J.D. Porter's Blog, page 8

Quail Dogs

Most of the dogs I have owned have been mutts. They were rescued from some animal shelter. But I do appreciate dogs that were bred for a specific purpose. Now that I am back driving the mule wagon, I have a ringside seat to some of the most enthusiastic sporting dogs on the planet. Every morning, after we load guests and guns and we ride out to the hunting ground, the first order of business is to stop and get two dogs out of the wagon. They are the pointers, muscular short-haired dogs with names like Buck and Gabby, Bud and Pearl, and Ike and Dot. The American Kennel Club calls them the “unquestioned aristocrats of the sporting world”.

the pointer is ready to go

They are taken out of the wagon in a male-female pair and positioned side by side in the middle of the road, with a gentle tug on their collars and an equally gentle command to “whoa.” Once released, they run up and down the dirt roads and in and out of the grassy lanes. By all outward appearances, they are running aimlessly at a brisk lope—aimlessly, that is, until one of them catches the scent of quail in the thick grass. Then it looks like the dog has come to the end of some invisible leash. His head snaps toward the birds and his body jerks sideways. He remains immobile with head down and tail up.

This is the heart of the hunt: the dogs on point and the guide positioning the hunters; followed by the moment of truth when the birds fly, the guns boom, and the birds fall. This is when another enthusiastic sporting dog comes into play. The little English cockers on the wagon seat next to me, stop whining and jumping around. They stand at full alert and go silent as they await the dog-handler’s call to help find a bird.

Most of the birds fall in an open area where they are easily picked up. Occasionally, however, one of these well-camouflaged birds falls into the deep grass. That takes a little more looking, even when the hunter knows where the bird fell. After a few moments of fruitless searching, the call goes up from the guide as he looks back to the wagon and hollers for me to send one of the English cockers, Millie or Shep.

Millie watching the action

The cocker scrambles down the steps at the side of the wagon and navigates the lanes to where the hunters and guides await. The guide points and says, “bird in here,” and the dog goes to work. She scrambles back and forth, nose to the ground in ever-shrinking circles until she homes in on her target. Finally, she dives in and emerges with a bird in her mouth. She looks to the guide who says “wagon” and back she comes to deliver the bird to me and then turn her attention back to the action in the field.

These young pups have picked up the art of finding birds with amazing quickness. It must be in their genes. But they have helped me appreciate the talent of Joy, my original wagon-dog, who died in December 2020 at the age of fifteen. These young dogs don’t release the bird into my hand like Joy did. They want to hang on to their prize. And, unlike Joy who would never leave until called, they must be clipped to the wagon, so they don’t rush out and spoil the hunt.

Shep on the wagon

Millie and Shep are doing well for a couple of young dogs that in their first season on the wagon. They obviously love what they do, much like another gun dog I know—a yellow Lab named Penny.

Dogs in the Family

When the last of our dogs died of natural causes a few years ago, we decided to take a break from dog ownership for a while. Aging parents and the potential need for spur-of-the-moment travel was the primary reason. I miss having a dog around and will someday invite one or two back into my home but, in the meantime, I have a marvelous substitute—a grand-dog. Our son in Atlanta acquired a golden retriever puppy in the spring and Libby has become part of the family. His girlfriend also has a dog, a 7-year-old English cocker spaniel named Alice. What a pair Alice and Libby make.

According to the American Kennel Club, the golden retriever is an exuberant gundog that was developed as a breed in Scotland in the mid-1800s. They are serious workers at hunting and field work, a breed built to find and retrieve waterfowl. The English cocker, on the other hand, is a compact sporting dog that is famous the world over for the ability to find, flush, and retrieve gamebirds. The contrasting characteristics of these two breeds became apparent to me on a recent walk. Libby, the retriever, walks with her head up and nose twitching as she carefully watches the world around her. Alice, on the other hand, keeps her nose to the ground, seemingly oblivious to anything that doesn’t smell.

Observing how these two dogs interact with the world around them helped me appreciate the diversity of dogs and how we have shaped and bred dogs to be much more than just pets and companions. Dogs are our partners at a variety of jobs, and I have a soft spot for working dogs.

I recently learned that we share our world with about a billion dogs. We have around seventy-five million in the United States, alone. Dogs evolved from an ancestor of the gray wolf, which has been around for three-hundred thousand years. But how did we get to the modern dog from this ruthless carnivore and apex predator with its bone-splintering bite?

The earliest dogs appeared about fifteen thousand years ago when humans began displacing Neanderthals in Northern Europe and Asia. But the explosion of diversity in shape and size only occurred about two hundred years ago with a breeding craze in Europe and the advent of kennel clubs in the 1800s. Dogs are great companions and have been bred to hunt, herd, and protect. But they can also learn an astonishing variety of tasks. They assist us in therapy, in search and rescue, in policing, and even in war.

Most surprising to me is the recent speculation that humans did not domesticate wolves. Wolves domesticated themselves. They accomplished this by staying in proximity to human settlements, scavenging our leftovers, and adapting to our ways over generations. Wolves evolved into dogs and became hunting companions that were a perfect complement to humans. Dogs were the chasers, and humans were the finishers. We both shared in the spoils of the hunt.

At this point, I should confess that Libby and Alice will probably never share in the spoils of any hunts. Both are house dogs. They are pets that provide companionship. But they also represent the diverse traits and abilities that we humans have shaped into working partnerships.

For thousands of years, humans have bred dogs for specific traits. As humans became more sophisticated, so did their dogs. Eventually, specific breeds of dogs emerged, custom-bred to suit the breeders’ local needs and circumstances. Huge mastiff types were bred as guard dogs and warriors. Sleek greyhound types were bred to chase fleet-footed prey and, according to the American Kennel Club (AKC), they became the foundation type for the immense Irish wolfhound and the dainty Italian greyhound. All three have a distinct family resemblance, but you’d never mistake one for another.

