meet.
Several aspens trees with
bear marks.
A hungry bear had climbed
to eat a just-waking-up salad
of vitamin-rich
aspen flowers
Stepping over a fallen log
I find a huge pile of
odorless,
green
bear dung.
I have finally discovered
the answer-
yes!
+++++
PLANTS
Lawns and Biodiversity
Lawns are green.
That's all most see
until they look close
at the minutiae.
There’s dull green of Bermudasgrass
And bright green of St Augustine
Emerald green of Zoysia
And a hundred flowers unseen.
Blue half flowers of Lobelia,
Yellow dots of Crigia,
kidney-shaped leaves of Dichondra
with inconspicuous flowers,
Euphorbia, Sida and Molluga,
the list is inexhaustible.
I could go on for hours.
A lawn by definition
Is a monoculture
But ,as any fool can see
most lawns are a mix
of everything green.
Hurrah for biodiversity.
+++++
Fall Color
Fallen Tuliptree leaves
Like bright yellow gold duck's feet
turn brown and twirl to the ground
Red oak leaves with scarlet teeth
still have green veins and
shield a few green leaves near the trunk.
Tall beech trees with orange leaves
that turn brown before they fall
replace the yellow flowers of late summer.
Maple and sweet gum leaves.
Their pointed scarlet melodies
provide a visual counterpoint to
the crunch of dry brown leaves.
+++++
A Maple Leaf in November
Three lobes with bright yellow veins
The green becoming brownish
with an overlay of a red and orange wash
lying on the wet sidewalk.
+++++
Sidewalk Images
Bigtooth maple leaves,
giant Bur oak leaves
lying on the sidewalk
soaked by a cold drizzle
that collects and washes
the sooty concrete.
The leaves dry
and crumble
and blow away
leaving dark stencils
on clean pavement.
+++++
Smoky Mountain Back Roads
Narrow two lane roads with no shoulders.
Rippling streams with pools and boulders.
Pine trees with kudzu, crows and chickadees,
fallen logs with moss and carpenter bees.
Highways disappear into fog most days,
the mountain ranges silhouetted in a smoky haze.
Oak Ridge labs nestled in the wooded hills
with Plutonium 'neath the mud of cool, clear rills.
Endangered species -birds and clams-
contend with open pit mines and TVA dams.
Land of progress and contrast -
modern technology and a Rebel past.
+++++
Forest Glen in Fall
The former Forest Glen girl’s school
in early November.
A pair of gilded lions guard steps
leading from a fountain with flying chargers
downwards to a blue windmill house.
Gilding tarnished, the lions,
waiting in the cool autumn shade,
await another winter's snow and cold.
Two dozen green species, soaking up
the warm noon-time sun
under a clear brilliant blue sky, wait,
waiting for crisp red dogwood leaves,
golden duckfooted tulip popular leaves,
red and green mottled sugar maple leaves,
large rust red white oak leaves
to fall, brown and cover the tender greenery,
protect it from the coming snow and cold,
love it through the winter
and support it in the cool, wet spring.
Several lavender Lamium buds,
a single dandelion
and three yellow strawberry flowers
could not wait
and bloomed today to celebrate the sun.
+++++
A Wooded Wetland,
Change in Progress
A meandering creek
divides a sunlit, grassy meadow
and disappears into a cool, moist woods.
The creek with its Vaccinium, grape
and poison ivy vines
is a sharp contrast to the meadows' grass
with speckles of yellow clover and ranunculus.
The woods presents a sudden change,
a curtain of greenbriar, Solomon's Seal and muscadine try to hide
tulip popular, Holly, Sassafras and willow oak.
The damp shade causes thin, young trees
to stretch towards the sun.
Moist air supports rotting wood, fungi and
a hundred kinds insects.
Just inside the woods the stream stops flowing.
There is a wooded wetland with skunk cabbage and cinnamon fern and anaerobic mud.
Birch, beech and willow oak
are still growing in the water.
Black leaves and brown water rings
mark at least a years standing water.
A beaver pond?
The trees show stress from standing in water.
In the gloom is a flash,
bare, beaver- gnawed birch,
a white beacon through the shadow.
Dead pointed stumps of trees
emerge from the water.
Then, with the slap of its tail a beaver
disappears beneath the brown water
its lodge in the distance.
This new beaver dam
backs up two feet of water,
kills trees,
and fills the wetland with silt.
A redwing blackbird lands on the lodge
and a teal launches from an open pool.
Strawberries bloom on the mud.
Change in progress.
+++++
Your duty is
to look,
to wonder,
to marvel,
to be amazed,
then,
to keep on looking.

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