Mother Nature's Medicine

Mother Nature is one of the greatest healers the world has ever known. Her work can be found in the pharmacy, the examination table and the recovery room. It fills the aisles of health food stores and grocery chains. More immediately, it dwells in a lonely garden path, within a fragrant orange grove, on a fallen-needle path of pines.

Ironically, Mother Nature is both the purveyor of health and the cause and deliverer of decay. She is constrained by the laws of death, but confirmed as the harbinger of life. She is, so very often, the prescription of Heaven. 

This is not a political truth or an advocate’s plea. It is a reality that most of us have recognized at some point in our lives. And yet, with only a few exceptions, we as Christians clearly draw the distinction between valuing the Creation and worshiping it.

Our sacred history is celebrated mostly in church and temple. Of course it also includes many exceptions – in garden, mountain and grove. But for some reason we become wary of those who take their religion to the wilderness.

So it is with a bit of suspicion or with an inherent hesitation that some of us admit how much we need the natural world for our own peace of mind. We shouldn’t need to feel this way. Admitting that we love to walk in the woods shouldn’t make us feel like we’re admitting a sin.

Take the masculine hobby of hunting as an example. It is filled with men that love being outdoors. It is also filled with men that have learned that it isn’t polite, in mixed company, to brag about their trophies. Neither do you hear these men talk about how much they love the wind in their hair, a beautiful sunset, or the honking of geese. Yet these are all very common feelings of most hunters.

I have felt, on a number of times, like I had to explain my political position at church or in a social gathering after being caught enthusing over a trip into the wild. Just recently I had an influential member of my community come up to me at church with surprise written all over his face. He had just learned how conservative I am on many issues. “Sam,” he said, “all this time I thought you were a tree-hugger.”

Because this sort of thing happens often enough, I have learned to boil my feelings down to a couple of simple points. I seek out nature because of a real curiosity about the created world. But I also seek out nature because of its profound ability to heal.

I recognize that other people do not share my fascination with animals and plants. Try as I might to convey my enthusiasm for beetles, these people only recoil at the sight of long antennae and stout mandibles. These individuals seem to survive happily behind manicured lawns in town.

Yet in spite of differences in our individual preferences, Mother Nature remains one of the greatest healers of all of us. This is just as true for the committed urbanite as it is for an aboriginal shaman. And no matter how blind we are to anything that isn’t man-made we can fix our lives and our relationships more often than we realize if we would just let go of the control we impose upon the world and let the natural rhythms of nature teach us a thing or two.

There are several extreme examples of this in a little book by Diane Ackerman entitled A Slender Thread.  This is a book about the author’s thoughts and phone conversations while volunteering at a suicide prevention center. As this fascinating book unfolds, it becomes clear that psychological health is a fragile thing indeed.

Ackerman shows that one of the best ways to help someone experiencing a deep suicidal depression is to get them out in the natural world. Dealing with these cases on an individual basis becomes very situational, but there is no doubt about the benefits of the real world.  

This can be frustrating to many people used to our world of quick fixes – to a world that has come to rely on modern medicine and a pharmaceutical solutions. Unfortunately mental and emotional angst is not always so easily cured and sometimes Mother Nature is a tremendous help.

On one occasion a woman, that Ackerman refers to as Louise, calls and admits that her life is in ruins and she is ready to end the suffering. Ackerman listens to her problems, coaches her and then listens some more. She tries appealing to Louise’s need to care for her teenage daughter. This doesn’t work. Then she asks the woman if she happens to be outside. As it turns out, she is.

“Look up,” she tells Louise, who laughs just a little at the beautiful cloudy sky. The conversation then turns to other natural things. Louise mentions a tree. “What kind is it,” asks Ackerman.

“It’s a gingko, it has fan-shaped leaves,” answers Louise. The conversation then turns more directly to botany and the disaster is averted, at least for the time being. For some reason (deeply embedded in human nature) the sky and a tree were capable of grounding this troubled woman.

The most obvious reason for this is that we are natural beings ourselves. It is true that sacred literature teaches us of our unique position in the world. Clearly we are different than other beings. And yet we are still created from the dust of the earth. Physiologically and anatomically we belong to this earth just like the squirrel outside the window or the dogwood blooming in the spring.

And so it should not be a surprise that we respond to the ways of nature. And it shouldn’t surprise us either that our manmade world – a world that takes us away from nature – might just be the cause of many of our ailments.

This was brought home to me a few years ago in a conversation I had with Reese Nelson, Professor of Horticulture at BYU – Idaho. Reese had grown up in the rural town of Grantsville, Utah amid old poplars and sagebrush and had learned to appreciate the rhythms of rural life.

During his graduate work at Idaho State University, he came up with a plan to see if he could measure the benefits of nature on a group of college students in a fairly stressful situation. He decided to create an area on one side of the university’s testing center with an abundance of ornamental plants. Then he arranged for the testing center to randomly assign some of the students taking a math exam to this area.

Reese’s design was straightforward and yet fairly convincing. He was able to show that students taking the exam near the plants were both calmer and scored higher than students that took the exam away from the plants. The differences were not enormous but they were real (and they were conducted on enough students to be scientifically valid).