So, then, when is a breed a breed and not just a type of dog? The simplest way to define a breed, according to the AKC, is to say it always “breeds true.” Breeding a purebred golden retriever to another purebred golden retriever will always produce golden retriever puppies.

The American Kennel Club recognizes two hundred of the more than three hundred breeds known around the world and classes them in eight or nine groups. These groups include working dogs, herding dogs, hounds, terriers, and more. Next week, we’ll take a look at a group that is special to me—the sporting dogs, like Libby and Alice.

A Sign of the Times

Yard signs are big business these days. Gone are the days when a sign in someone’s yard meant their house was for sale. These days, signs are posted all over my neighborhood. They advertise pest control, irrigation, roofing, swimming pool maintenance, and tree removal. My neighbors want me to know what school they support, that Black Lives Matter, and that I should Back the Blue. Lately, these signs have revealed our political leanings. During the election campaign, supporters of President Trump posted enthusiastic displays with flags and whirligigs while Biden folks seemed more subdued, often with handmade signs.

And just when I thought the endless political season was over, we Georgians are treated to a runoff campaign for two U.S. Senate seats. The only positive note is that the four people who are campaigning seem to have combined their efforts, much like the presidential races. On the Republican side, we have the Loeffler-Perdue “ticket” and for the Democrats, I see yard signs for Warnock-Ossoff. Maybe that means fewer yard signs and fewer TV and radio commercials. This election season can’t end too soon for me. The campaign ads have become offensive and insulting—and not just for the candidates.

Human beings are tribal animals and Americans may be the most tribal of all. We fly our flags, display our school colors, and support out state and local sports teams. Actually “support” is too mild a word. Love and hate seem more appropriate when it comes to college athletics. Our neighborhood watch groups keep an eye on any outsiders who might wander into our neighborhoods. Many of us want to keep people who don’t look like us off of our streets or foreigners from coming to our country and “taking our jobs”. Even though these immigrants are taking jobs no one else wants. It is hard to find people who want to clean motel rooms or pick tomatoes. I appreciate immigrants who want to work hard and get ahead. My sentiments are shared by some folks in Louisville, Kentucky. On a recent visit there, I saw numerous yard signs that said: No matter where you are from, we’re glad you’re our neighbor. It was printed in three languages.

Many of the yard signs I see suggest we are a bitterly divided country. It is no longer good enough to be an American. We must declare a party allegiance. Am I a Republican or a Democrat, a conservative or a liberal? I would like to be neither or perhaps both. I would like my government to rule by common sense and compromise—something that might approach the common good. I am a middle of the road kind of guy who is tired of the prevailing “my way or the highway” attitude. I could support a moderate Republican or a moderate Democrat if there were any of them in existence.

I am okay with my neighbors displaying Black Lives Matter signs. While it is true that all lives matter, we don’t need a sign to remind us that white lives matter. I grew up in the segregated south at a time when the only lives that seemed to matter were white lives. I will support the Black Lives Matter movement until ALL lives really do matter.

I don’t have any signs in my yard even though I support Georgia football and Braves baseball. If I am paying a company to service my air conditioner or to cut my trees then I think they should pay me for advertising their business with a sign in my yard. All of these yard signs are visual pollution to me. There should be limits—like one sign per yard and a one-month time limit per sign. And if you place a sign advertising your candidate or your yard sale on a street corner, you should be fined if you don’t remove it when the event is over.

On my recent visit to Kentucky, I saw yard signs that proclaimed: black lives matter, women’s rights are human rights, immigrants make America great, science is real, and kindness is everything. In many cases, all of these sentiments were on a single sign. That is a sign I might place in my yard, although I have not seen any signs that cover an important segment of our population. To my sign, I would need to add be kind to animals. Their lives matter, too.

Dancing Around the Christmas tree

I grew up in the south where we didn’t herald the Christmas season with our first snowfall or by trudging through a frozen field to cut our Christmas tree. For us, the season began when Aunt Marge and her friend Sandy pulled into St. Petersburg, Florida just after Thanksgiving. They were usually driving a salt-splattered sedan with Montana plates and pulling a trailer full of Christmas trees. They sold the trees in the parking lot of Allendale Methodist Church where my brothers and I helped on the lot during the weeks before the Holiday. Marge and Sandy used the trees to help pay for their trip. I suppose my Mom and Dad received a free tree in exchange for our labors.

Those Montana fir trees were our only tangible link to the kind of Christmas we saw on television. We never had a white Christmas. We never rode a sleigh “over the river and through the woods to grandmother’s house”. And Frosty the Snowman never came to life on our front lawn—probably because our front lawn was always a lawn.

I was in my twenties and living in Canada before I saw my first snowfall. We certainly had our share of white Christmases up there. Living in places like Canada, Kentucky, South Dakota, and Ohio afforded us plenty of opportunities to cut our own trees. When we moved back to the south, we still had fresh-cut trees from my Mom and Dad’s friend Gerry, who owned a Christmas tree farm near Burnsville, North Carolina. He sold them to big retailers by the truckload, but he allowed us to cut any tree on his lot for $25. We picked out the perfect tree, his guys cut it and bundled it, and we hauled it home on top of our car.

Sometimes we got carried away with not having a limit on the size of the tree. Like the time we learned that some tree-stands have a height limit. Our home at the time had cathedral ceilings and could accommodate a very tall tree so we picked out the largest tree we could fit on our car. I installed it in the stand, placed it in the living room, and left for a few days to attend a meeting. Karen began the decorating process in my absence.

As she remembers it, she was admiring the tree after she had decorated it and noticed it leaning. On closer inspection, it was not just leaning, it was slowly falling. She grabbed it to hold it up and realized it would not stand back upright on its own. What to do?