After thinking about this study I realized that I already believed its basic conclusions. The natural world can calm us down and help us regain peace of mind. One particularly telling example of this happened at the time I lost my job a number of years ago. This was a very stressful time and for years, even after finding other employment, I was anxious much of the time. The experience had left me quite vulnerable and numb, both mentally and emotionally.

Fortunately, I was able to escape to wild places often and this helped a great deal. I also learned that a bracing bath in a cold stream (or in a cold shower) did wonders. The sudden (and uncomfortable) sensation of the frigid water left me wide awake and acutely aware of the moment. During the time of the bath or shower, and for over an hour afterwards, I felt very much alive.

I became convinced over the years that mental, physical and emotional health all require that we interact with the natural world. When we fail to do this, we build instead a wall of unnatural barriers between us and the way we were meant to live.

Consider all the things that fill our lives today that were not part of the world our ancestors lived in – not part, that is, of the world in which we were created. We live in buildings that are kept at constant comfortable temperatures. We only walk a fraction of what we used to. And when we do, it is in shoes that keep us from strengthening our feet. We travel at speeds and at heights that our bodies do not understand completely – not to mention the shock of changing time zones so suddenly.

We eat foods that are saturated with refined sugars and carbohydrates that our ancestors often considered to be rare delicacies. We sit around most of the day in postures that don’t match our bodies’ needs. We breathe a myriad of chemicals that have completely unknown effects on our bodies. And we fill our heads with an almost constant stream of noise and visual stimuli that are quite unnatural. Is it any wonder that so many of us struggle?

The reality is that our many technologies, for all of their conveniences, almost never reach us at a visceral level. And if we never allow the natural world into our lives; then, by definition, we are living unnatural lives. 

My favorite example of the healing power of nature is the classic children’s story The Secret Garden written by Frances Hodgson Burnett. The story is about three children that circumstances bring together in a setting of Victorian gardens.

Mary Lennox is a spoiled and petulant girl who loses both of her parents in a cholera epidemic in India. Because there is nobody left in the household to take care of her, she is sent to England to live at Misselthwaite Manor in the home of her uncle Archibald Craven.

Mary hardly ever sees her uncle who travels a great deal after having lost his wife. And Mary’s sour disposition doesn’t win her many friends in her new home. Even so, Mary becomes captivated by a young boy named Dickon who loves being outside and who has a patient way with animals and plants. When Mary discovers that Dickon feeds and plays with animals, she is so fascinated that she manages to stop being mean and the two children become friends.

After arriving in Misselthwaite, Mary begins hearing cries coming from someplace within the large house. Despite warnings that she is never to venture into unbidden rooms, Mary sneaks around searching for the source of the sounds. As it turns out, the cries have been coming from Mr. Craven’s invalid son Colin, who is confined to his room and almost never leaves his bed.

Colin is a very spoiled boy who insists on getting his own way. He is not expected to live very long and the household has been instructed by Mr. Craven to humor the boy until he dies.

When Colin meets Mary for the first time, he is both frustrated and pleased that she is not afraid of him and will not be intimidated by his domineering ways. The two children become friends and Mary tells Colin of all the wonderful adventures that she is having outside with Dickon.

Eventually Mary tells Colin about a great secret. It is a hidden garden that she has discovered outside the manor. This garden was the former treasure of Colin’s mother, but after her death it had been closed. His wife’s death, in fact, had been such a blow to Mr. Craven that the garden was abandoned and the key was thrown away.

Through the passing years, the outside door to the garden had become hidden in vegetation and nearly forgotten. It was only by chance (and the instincts of a robin) that Mary found the key and the door. Then, together with Dickon and the forbearance of the gardener, the two children set to work rehabilitating the long abandoned wonderland.

When Colin was finally trusted enough to secretly join Mary and Dickon in the garden, his spirits greatly improved and he began to heal. But this was all kept highly confidential among the three children. Finally, at the end of the story, the family learns that Colin has been sneaking outside and has been healed in the secret garden. He can stand up and walk and his complexion is ruddy and full of health. He is no longer expected to die. In fact he stands to inherit Misselthwaite Manor.

My wife, Kathy, and I read this wonderful book together some time ago. And as it happened, we finished it on Easter morning. We couldn’t help but notice the impressive moral implications. The theme of renewal and healing was so obviously and effectively portrayed that the connection between nature and Christianity seemed the most natural thing in the world.

And in fact most of us already believe this to be true. But the relationship between Christianity and nature is a complicated one. We see it tangentially in Christian romantics like William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge. In America’s Christian culture we have the examples of William Bartram, Henry David Thoreau, Walt Whitman and John Muir. Each of these nature writers drew heavily from their Christian heritage.

Yet, even as Christianity has been the vantage point from which much of our natural interest derives, we don’t often find the likes of a Saint Francis who was as clearly passionate about the Creation as he was about the Creator. And even though Jesus Himself clearly loved sparrows and the lilies of the field, we find little of this dual appreciation throughout Christian history.