She began removing any breakable ornaments within reach as she scouted the room for the cordless phone (no cellphone in those days). She pushed the tree upright, ran for the phone, and rushed back to grab the tree as it toppled again. My brother Don, who lived about twenty minutes away, came to the rescue.

After that, we bought more modest sized trees—trees that were appropriate for the stands that held them up. Karen also insisted on a new family tradition of weighting the base of our trees with cement blocks and tying them to the wall with fishing line.

After Dad died and Mom left the mountains, we lost our Gerry-connection and began buying our trees from the Busy Elf on Highway 82 in Terrell county. When he went out of business, we looked to the small operation in a parking lot on Westover Road—a place that reminds me of my time selling trees for Aunt Marge. My Christmas tree experience has come full circle after seventy years.

Aunt Marge was actually my mother’s aunt. She and Sandy were of my grandparents’ generation. They had been in the military during World War II and had traveled the world running a USO unit. Marge and Sandy were the type of larger-than-life characters that every family seems to have. Why they settled in Montana I don’t know. Perhaps it was because they were the loud and flamboyant side of our quiet, conservative family—the life of every Christmas party they attended. The memory of two old ladies dancing around a Christmas tree tickles me to this day. Marge and Sandy were accepted for who they were, and their “special friendship” was never discussed. I looked forward to seeing them every year—except for having to sell all those trees.

To me, Aunt Marge’s trees were beautiful and perfect. In the 1965 animated television special A Charlie Brown Christmas, Charlie Brown purposefully chooses an unattractive Christmas tree to decorate. He did it as a protest against the commercialization of Christmas. At the risk of sounding like an old curmudgeon, it feels like Charlie Brown was right. Christmas has been hijacked by the consumer market. Christmas is all about Cyber Monday, Black Friday, and the number of shopping days before Christmas.

I realize that not everyone celebrates Christmas. It is, after all, a Christian holiday. Some of our neighbors have erected an eight-foot-tall menorah on their front lawn and placed a sign that wishes us a Happy Hanukkah. It makes me happy to see them outside with their children decorating their house for their holiday.

The origin of the Christmas tree is wrapped in myth and legend. Some say the tradition began in Germany during the Renaissance. Others suggest that it evolved from the pagan worship of the evergreen tree that appeared to thrive during the winter when all other trees (which represented their “gods”) appeared to be sick. But whatever its origin, the Christmas tree is a symbol that I look forward to bringing into my house again this year. One reason it is so special is that our tree was sustainably grown and harvested by farmers like Gerry, sold in parking lots by entrepreneurs like Aunt Marge, and enjoyed by children who have never built a snowman. And at the end of the season, it will be recycled into wood mulch.

We had an artificial tree for several years. It was okay at the time. Our parents downsized to small, table-top trees after we all left home, which was also okay. They were reminiscent of the Charlie Brown trees, but they were easy to decorate for aging parents and they still held the spirit of Christmas. The Christmas tree, no matter what kind we choose, is the symbol of a season of love. It shelters the gifts. It holds ornaments that represent a lifetime of collecting. And it reminds us of Christmases past. It is something we can gather around and remember how much we have to be thankful for. The real holiday season begins for me with a Thanksgiving dinner, is followed by putting up the Christmas tree, and ends when we take the tree down after the new year.

In the days leading up to Thanksgiving when health experts were pleading with us to forgo big family celebrations, the airports were packed, and the roadways were clogged anyway. The draw of family was too powerful. Perhaps that COVID warning and our determination to ignore it is a reminder of what the holidays are all about. We just can’t imagine the holidays without family. It seems ironic that it took a pandemic to show us the true meaning of Christmas—health and happiness, family and friends. I, for one, don’t care how many presents are under the tree this year. I would gladly give up all my gifts in exchange for a healthy family sitting around a Christmas tree or—if we want to pay tribute to Aunt Marge—dancing around the living room.

It was always said of [Scrooge], that he knew how to keep Christmas well, if any man alive possessed the knowledge. May that be truly said of us, and all of us! And so, as Tiny Tim observed, God bless Us, Every One!                                   Charles Dickens

The Joy of Thanksgiving

I am back on the wagon—the mule wagon, that is. It has been nearly a year since my last hunt, so I had to get reacquainted with my mules, Mike and Ike. My faithful old retriever Joy is semi-retired, but some new, young English cockers are ready to take her place next to me on the wagon. Shep and Millie worked one day, and Brody worked the next with Joy along for the ride. We were all a bit rusty.

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Our quail hunting operation is a nostalgic nod to an earlier era. The hunters and guides are on horseback—not in jeeps—and my mule-drawn wagon carries dogs, supplies, and any hunters who would rather not ride horses. Not many operations around Albany do it this way anymore. It is slow-paced and has many moving parts. I commute to Tallahassee for my job.

After seven months, I was a bit apprehensive about climbing back on the wagon. I had grown accustomed to my COVID-induced isolation, keeping several facemasks in my car and facing plexiglass shields in the stores. But, I rationalized, I drive for a family and their guests not the general public. Being outdoors and somewhat isolated on my wagon seat seems safe enough for me. Hunting, like golf, is an easily distanced outdoor sport. Hunters don’t need to wear masks while shooting and we greet with gloved fist-bumps instead of stripping off the gloves to “press the flesh”.

The property where I hunt is new to quail hunting. It is ideal quail habitat—wide-open pine-savanna—and it was burned this past spring for the first time in years. The results were astonishing. I wish I could identify the wildflowers I saw. The fields were a sea of color, mostly in yellow and orange, interspersed with some blues. It was the first cool snap. The quail were flying like mad and even the best shooters were having trouble drawing a bead. I, too, had my challenges when Mike and Ike lost their patience midway through the afternoon and began acting up.

Actually, my struggles began early in the day when I needed help throwing the heavy harnesses across the head-high backs of the mules. Then, when loading them into the trailer, I forgot to let go of their bridles and got dragged inside sandwiched between two, thousand-pound mules. The only member of the hunt that did not struggle that day was our retriever Joy.

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Joy is solid brown—known as “liver” color—and about fifteen years old, which is ancient for a working dog. She is covered in wart-like skin tags, has an ominous lump growing on her left side, and is nearly deaf. Joy is so good at her job that she is never clipped to the wagon, but these days when her name is called from the field, she can’t hear the call. I need to give her a pat on the head and tell her it is time to go.

Joy is always watching the action. When she sees the hunters kicking about in the underbrush looking for a downed bird, she is ready to go—unlike Brody, her three-year-old wagon-mate. Brody is a handsome, athletic, brown and white cocker and a veteran of last year’s hunt. He knows his job—or so we thought.

The first time he was called to find a bird, I unclipped him and he bounded down the steps. But when he reached the ground and turned to the front of the wagon, he froze. He appeared to be surprised at the knot of horses and mules in front of him. Or perhaps he forgot what he was supposed to do once he was on the ground. That happens to me more often than I care to admit—like when I walk into a room and wonder why I went in there.

Whatever the reason, Brody stood for a moment then turned and bounded back up on the wagon. Chris, the guide, called as I attempted to push him off, but Brody wasn’t having it. The hunters continued to look for the bird and everyone grew impatient, so Chris had to make the call.

“JOY!”

All thoughts of an aging retriever faded from our minds as the old girl sprang from the wagon. She navigated the lanes to where the hunters waited and found the missing quail in no time. But when she brought her treasure back, she faced one final indignity. She was not spry enough to leap onto the wagon. She had to be lifted up to the steps by one of the guides so she could drop the bird in my hand and return her attention to the field. Joy was thankful, it appeared, to be back in the game. The rest of the day’s hunt was hers.

It seems fitting that Thanksgiving coincides with hunting season. Hunting has been an essential part of Thanksgiving since the Pilgrims sat down with the Wampanoags in 1621. And we know from first-hand accounts that “wild fowl” was on the menu. I wonder if that included the northern bobwhite quail.

Today, we tend to replace wild game and the bounty of the harvest with huge, pen-raised frozen turkeys and a table-full of canned vegetables. But in many parts of the country—like South Georgia—where Thanksgiving coincides with hunting season, people still include wild game and fowl on the menu. For the rural South, there is more to Thanksgiving than gorging ourselves and watching football. There is the hunt and the harvest that precedes the meal.

I wasn’t raised as a hunter. I never spent cool, fall mornings in the woods with my dad. I come late to the party. But even though I am old, I still appreciate the hunting experience as much as Joy seems to. I am grateful, on this Thanksgiving holiday, to be back in the game because even though Joy and I may need a little help from time to time, we can still get the job done.

So, prop me up on the wagon, hand me the reins, and I’ll guide the mules through the woods. And when you call me for Thanksgiving dinner, shout a little louder and give me a pat on the head. I’ll take it from there—if I can remember why I came into the room.

NOTE: Joy passed away on Monday, December 7, 2020.

Lizards in our Midst

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Now that the blazing hot South Georgia weather has broken and I can once again sit outside on my porch, I have become reacquainted with some old friends. I grew up in Florida calling them chameleons, but they are actually green anoles. These 5 to 8-inch lizards may be either green or brown depending on environmental conditions. I have always admired the pinkish throat fan that anoles display in territorial rivalries or when approaching a potential mate. They are common throughout Georgia and can be found almost anywhere perched on trees, fences, and rooftops from suburban woodlands to urban neighborhoods.

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Anoles are active by day in warm weather, sunning themselves on vegetation and occasionally charging away from a basking spot to grab an insect or chase off a rival. During cool weather anoles are often found hiding under tree bark, shingles, or in rotten logs. They eat a wide variety of insects, spiders, and other invertebrates. Their ability to change color from bright green to dark brown has given them the nickname chameleon, but their color changing abilities are not nearly as sophisticated as the technicolor changes of true, old-world chameleons.

For the longest time, when I thought of lizards, I thought of the green anole. But as I have grown older I have come to appreciate and enjoy the diversity of lizards in my yard, lizards like the five-lined skink. Although the same size, skinks and anoles are not easily confused. Skinks are gray, brown, or black, in background color with five white or yellowish stripes (two on each side and one down the center of the back). Young have a bright blue tail while adult males often develop reddish or orange coloration on the head. Skinks don’t have the anole’s distinctive pinkish throat fan.

Like the anoles, five-lined skinks also range throughout Georgia, living in almost any habitat, and eating a wide variety of insects, spiders, and other invertebrates. They are reported to be equally at home on the ground and in trees, but in my yard, I mainly see skinks scurrying across the ground.  

I have worked with plenty of exotic lizards in my career, including iguanas, tegus, and monitors. They come in all shapes, sizes, and colors. So, when I saw a lizard that was nearly a foot long basking on the ground outside the door to my garden shed, I thought it must be an exotic. I had never seen anything like it, with its enlarged orange head and powerful jaws. I had a hard time getting a good look at it since it scurried under the shed whenever I approached. It is, I have come to learn, not an exotic. It is a broadhead skink—the largest skink in the southeast, and the largest of the lizards in our region. Female and immature broadheads are similar in appearance to five-lined skinks, but adult male broadhead skinks are unmistakable.