Part of the reason is clear enough. Christianity has a long and complicated history associated with nature religions. In the beginning of the Christian Era, the Roman Empire’s religious diversity included several cults and religious groups that worshipped some aspect of the natural world. Magic and pagan worship such as the Bacchanalia (celebrating the wine god Bacchus) were practiced along with the more popular Olympian deities imported from ancient Greece.

Much of the natural world – including trees, mountains and springs – was worshipped by these non-Christian groups. Yet in spite of this perceived (and undoubtedly real) threat, these early Christians refused to distance themselves from the same natural objects that their pagan rivals worshipped. Springs were particularly important to both groups – with references to springs in the Bible having particular sway among the Christians.

Robert Bartlett points out in his recent history of saints and martyrs that these early Christians often built churches over sacred wells. Bartlett makes the ironic observation that, “despite all this evidence for saints as opponents of and substitutes for the holy springs, the saints left their deepest mark on the landscape through their association with wells and springs.”

This complicated Christian relationship with nature and pagan nature worship continues to our day. The religious scholar Peter Beyer, in an attempt to get a handle on what he considers to be an abstract mix of religious practices, places several groups in the broader category of “Nature Religion”. These groups mostly tend to be critical of Christianity and it is easy to see that there still exists a substantial divide. These groups include modern witchcraft (Wicca), Neo-paganism, aboriginal spirituality, portions of some environmental groups, and even some feminist and New Age groups.

This tension is not going to disappear anytime soon. But, in fact, neither will the Christian love of nature or the very real healing power of the natural world. Our Christian heritage and belief in the importance of the Creation are more venerable and real today than are its rivals.

I think this is abundantly clear not only in our history but also in our literature. The Canadian novelist Lucy Maud Montgomery put it quite simply and elegantly in her classic story Anne of Green Gables. You will recall that Anne was an orphan who came to the town of Avonlea by mistake. Matthew and Marilla Cuthbert had originally asked for a boy that could help with the chores.

Anne was about to be sent back to the orphanage but Matthew had sympathy on her and persuaded Marilla to keep the young (and at times exasperating) girl. Anne loved Avonlea, with its woods, flowers, lakes and meadows. Through the years she became the pride of both Marilla and Matthew. But she always had a special place in her heart for Matthew. And when he died, it nearly broke her heart.

A few days after the funeral, Anne found herself talking with Mrs. Allen, the minister’s wife. She was concerned that she was beginning to enjoy nature again and wondered if this didn’t imply disrespect for Matthew. Mrs. Allen assured Anne that, on the contrary, Matthew would want Anne to continue enjoying the beauties of the natural world. “I am sure,” she told Anne, “we should not shut our hearts against the healing influences that nature offers us.”

Perhaps no better call to nature exists than this simple line form a classic Christian story. The beauty of it stems from its universal truth and applicability – no matter what our heritage and faith may be. Mrs. Allen knew it. Anne knew it. And so do most of the rest of us. God’s creation – fallen and imperfectly understood as it is – can make all of us feel a lot better.

References. Diane Ackerman’s book A Slender Thread, Rediscovering Hope at the Heart of Crisis was published by Random house in 1997. A good reference dealing with the health needs of our ancestors is John Durant’s book The Paleo Manifesto, Ancient Wisdom for Lifelong Health published by Harmony Books in 2013. My copy of The Secret Garden was published by the Folio Society in 2006. Reese Nelson’s work on restorative environments can be found in his dissertation: Mitigating Stress in College Students by Enhancing Testing Center Environments through Passive Interaction with Plants. Idaho State University, 2006. Peter Beyer’s article, Globalization and the Religion of Nature can be found in Nature Religion Today: Paganism in the Modern World (compiled by Pearson, Roberts and Samuel in 1998, and published by Edinburgh University Press). For a summary of the early Christian perception of nature see Chapter 15 of Jim Bartlett’s Why Can the Dead Do Such Great Things, Saints and Worshippers from the Martyrs to the Reformation (published by Princeton University Press, 2013). Anne’s conversation with Mrs. Allen in Anne of Green Gables is found in Chapter 37 (The Reaper Whose name is Death).

Botfly Lessons

There are a lot of creatures in this world that get bad press. Think of rats which hide beneath old boxes in garages, and that linger in our memories as the carriers of plague. Or consider rattlesnakes that slither in tall grass and bite unsuspecting passersby. Or the yellow jacket that interferes with our picnicking and stings us when we least expect it.
Of course we recognize that these creatures have their place. And in our more reflective moments – safe in a clean and comfy easy chair – we will grant them a place in the created order, far away from us. There are a handful of things, however, that hardly ever make it even to this guarded list of acceptable nuisances. Mosquitoes, for example, come to mind. What good do they provide? Not many of us have the understanding (or the desire) to accept their immature stages as an ecological plus - as fish or frog food. They are just pests, plain and simple.

And then there is the little known but greatly despised botfly, an insect about the size of a honeybee. Bots make their living by burrowing into the bodies of animals, including humans. Female flies drop eggs either directly onto the skin of animals or they capture another creature, like a mosquito or a tick, and lay eggs on it. These smaller creatures then find their normal warm-blooded hosts and when the young botflies (now having become small worms) sense warmth, they drop onto the new host. In either case, the little worms then burrow under the skin of their unsuspecting benefactors.