It has been many months since I have seen the big male broadhead. I presume he got tired of my intruding on his habitat and retreated to live in the trees. Although they may be found both on the ground and in trees, broadhead skinks, particularly large males, are more arboreal (tree-dwelling) than any of the other southeastern skinks. When pursued, broadhead skinks generally run for the nearest tree or log and can be quite difficult to capture. Like many other lizards, broadhead skinks will break off their tails when restrained, distracting the predator and allowing the lizard to escape.

One lizard that had me stumped, however, was the small, 4 to 5-inch lizard that I saw scurrying away from my grill when I removed the cover. I managed to get a better look one night when I saw it clinging to the outside of my kitchen window. It was unlike any native lizard, with its sticky toe pads, vertical pupils, and large eyes that lack eyelids. It was the Mediterranean Gecko—an introduced species.

As its name implies, the Mediterranean gecko is what is known as an old-world lizard. It is common in Southern Europe and Northern Africa but has been introduced in many tropical areas worldwide, including urban areas in the Southeastern United States. In almost all areas, this species is associated with human development, and it is seldom found far from buildings with outdoor lights. They are almost completely nocturnal and are generally light gray or almost white but may have some darker mottling. Their sticky toe pads allow them to climb walls and they are often observed perched on walls and windows around outside lights, waiting to grab insects attracted to the light. By day, these lizards hide in cracks, crevices, and under tree bark—or grill covers.

I appreciate the diversity of lizards in my back yard. Anoles scurry around on the ledges and furniture of my porch while the skinks seem to prefer the underbrush of the garden leaf-litter. The giant broadhead skink lurks under the shed while the tiny Mediterranean gecko boldly clings to my kitchen window. They all seem to get along, occupying their own little niche. The lizards may be a metaphor for the diversity of people in my community.

On our evening walks around the neighborhood, we see our neighbors. Some of us are walking alone, some in couples, and a few as families. Young couples push strollers and older folks just stroll. Some ride bicycles. A few drive golf carts with music blaring, drinks in hand, and the family dog along for the ride. Rich and poor; young and old; black, white, Asian, and Latino—we are all just people getting on with our lives clinging to whatever ledge we can find.

This Place is a Zoo

To say “This Place is a Zoo” is to imply chaos and confusion, but at every zoo in which I have worked, nothing could be further from the truth. Animal diets are carefully planned and applied based on nutritional value. Medical care is professionally managed by trained veterinary staff. And breeding is controlled based on computer models and genetic profiles. Zoos (and I use this term to include aquariums) are highly organized, professionally managed, and tightly choreographed. In fact, at a modern zoo we might better say, “This place is a dance”.

I believe in zoos and aquariums and the work they do on behalf of wildlife. But today’s zoos are struggling in a world ravaged by pandemic and climate change. It is unfortunate that the term zoo has taken a negative connotation because zoos are much more important than just places for animals. They are cultural touchstones in our lives and for our communities. They are as much a part of our social infrastructure as our parks, museums, and libraries. Zoos are not just for animals. They are for people and zoo animals are guests in our community.

During the 2008 financial crisis, some financial institutions were said to be “too big to fail”. Now, during the financial crisis caused by the pandemic, I would suggest that some institutions—like zoos and aquariums—are too important to fail. Here is why.

The story of the American zoo begins much earlier than people might imagine. The first American zoos were travelling menageries that trundled the continent in the years before the Civil War. These makeshift caravans set up their ephemeral zoos in farm-fields and town squares from San Francisco to New York. By the end of the Civil War, traveling menageries had joined with traveling circuses and, with the advent of the railroad, these combined attractions grew exponentially until they could rightly be called the Greatest Show on Earth.

In the 1870s, some of America’s more progressive cities began providing amenities for their citizens—amenities like parks, museums, golf courses, and zoos. With the establishment of zoos in cities like Chicago, Cincinnati, and Philadelphia, the history of zoos in America officially began. By the turn of the Twentieth Century, dozens of cities had their own zoos. Zoos evolved little in the next one hundred years, but in the 1970s all that began to change. I was there to witness their progress and wrote about in my memoir, Lessons from the Zoo, Ten Animals That Changed My Life.  

Zoos evolved, grew, and became conservation centers that provided quality environments for the animals. Big cities poured millions of dollars into their zoos and aquariums while small towns used grit, determination, and ingenuity to provide more modest, but high-quality facilities. Attendance at zoos soared over the decades as people came to value their connection to the animals. These institutions have evolved into a vital part of our human communities. But what about the animals? There was always this nagging doubt in the minds of some. Are zoos really humane? Wouldn’t the animals be better off in the wild? Back to the question—why do we still need zoos?

As 2020 began, some of those doubts about the importance of zoos may have been laid to rest. Animals in the wild were in trouble. During the Australian bushfire season of 2019-2020, according to The Guardian news, nearly three billion animals were killed or displaced, including tens of millions of mammals, birds, and frogs along with a staggering two billion reptiles. Thousands of koalas were also killed, and they are in danger of extinction in some areas of Australia.

What wild do we expect animals to inhabit? Those parts of the Amazon that are not being logged are burning. The remote jungles of Central Africa are being opened up by logging and animals like chimps and gorillas are being consumed as something called “bush meat”. Indonesia is clearing the forest for palm oil plantations and the Arctic sea ice is melting. There is, it seems, little wild left on earth. Zoos might be the only hope for animals.

Now, in the midst of the pandemic, zoos themselves are in danger of going extinct. Zoos and Aquariums have been shut down and employees laid off. Disney just laid off an astonishing 27,000 employees. But, ironically, it might be the pandemic that could save zoos as we take another look at the idea of replacing live animals in zoos with animals that are on-screen in virtual zoos.

I just watched David Attenborough’s new Netflix film A Life on Our Planet. I hope it comes to television someday. It is an eloquent plea for the environment that everyone should watch. But even with its stunning images and its soaring music, it is still just a movie. It is, in fact, a virtual experience—something that has become all-to-familiar in 2020.

During the coronavirus pandemic, I have been attending virtual church and virtual Sunday school. My wife has been forced to become a virtual schoolteacher. But I don’t believe I have heard a single person say, “These virtual experiences are great!” Nobody has suggested that they would like to try a round of virtual golf or that they prefer virtual sporting events to being present inside the stadium. We are programmed to enjoy things as a group. We want to be in church together, we want to attend live sporting events and concerts. And just look at how difficult has become for us to stay out of restaurants and bars.

For years, people have been suggesting we could do away with zoos because we have so much access to animals and natural environments through television and film. In the 1960s we had Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom then in the 1990s, when Animal Planet went on air, we were enthralled with stars like Jeff Corwin and Steve “The Crocodile Hunter” Irwin.  Today, new technology continues to bring us amazing animal programs in digital, high-definition, slow-motion. I have seen things on television that I never dreamed of seeing in the wild—even after a half century of studying wild animals. So, why do we need zoos? Why not just have virtual zoos and aquariums? It took the events of 2020 to give me some clarity on that. When it comes to the choice of televised access to animals versus live animals at a zoo or aquarium, there is no contest.

We need zoos both for our own social wellbeing and for the sake of the animals. We humans created parks, golf courses, museums, zoos, and aquariums because they are vital components to a civilized community. Now, as these institutions try to figure out how to operate in a post-COVID world, we need to rally around them. Maybe now it not the time for elaborate, expensive masterplans but rather a review of financial operating models. Zoos need our tax dollars now more than ever—not because we place the needs of animals above humans, but because zoos and aquariums are as much a part of our community as parks, libraries, and public schools.

I have always known that extinction was a battle that zoos fought on behalf of the animals they seek to protect. I never dreamed that zoos and aquariums themselves might face extinction. I am not a fan of virtual learning, virtual church, and virtual sporting events. And none of us would be happy with a virtual zoo. So the next time you are exasperated with something, don’t say, “this place is a zoo” when you should be exclaiming: “this place is a virtual zoo”.

Box Turtles & Gopher Tortoises

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I feel like they should have names. Maybe I’ll call them Fred and Wilma. They have lived in my yard for years. I’m not sure exactly where their home is but they appear once or twice a year like ghosts out of the fog—or I should say out of the iris beds. Sometimes just Fred, sometimes just Wilma, and occasionally one of their offspring. Once, my wife saw Fred and Wilma together right there in the middle of the lawn. That’s how we discovered which one was Fred and which one was Wilma. Fred’s plastron (bottom of the shell) is concave, allowing him to mount Wilma for breeding. They are box turtles.

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The box turtle is a medium-sized, terrestrial turtle, about 5 – 6 inches long with a high, rounded shell that is dark with yellow and orange splotches. The front third of the plastron is hinged, allowing the box turtle to close itself inside (hence, the name).

Box turtles are omnivorous and eat everything from mushrooms, fruits, and vegetation to worms, slugs, and insects. These animals are long-lived (perhaps reaching 50 years old or more) and take over five years to reach maturity. Eastern box turtles mate from around April to October, then hibernate through the colder months from October or November until April.

Common throughout the eastern United States, box turtles are found in a variety of habitats like open hardwood forests and fields or wetland edges. They also do quite well in my backyard. They are survivors that can apparently adapt to an unconventional habitat, unlike their cousin the gopher tortoise.

The gopher tortoise was designated Georgia’s State Reptile in 1989 and is now listed as “threatened”. It is considered a keystone species in the rapidly disappearing longleaf pine/wiregrass ecosystem because its burrows provide shelter for hundreds of other species living in their habitat.

A keystone is the wedge-shaped stone at the apex of a masonry arch. It is the last piece placed during construction and locks all the stones into position, allowing the arch or vault to bear weight. A keystone species is a species on which other species in an ecosystem largely depend. It can be any organism, from animals and plants to bacteria and fungi. It is not necessarily the largest or most plentiful species in an ecological community, but if a keystone is removed, it sets off a chain of events that turns the structure and biodiversity of its habitat into something different.

A keystone might be a predator, like the timber wolf of western North America, which keeps the population and range of their prey in check. Remove a keystone predator, and the population of creatures it once hunted can explode, pushing out other organisms and reducing species diversity.

Keystone prey, which include animals ranging from Antarctic krill to Canadian snowshoe hares, also have a big role to play in the ecosystem. They serve as a critical food source for predator populations. But keystone prey must be resilient creatures, unlike some other types of prey species that are more susceptible to becoming rare or extinct within an ecosystem.

A keystone can also be an ecosystem engineer. Instead of impacting the food supply, animals like beavers, African elephants, and gopher tortoises can create, modify, or maintain the surrounding landscape. They influence the prevalence and activities of other organisms and help define the overall biodiversity of their habitat.

So, gopher tortoises are the “influencers” of the animal kingdom. Human influencers are people who use their fame to influence the decisions of the masses. They are mostly people I have never heard of and who are famous for being famous. The only ones I can think of are Justin Bieber, Katy Perry, and the Kardashians.

My box turtles, Fred and Wilma, on the other hand, are not influencers or ecosystem engineers. They are like me, just going about their daily lives and quietly minding their own business. I don’t know where they are at the moment. I don’t know where they live, whether they have bred, or where Wilma might lay her eggs. But I’m glad they are poking about in the underbrush outside my house, eating mushrooms, worms, and bugs.

Their quiet life represents all of us who lead quiet lives. We can’t all be bigshot influencers or keystones, holding our communities together. Some of us just ARE. We lead lives, as Henry David Thoreau suggested, “of quiet desperation”. Most of us are like Fred and Wilma, enjoying life’s pleasures, enduring life’s pain, and hoping to find a worm or two in the leaf-litter of our existence. 