I remember a number of years ago, a friend of mine told the story of his mother’s encounter with one of these noisome insects. She had been visiting tropical America with her husband and must have picked up the parasite during their travels. She didn’t notice the bump on her skin until the bot was half grown.

And in fact this is not unusual. As small worms, the botfly larva can burrow under the skin without detection for several days. They artfully consume living tissue while leaving the nerves untouched. The human bot cases that I know of have not experienced pain of any kind. Remarkably, even the initial act of burrowing into the skin is not felt.

When my friend’s mother discovered her parasite, she was alarmed at first and then fascinated. She is a hardy sort of lady with a passion for natural history and her curiosity soon overcame her anxieties. She decided to let the insect emerge. Several days later, it did just that as she was taking a bath. The fully-developed larva broke through her skin around the neck and dropped to the ground. In the wild, the worm then hides itself in the soil to pupate, before emerging as an adult to start the process over again.

In North America (where I live), this doesn’t happen very often. We have a handful of botflies but these are parasites of non-human animals. People that have the misfortune of carrying one almost always pick them up from the tropics, where the human botfly (Dermatobia hominis) lives.

But there are exceptions. Occasionally a disoriented botfly will mistake a human for a sheep, a horse, or some other creature. I know this from personal experience.

A few years ago, while travelling on the dusty back roads of eastern Wyoming, I had a botfly land in my hair and lay at least one egg. I didn’t realize at the time what had happened. I thought it was just an ordinary prairie fly that was unfortunate enough to get blown into a slow-moving truck (of a foraging entomologist).

Several days passed. I was now at home in Windsor, Colorado taking a shower and noticed a lump on my neck. This worried me and over the course of several days I became convinced that I had cancer. The thought was constantly on my mind, although I kept it to myself. I wasn’t sure how to deal with it.

Then one morning I lay in bed longer than usual (it was a Sunday). While I was in that half-conscious state between sleep and wakefulness, I realized what had happened. I remembered the Wyoming fly buzzing around in my hair and knew that it must have been a botfly. I quickly ran my hand over the area of my head where the fly had landed. Sure enough, there was a bump.

Now if I had been a little more restrained and in control of my reflexes, I might have left it alone and waited for the larva to come out. I wasn’t and I didn’t. As an immediate reflex, I buckled my fingers and punched myself on the head. Not just once, mind you, but several times. Kathy, who was asleep next to me, rolled over and mumbled something incoherent. After a few minutes, it was all over. Then I remembered the lump on my neck. It was still there and I realized that it was an enlarged lymph node. My body had been fighting the parasite in its own way without my knowledge. The lump stayed on my neck for several days before going away. Slowly my body cleansed itself of the worm, and my head – bruises and botfly behind – began to heal.

It’s understandable that we would despise botflies. If the very thought of one doesn’t give you the willies, I challenge you to find a picture of one emerging from its host. Unless you happen to have a truly unusual stomach, I guarantee that you will lose your appetite in short order.

What are we to make of such creatures? I know of no Victorian descriptions or essays of natural theology dealing with botflies. Such stories were often written during the 19th Century with the intent to draw a moral lesson from the Creation or to gain insight into the mind of the Creator Himself. The botfly, it seems, is hard to make sense of in this sort of doctrinal milieu.

It is clearly a creature of mortality – of the fallen Darwinian order. It is one of those threads – woven into the fabric of Creation – that ensures a future dissolution. Its very existence is a hint that evil cannot be escaped in this mortal sphere. And maybe this is its purpose. This part of our divine curriculum involves death and suffering and bots are one of its purveyors.

In certain parts of the world and to some animals this fallen fly requires a very real vigilance. The tropical American oropendolas are one of these. They are fairly large birds that are known for their large well-crafted nests that hang like grassy gourds from high branches of trees. A golf-ball sized hole is the entrance to the nest. And, as you may have guessed, sometimes botflies make it inside and feed on the young oropendola nestlings. When they do, the young birds often die.

But often the botflies don’t bother the birds. When there are wasps or wild bees living nearby, the flies stay away. The oropendolas also have another line of defense. It comes from an unlikely place. In fact it comes from a bird that we often despise. It is a parasite known as the cowbird, and it lays eggs in the nests of other birds so it doesn’t have to do the hard work of raising a brood itself. And since the cowbird hatchling is more aggressive than the baby oropendola, it gets more food from the dutiful oropendola parents. This unsolicited adoption at first might strike us the wrong way. But, in fact, there is a benefit to the young oropendola. Cowbird chicks are quite good at eating botfly larvae. In fact they can even snap up an adult fly now and then. When bee swarms are not around to protect oropendola nests from bots, letting cowbird chicks into the nest is the next best strategy. In fact adult oropendolas are known to aggressively keep cowbirds away when bees are around. When they aren’t, they let the cowbirds lay an egg in their nests. This is a surprising level of sophistication for a bird.

It is also an uncommonly good window into the ways of mortality. With parasites and predators all around us, our decisions often revolve around choosing between two evils. Do we let botflies feed on our family or do we agree to pay the mafia boss (cowbird) to protect us from such a scourge?

Or maybe the decision is less obvious. Do we decline an important business dinner or skip our child’s choir performance? Do we go without a car repair or eat beans and rice for a month? Sadly mortality is full of such dually dislikable decisions. And in the end they get the better of us. Mortality always wins Round One (or is it Round Two, or Round Twenty Two?).

To someone who believes in the Created Order the legions of bots and their ilk can leave us wondering about the priorities of Heaven. If the Creator can paint such a beautiful sunset and design the tail of a peacock, what on earth is the reason for parasites?

There haven’t been many good answers to this dilemma. There is, however, an unavoidable conclusion if we are willing to admit it. The experiences of actual life on earth are meant to include suffering and ultimately death. This may seem unreasonable to many of us. After all, we spend so much of our time and resources intentionally mitigating the bad in the world. How can divinity do anything less?

The truth is that such an avuncular deity as our democratic world contrives is not necessarily the same transcendent being that our ancestors worshipped, nor is it the Heavenly Father of our sacred texts. The truth is that there is no necessary conflict between the realities of a divine Creator of beauty and a divinely established decay.

Our wise teachers and leaders have always provided us with challenges to overcome. We acknowledge that there is no royal road to learning. In fact the exams we face often get progressively more difficult as we move from kindergarten up through high school and college. Why should grade earth be without its own challenges?

One solution to all of this is to recognize that part of our earthly curriculum is to be bothered by bots, to be beaten by disease. This is the way mortality is meant to be. I don’t mean that we should resign ourselves, as some belief systems encourage, to the exsanguinating insults of insects. (I, for one, still swat every skeeter that I can.)

But consider for a moment what this suggests: there is amazing beauty in the world in spite of our aches and pains. Surely, then, beauty is possible without them. If death is imposed now, what will life be like when it isn’t? Or maybe more immediately: how can life be improved if we admit to the terms of the test?

For starters, we might realize that humility is the correct approach to a fallen world that we cannot escape. And with an eternal perspective, this humility can develop into gratitude. We can decide to take a hint from the Creation and accept bots for what they are – a possible essay question on a mid-term exam.

References

For a discussion of oropendolas and cowbirds see Don Moser’s Central America Jungles (one of The American Wilderness/Time-Life Books, 1975) starting on page 97.

The Weather

Weather is always in the news. Back in the day when we used to read newspapers, it was as frequently considered as the comics. Now almost everyone has a link to some sort to weather information. Even I, who refuse to be overly “connected”, check at least a couple of weather sites on a regular basis.

And the weather that we learn about is usually unpleasant. In fact with the sophistication and prevalence of communication technology it’s easy to get the impression that natural weather-related catastrophes are increasing in frequency. And it’s possible that they are.

In the 1990’s I remember learning about major flooding in the Dakotas, in California, and in Chicago. It seemed that there was one weather-related catastrophe after another – to the extent that Mother Nature’s malcontents almost became expected. I’m not sure that they have lessened very much since then. If we believe meteorologists, we have more to look forward to as the climate continues to change in coming years.

So we find ourselves in the odd situation of taking newsworthy catastrophes for granted even as we take all the other more typical weather events for granted too. Maybe we think differently when our own local weather is out of sorts. But this is not an every-day event. Weather has become so quotidian that we usually ignore it altogether. Our more serious conversationalists think of weather-talk as a subject for lesser mortals. Few people really love the weather and appreciate it for what it is: a veritable force of nature.

Or maybe we do have a few pleasant weather memories, like flying kites on a windy March afternoon. Perhaps we are genuinely interested in watching the evening weather report to see what the weekend will offer. But weather has a lot more potential than this for the genuine nature enthusiast. It is one of the great ways available of experiencing the natural world. One of the saddest effects of our cloistered work environments and over-crowded cities is the partitions we put between us and the weather. There is much that we are missing when we stay inside.

I grew up in the high deserts of Utah and summer rainstorms were a real treat. They weren’t very common but it seems we had at least a couple every year. When they did come, I experienced a thrill and an inexplicable urge to go out and get drenched. One sunny day I remember driving past a field where horses were jumping up and down, swinging their necks about, and otherwise having a great time. Not knowing the language of horses, I could still tell that they were very happy about something.

I asked my Dad what the excitement was all about. He told me that some animals often behaved that way right before a rainstorm. I could empathize with the horses. Summer rain made me feel the same way. But I was also surprised because I could only see a few clouds on the horizon. It certainly didn’t look to me like it was going to rain.

But rain it did. It took maybe half an hour to come and the storm didn’t last all that long, but it was enough to cool things down and leave that refreshing smell of pluvial pine and moist desert soil that lifts my mood to this day, just thinking about it.

Most of us, however, go to great lengths to avoid the weather. Maybe we do this without thinking about it. Most of the time we hurry inside just to be comfortable – to avoid the heat or the cold. And of course, we grew up with our parents telling us that we would get sick if we stayed out in the cold. And we were constantly being reminded of how terribly the sun could burn our skin.