Deer in the Garden

When I was growing up, big boys weren’t supposed to cry at the movies. I knew that. But when I was nine or ten-years -old, two movies did make me cry and probably helped shape the rest of my life. The worst one, the movie that broke my heart, was Old Yeller. When Old Yeller, the family dog, had to be put down because he had been bitten while protecting his family from a rabid wolf, I cried like a baby. I wonder if that had something to do with my lifelong love affair with dogs?

The second movie that touched my heart and made me cry was Bambi. Even though it was only a cartoon, I couldn’t understand why someone would shoot Bambi’s mother. This may be one of the reasons I have always had a soft spot for deer. I have worked with all types of deer—reindeer, red deer, and roe deer; elk, moose, and muntjac; fallow deer, barasingha, and Pere David’s—but white-tailed deer are my favorite.

[image error]W. T. Deer Patricia ca. 1977-78

When I was a senior keeper at the Toronto Zoo, I had a hand raised white-tail named Patricia that followed me around like a pet dog when I cleaned her pen. She was wild enough to breed and raise babies, but she was also imprinted on humans. Imprinting is cute when the deer is a female. But I once worked with an imprinted male that saw me as a rival during his rut. I stopped going in with him when he charged at me with his head lowered and I had to hold on to his antlers and back my way to the gate.

The range of the white-tailed deer is huge, from the Arctic Circle in Canada to parts of South America. If you look up the diet of white-tailed deer, you will see leaves, twigs, fruits, and nuts, as well as lichens and fungi listed. Place a group of deer in a heavily wooded area, fence them in, and they will eat everything from the ground up to about six feet. The entire area will look like someone when through with a chainsaw and manicured all the vegetation to a precise height—a height that is known in wildlife management as the “browse-line”. But white-tailed deer will readily turn to cultivated vegetation when available in urban areas—like my neighborhood. You might even list the daylilies in my wife’s garden as a favorite food.

Last summer, for the first time in the fifteen years, our deer problem escalated. We looked out the kitchen window into our fenced back yard one morning to see a doe and fawn standing on the lawn. When we went out to chase them off, mama easily jumped the fence to escape while the baby walked through the slats. That afternoon, Karen was out extending the height of our fence by stringing twine from tree to tree and fastening strips of rags. Problem solved—for now.

Deer are abundant in our land-locked urban neighborhood. I see them on my early morning walks and late in the evenings when driving home from some appointment. They are probably safer in my neighborhood than they are in the woods. I wonder if they know that. Do they pass the word to each other that the eating is good, and no one is shooting?

People have been hunting deer for thousands of years. Deer, along with gazelles, are designated in the book of Deuteronomy as “clean” animals that are given by God for humans to eat. And in Georgia, we take that God-given right seriously. Georgia’s 2020-2021 deer hunting season opens soon—archery in mid-September and firearms in mid-October. Out of the more than a million deer that live in Georgia, about a quarter of them are harvested every year. Another fifty thousand are killed on our roadways. But the population remains relatively constant because a female deer will give birth to one or two fawns every year.

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It seems ironic that this fall, when thousands of hunters are getting up before dawn hoping to see a deer, my wife will be trying her best to shoo them away. Since we have successfully kept them out of our back yard, they have adapted to front-yard dining. The daylilies along the road seem to be attracting them. I have not witnessed this, but judging by the grazing pattern, they must be strolling along the road late at night and pausing to eat at the curb without stepping foot on the grass. Then, unfortunately, they see what is up in the yard.

They don’t eat our spirea, azaleas, or lantana. They seem to prefer the grassy plants like daylilies, agapanthus, and liriope. But hydrangeas must be some kind of delicacy. Last year, Karen planted three oak-leaf hydrangeas in the front bed. They were beautiful with large, dark green leaves and delicate, white blossoms. Had we done a little more research, we would have seen this notation on one website: Deer love to eat this plant. The hydrangeas never stood a chance. We tried erecting chicken wire cages over them, but we eventually transplanted them to the relative safety of the back yard.

Sometimes, when I wake up at night, I will creep to the front window and gaze into the front yard. A few weeks ago I saw a doe and two fawns standing on the lawn. I was mesmerized by the three deer bathed in the soft glow of moonlight and I was reminded of Patricia, my long-ago “pet” deer. The spell was broken when I realized they were standing in the daylilies. I remembered Bambi and knew I needed to warn them off. I opened the front door. That was all it took.

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This summer, Karen has upped her game. The deer won’t leave those front-yard daylilies alone, and she is at the breaking point. We replaced the hydrangeas with spirea. She spent one evening cutting a disposable, aluminum roasting pan into little squares and strung the bits of shiny metal with twine in the front yard flower beds as a deterrent. She purchased three-pound containers of animal repellent granules to spread around the edges of the beds. It claims to ward off everything from deer to shrews. I’ve never seen a shrew in my yard, so at least it works on them. Whether it works on deer remains to be seen.

We pride ourselves on having a wildlife-friendly yard. We feed the hummingbirds. We have a pond with goldfish and frogs and a pair of box turtles raise their young. We even welcome any non-venomous snakes that want to hang out in the iris beds. Karen loves wildlife as much as I do but I am worried that one morning, when I walk out in the pre-dawn darkness to get the newspaper, I will find her crouched high above the front yard in my son’s tree-stand, wearing his camo-gear, and resting our shotgun across her knees. Bambi and her mother had better watch out.

Life in Quarantine

This COVID crisis is not the first time I have had to deal with quarantines. My first quarantine experience occurred late on the evening of May 9, 1974, when I was a young zookeeper. My partner and I had just returned to the zoo from the airport. Our job had been to pick up two wooden crates from an international flight, return to the zoo’s quarantine facility, and uncrate the animals—two baby gorillas. They would come to be named Joseph and Josephine. We were to give them some food and water and, if they appeared healthy, leave them for the night. The veterinarians would give them a thorough exam in the morning.