But not everything is as it seems. More people do, in fact, get sick during the cold months than at other times of the year. A great deal of this, however, comes from the fact that we’re not as active in the wintertime. It is true that over-exposure to cold weather can compromise our immune system, but the larger reason for more sickness in the winter is because germs stay viable for a longer period of time in the cold than they do when it is warm. It’s like a pathologist keeping a culture of germs alive by putting a Petri dish in the refrigerator.

This doesn’t mean that being outside in the cold is dangerous. It does mean that germs might stay alive under your fingernails or on the doorknob a little longer. The best advice is to wash your hands more often, keep your hands away from your face and try to avoid germy atmospheres as much as possible.

As far as being out in the cold, it can make you feel a whole lot more alive. You might want to try a little experiment if you find yourself on a cloudy day unable to warm up. Put on a coat and go for a walk outside. Take your binoculars and notice what the creatures in your neighborhood are doing. Some of them will be sleeping and not visible. Others, however, will be out despite the weather. Notice the plants that stay green all year. You will probably be cold at first but then your body will warm up as you go. Soon you will find yourself enjoying the walk. When you get back inside you’ll take your coat off and say, “it sure is warm in here”. And you’ll feel a lot better.

And what about the sun? It gets overly maligned too. We love it on vacation at the beach, and are careful to use sunscreen. We could be just as careful when we’re not on vacation and get out a bit more. Some of us are so worried about getting skin cancer, that we’ve talked ourselves out of enjoying the sunshine. In fact, our bodies are made to utilize the sun’s energy. They need sunshine to make important life-sustaining molecules. Sunshine is a very important part of our health. We just have to avoid getting burned too much.

As you learn more about the living things where you live, you will get a better feel for their periods of activity. In warmer areas, the afternoon might be too hot for most species and they will be waiting for the cooler times of the day to be active. In other areas, the afternoon warmth is the most active time of the day.

Another way to enjoy the weather is to watch clouds. I know this sounds a bit dreamy, but it can be addicting. As I write this, the sky outside my window is filled to capacity with cumulous clouds pushed up against each other from horizon to horizon. They are the medium kind building to the tall stormy cumulonimbus clouds. They are bottom-heavy with water and each one weighs more than a small herd of elephants.

This may surprise you. How can something so heavy float through the sky? Is it magic? Not really. But it is a powerful force of nature. Water first gathers into the air from the moisture-rich ocean and earth. As warm air currents carry the humid air higher into the cool atmosphere, the moisture combines into microscopic specks that interfere with light rays. These specks reflect the image of a fluffy cotton ball and give away the presence of all the water. When these specks join together into larger droplets they give off heat of their own (a reverse process somewhat like sweating which cools us down, when water is given off).

If enough water accumulates in big enough droplets, it begins to fall to the bottom of the cloud – like the border of gray outside my window. When this happens a storm is brewing. Somewhere close by a landscape is going to get a big drink of water.

It is truly awe-inspiring to realize what is happening in the air around us. Sometimes this is dangerous. Yet even something as powerful as a bolt of lightning is also beautiful. There is a reason that the ancients – from Moses on – saw the works of God in the clouds, in the rain, and in the air around us. Atmosphere is part of a living planet. We should enjoy it for what it is.

Have you ever been out in a snowstorm when nobody else was around? The falling crystals reflecting light from a distant street lamp or farm house? It’s as if the snow itself muffled everything and enforced a widespread silence – a soft and sleepy silence.

Such a storm sends most people inside where it is warm. But if you really want to get warm inside put on some mittens, some warm shoes, a knitted cap and a good coat and go for a walk in the snow with a friend, with your dog, or with your lover. If you’re really courageous, try sleeping outside in the midst of it all.

You might think I’m crazy (maybe I am) but let me explain. When I was young we lived in a house with electric heating that was regulated in each room. My bedroom was in the corner of the house and I had two windows opening in different directions. On stormy nights I loved opening both windows, letting in the moist air and cuddling up under warm blankets. I just had to make sure I turned the heat off so my parents wouldn’t get mad.

Then one evening I had the bright idea of sleeping outside near my grandfather’s woodshed in a storm. I knew a place I could put my sleeping bag that would be protected from the snow. It was up next to the shed where Grandpa had placed dozens of old boards. There was a long wide shelf that was covered by a piece of plywood. Grandpa used to lay down there himself on sunny days and rest in the shade.

So I found a foam pad, gathered my sleeping bag and pillow together and prepared my bed. By the time I was situated, snow had already begun to fall. It came floating down in undecided spirals. I captured hundreds of their delicate frozen patterns on my outstretched hand before they melted and I licked them up.

It was a mesmerizing moment to be in bed and only inches away from a snowstorm. And even though I exhaled a small cloud of my own with every breath, I was as warm as could be. I will never forget the night as long as I live. Experiencing nature so intimately has that effect on my memory.

It does happen that weather-watchers develop a refined sense of our human frailty. Compared to the forces of nature, we very seem so helpless. Nature on a grand scale is no match for our puny presumptions. And yet this universal magnitude that seems to diminish us can also have a very contrasting affect. It can (and should) inspire us with awe.

Our ancestors knew this feeling well. They lived close to the land and experienced the torments of nature as well as her exceeding beauty. They understood their place in the universe because they felt the presence of the divine in this power. We are the ones missing the point when we fail to experience the same thing.
References

The Nature Company Guides, Weather by William J. Burroughs et al. (published by Time Life Books, 1996) is a fun handbook for things weather. Also valuable is Gavin Prestor-Pinney’s The Cloudspotter’s Guide (Sceptre, 2006). You might also visit the photo gallery of the Cloud Appreciation Society at http://cloudappreciationsociety.org.

Ask a Ranger

One of the best ways to learn about the natural world is to ask an expert for help. Even experienced naturalists can benefit from talking with local amateurs that know their corner of the world better than others can ever hope to.

You might visit a state or national park and ask a ranger about what you might expect to see. There is, of course, the occasional distracted or misanthropic employee that will not bother to engage your curiosity. But these kinds of people are not the rule. Most rangers are living their dream, of making a living around nature, and love nothing more than to tell you about it.

My advice is to start with a state park that doesn’t get inundated with weekend visitors. You might even decide to visit during the middle of the week. Nature has a funny way of showing herself a little more willingly when there aren’t so many people around. And you will be more likely to find someone with time to talk. If you’re lucky you may even get a tour.

Several years ago Erik, Michael and I were visiting Merchant’s Millpond State Park in the coastal area of North Carolina. It was late in the year and most of the leaves were gone from the trees. Only pine needles and a few brown beech leaves were all that were left on the trees. The forest was mostly a latticework of bare branches.

As we were finishing our dinner a ranger came by to check on us. It was obvious that he was less interested in our camping fee than in our experience at the park. There was almost nobody else around and he was curious why we had visited. I told him that we were just out to enjoy the forest and to look for birds. I told him that I was also an entomologist and that, believe it or not, insects could be found at such times if you knew where to look.

One thing led to another and we soon learned that Merchant’s Millpond State Park was one of the buggiest places on earth – a real find for someone that likes insects. Our new ranger friend told us about hoards of mosquitoes, deer flies and ticks that kept a lot of people away. But he also told us that were ways to avoid these pests. He then told us about some of the real treasures of the park. When we returned a few months later, he realized that we really appreciated our visit. He then invited us to come back and join him and his wife on a canoe trip into the remote areas of the swamp.

This was a trip the three of us will never forget. The canoe ride was, by itself, a new experience for Michael and he learned the art of paddling fairly quickly. We were surrounded by large cypress trees and there were dozens of turtles sunning themselves on half-submerged logs. Duckweed and pond lilies were abundant in the water and kingfishers, cormorants and herons watched us from their many riparian perches.

An hour into our trip took us to a narrow arm of the swamp. Swollen cypress trunks supported an arching canopy overhead. And then we saw our first water snake. It was sunning itself on a bush like a string of tinsel on a Christmas tree, and completely surrounded by water.

Then we started seeing snakes more regularly. Some of them were water moccasins, a beautiful yet venomous snake of southern wetlands. I knew this species lived in wet areas but I was not prepared for the surprise of seeing one swim. At times, individual snakes would start across the water in a zigzagging pattern just as if they were moving across the forest floor. Our ranger friend picked one up right out of the water with a paddle, showing no more concern than if he were picking up a floating piece of wood.

Then Erik and Michael were given flashlights, taken to a few hollow trees and (quietly), shown some of the rarely seen native bats sleeping upside down inside the cavity. Our most memorable moment was the alligator that we saw on our way back. It was first noticed by the ranger’s wife in a deep part of the swamp surrounded by duckweed. Things got a little interesting even after we stopped paddling and our momentum brought us to within a few feet of the reptile. It was one of those intense moments you don’t forget. For its part, the alligator hardly paid us any attention.

There are a lot of great nature moments that you will miss unless you ask a ranger what to be on the lookout for. Nature abides by her own time schedule and living things behave differently depending on where they occur. You may walk all the way through a park and see only common species if you only follow your own advice. And you may pass within minutes of a real treasure that you didn’t even know was there.

Some years ago I travelled with my friend Steve to Amherst Island on the Canadian side of Lake Ontario. We went during January and the countryside was covered in snow. The ferry from Millhaven (on the mainland) to Stella (on the island) took less than half an hour. The lake was choppy and the sky was gray – as it often is during the winter. But we arrived in good spirits, eager to see some of the island’s birds.

We were particularly looking for snowy owls that were known to come to the island in the winter. One doesn’t expect to see owls in the middle of the day. Owls, after all, are nocturnal – or so we suppose. In fact northern owls do not always follow this rule. Living in a land that experiences long periods of darkness and long periods of light, they make use of hunting opportunities as they present themselves, irrespective of light.

After a bit of driving around we found our first one. They were resting on the ground on top of the snow – white balls of feathers with dark flecks on their wings. They were wary and we kept our distance. As we became more familiar with the island, we learned that there was plenty for them to eat. In fact Amherst Island is home to several owls. Saw-whet owls, long eared owls, short-eared owls, barred owls, snowy owls and boreal owls can be seen there on a regular basis.