While my partner was down the hall tending to his own crate, I sat cross-legged in a twelve-foot-by-twelve-foot holding stall. The heavy bedding of hay and wood shavings was both comfortable to sit in and soothing in its scent of fresh pine. I lifted the crate’s sliding door out of its track, laid it on top of the box, and settled a few feet from the opening, peering into the darkness within. My plan was to sit quietly and wait for Joseph to emerge.

We sat staring at each other for a long time. He had wedged himself toward the far end of the crate, glancing at me without making direct eye contact. He was thirty pounds of black fur and dark eyes, clearly frightened, and unsure of what to do next. As I was about to give up and leave him to explore his new surroundings, he stirred and walked calmly out of the crate and into my lap. He smelled earthy—a combination of freshly turned soil and over-ripe fruit. I wanted to comfort the little guy and welcome him to his new home. I knew he would be safe and well cared for, with the best food, other gorillas for companionship, and modern veterinary care.

That zoo quarantine nearly half a century ago was a pretty loose affair. We were mainly worried about parasites, both external and internal, and diseases that were transmissible to other animals in the collection. I may have been wearing coveralls that could be removed and left at the zoo, but I don’t recall being concerned with zoonotic diseases.

In the mid-1990s, I read Richard Preston’s book, The Hot Zone. It was described as “a terrifying true story” about what happens when “a highly infectious, deadly virus from the central African rain forest suddenly appears in the suburbs of Washington, D.C.”. The disease was a viral hemorrhagic fever that was discovered in 1976 near the Ebola River in what is now the Democratic Republic of Congo. There is no cure for the Ebola virus. It has been infecting people from time to time, leading to outbreaks in several African countries. Scientists still do not know where Ebola virus comes from. When I read that book, my mind drifted back to that May evening and an encounter with a baby gorilla that had flown in from Africa. I could have been at the epicenter of a zoonotic disease outbreak.

A zoonosis is a disease that is naturally transmissible from animals to humans. It can be something as common as tuberculosis or Lyme disease or as scary as bubonic plague or Ebola. If a pathogen only infects humans—like polio or smallpox—it is theoretically possible to eliminate it by vaccinating everyone on the planet. Zoonotic pathogens can hide in an animal host like a rodent, bird, or bat and reoccur in outbreaks—or spillovers..

As frightening as Preston’s book was, it was nothing compared to the book I read a few weeks ago. David Quammen’s book, Spillover: Animal Infections and the Next Human Pandemic. Here is the description provided by the book’s publisher:

The next big human pandemic―the next disease cataclysm, perhaps on the scale of AIDS or the 1918 influenza―is likely to be caused by a new virus coming to humans from wildlife. (Sound familiar?) Experts call such an event “spillover” and they warn us to brace ourselves. David Quammen has tracked this subject from the jungles of Central Africa, the rooftops of Bangladesh, and the caves of southern China to the laboratories where researchers work in space suits to study lethal viruses. He illuminates the dynamics of Ebola, SARS, bird flu, Lyme disease, and other emerging threats and tells the story of AIDS and its origins as it has never before been told. 

Today, it seems the whole world is engulfed in a spillover event. According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), COVID-19 is caused by a coronavirus, a large family of viruses that are common in people and many species of animals, including camels, cattle, cats, and bats.  Rarely, animal coronaviruses can infect people and then spread between people. This occurred with MERS, SARS, and now with the virus that causes COVID-19. All three of these viruses have their origins in bats.

Over the course of my career, I became familiar with the dangers of zoonotic diseases. We learned to check incoming zoo animals for tuberculosis, brucellosis, rabies, and more. We began wearing face masks, using antiseptic footbaths, and following strict protocols. But that was not the case in 1974 when Joseph, the baby gorilla, emerged from his crate. He sat on my lap for a few seconds, facing away from me. Then, without warning, he placed his mouth over my bare right forearm, and, in slow motion, he bit down—hard. So hard, in fact, that I hollered in pain and jerked my arm away. I pushed him out of my lap as gently as I could under the painful circumstances and left the stall to examine my injury. The bite broke the skin slightly, leaving the bloody imprint of his upper and lower teeth on my arm like some dental impression. My worries about what diseases he might be carrying escalated ten days later when Joseph died. Fortunately for me, his death was due to a nutritional deficiency. As it turned out, he had no transmissible diseases, and obviously, I have survived with no ill effects. This incident occurred two years before we knew about the Ebola virus and the other deadly diseases coming out of Africa, or I would have been well and truly frightened. The memory of that incident makes my current opportunity to quarantine myself and avoid a deadly virus all the more acceptable.

One of the things that attracted me to David Quammen’s book was the publisher’s description, which goes on to say, “Spillover reads like a mystery tale, full of mayhem and clues and questions. When the Next Big One arrives, what will it look like? From which innocent host animal will it emerge? Will we be ready?”

A good question—and the answer is NO. We were not ready, in spite of repeated warnings. And we probably won’t be ready when the next virus jumps from animals to humans. That’s right. There will be more zoonotic viruses, just like there will be more natural disasters like hurricanes, tornadoes, and earthquakes. Spillover warns us of that fact. The book is frighteningly real because it describes the COVID world we are living in today—and it was published eight years ago in 2012.

I don’t mind quarantining myself and washing my hands obsessively. I am okay with the discomfort and inconvenience of wearing a face-mask when out in public. I learned my lesson four decades ago when I allowed an animal from the Ebola infested jungles of Africa to bite me. I got away with it then. I don’t intend to ignore the warnings this time.