But our most exciting find was the northern hawk owl that we found the following day on the mainland a few miles east of Millhaven. This is a northern owl that is rarely seen anywhere near the United States. In fact you have to really know where to look to even see one in Canada. I have spoken to many birders (much more experienced than I am) that have never seen one.

The only reason we were so fortunate was because of Steve’s connections to the birding community in the area. During our second day on the island, Steve received a message that one had been spotted not far from Millhaven. We quickly changed our plans and drove to the spot as quickly as we could. After driving on many back roads, we finally found it – perched happily on a telephone line looking for signs of rodents.

There are people all around you – both where you live and where you might travel on vacation – that know where interesting species might be seen. They can make the difference between an average walk in the woods and an unforgettable wildlife experience.

If you happen to be visiting an undeveloped country, however, finding somebody to talk with about nature can be a challenge. Most of the parks you might want to visit will not have rangers or guides on staff. In fact there may not even be accessible hiking trails. Many countries are making the wise decision to protect wild areas but lack the funds to employ the help they need.

A good alternative is to contact one of the many ecotourism groups scattered throughout the world. You will want to do your homework or you will certainly pay more than you might like. But the time you spend will be worth the effort.

Some years ago while visiting Costa Rica, we found ourselves on the Osa Peninsula looking for insects and other kinds of wildlife. The area is a rich lowland tropical forest and we were amazed by the species diversity. There were brightly colored tortoise beetles and lizards that “walk” on water (and that are considered Christian lizards as a result). Giant fig trees lined the roads and many bird species that I couldn’t identify were flying all around.

It was easy to let the day get away from us. Evening came much sooner than expected. We had been hoping to find a place to camp but couldn’t even find a side road that would accommodate a tent. In the end we pulled into an eco-lodge and paid several hundred dollars for a single night’s sleep. I wasn’t very happy about this but made the best of it.

Then, when we discovered that a nature guide was taking a group out the next morning, we decided to sign up and go along. It turned out to be the highlight of our trip. We hadn’t even made it out of the small parking area before we saw a sloth high up in a tree – sitting with its back to us and otherwise motionless. If it knew we were there, it made no sign of it. We watched it do nothing for quite a while and then moved on.

Through the course of the morning we saw howler monkeys, spider monkeys, and squirrel monkeys. There were iguanas and other lizards. We found a second sloth and an eagle flying high above. Jaçanas, woodpeckers and macaws (along with many other species) kept our binoculars constantly at our fingertips. And all of these were seen from the same road that we had just travelled on the day before. The big difference was that our guide knew where to look and what to expect.

Now allow me to change subjects momentarily and bring your attention to a new awareness that is happening in many fields these days. Health care providers are slowly waking up to the fact that nature has a much more profound effect on our sense of wellbeing than previously realized. Mental health professionals are now prescribing nature walks and other therapies that take patients to parks, arboreta and other natural areas. More and more hospitals are being built with natural places for patients to enjoy. Even school teachers are finding that energetic students will be better behaved if they are taken outside and exposed to nature.

One of my favorite recent findings is the work done by Reese Nelson on college students taking standardized math exams. He placed house plants in one area of a testing center and kept another area without plants. He found that students taking the exam near plants not only did better on the exams but that their stress levels were less too.

These new findings might seem obvious or intuitive to those of us that have been seeking natural places all our lives. Yet these formal efforts are bringing the importance of nature to a wider group – a group with decision-making potential. The reason that I bring this up is because now, more than ever before, you can find park rangers and informed amateur naturalists that are willing to go the extra mile and accommodate your interest in the natural world. It is now becoming a civic service in many places, not just a habit of a few hobbyists.

Daphne Miller (a general practitioner in San Francisco) was recently made aware of the impact conscientious rangers made after visiting a conference where she heard of the work of some rangers in Yosemite National Park in California. The rangers had realized the positive effects the park was making on the mental health of many visitors and were working to meet their needs. Miller’s work, recognizing the larger utility of this finding, is being called “ranger therapy” in some quarters. In fact, there are rangers that have now been trained to provide “nature prescriptions” to visitors that need this kind of natural medicine.

Now I realize that this may sound a bit odd to some – somewhat like the psychotic and well-heeled city slicker asking the happy country bumpkin for help with a flat tire. I don’t intend it that way. I think we should take the natural world more seriously than this. Those that have made career decisions to be in nature have, for a long time, lived on lower incomes than many of us. And the reality is that their efforts have often been ignored or trivialized. It’s a positive thing that we begin to recognize the importance of their work.

The more we ask these natural experts for help, the more we promote the natural world that they represent. Asking for their advice is the best part of their job. It will also help you make the most out your time in nature.

References

Daphne Miller’s reference to ranger therapy is in Richard Louv’s, The Nature Principle (see page 82), published by Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill, 2011. Nelson’s University of Idaho dissertation on the effects of testing center plants (Mitigating stress in college students by enhancing testing center environments through passive interaction with plants) can be found on the UMI website (http://gradworks.umi.com/32/20/3220450.html - accessed 3/27/12).