Archive for October, 2007
nps.gov
One of the most significant bird species in North America uses Carlsbad Cavern as a summer nesting home. The cave swallow, a close relative of the cliff swallow, can be seen from early February to late October (sometimes even November) nesting just inside the entrance to Carlsbad Cavern. The swallows provide entertainment for visitors by chattering, swooping, and making spectacular dives into and around the mouth of the cave.
Habitat and Range
The cave swallow is a permanent resident of Mexico. Currently it is expanding its range northward into the United States. The primary nesting sites chosen by the birds are caves, however they sometimes occupy bridges and similar structures. Unlike the cliff swallow, the cave swallows’ nest is not fully enclosed. It is shaped like a small half-cup; it is constructed of mud and plant fibers, and lined with feathers.
The colony of cave swallows at Carlsbad Cavern is probably one of the northernmost colonies of cave swallows in the United States. It is also probably the largest, no one knows for sure. A migratory species, the cave swallows usually arrive at Carlsbad Cavern in the early spring, and depart for wintering grounds by late fall.
History
Cave swallows were first found nesting in undeveloped caves in the Slaughter Canyon area in the 1930. They were rediscovered in June 1952. In 1966, three nesting pairs of cave swallows arrived at Carlsbad Cavern and made their nests just inside the entrance. Since then the population has increased to an estimated 2,000 birds. Although the colony varies in size from year to year, it is the largest known colony of this species in the United States.
Each nest usually contains from two to five eggs, which are laid in mid-May. The young birds are able to fly about 20-23 days after they have hatched. After reaching maturity the swallows appear to return to Carlsbad each summer for the rest of their lives. However, this information has not been proven, and research is ongoing.
The cave swallows share Carlsbad Cavern with the cave’s large summer Mexican free-tailed bat colony. The bats, however, roost considerably further into the cave than the swallows. The birds are daytime flyers, feeding primarily on insects. Both colonies seem to co-exist without difficulty.
A Continuing Study
In 1980, an extensive banding project was initiated by a local researcher. Its purpose is to learn more about the birds and research their winter range.
October 31st, 2007
The effects of mutation on phenotypic expression are supposed to be mainly deleterious because mutations disrupt the expression of genes that function relatively well under current environmental conditions. Thus, mutations are assumed to give rise to deviant phenotypes that are generally selected against. Radioactive contamination in the Chernobyl region of Ukraine is associated with a significant increase by a factor two to 10 in mutation rate in microsatellite markers of the barn swallow, Hirundo rustica. Barn swallows from Chernobyl had a temporally constant, elevated frequency of partial albinism compared to the situation before radioactive contamination and compared to birds from a control area. Albinism disproportionately affected the carotenoid-based plumage of the head, suggesting that carotenoid metabolism is particularly susceptible to the effects of radiation. Individuals with partially albinistic plumage had, on average, lower mean phenotypic values than other birds, and this was particularly the case for males. Furthermore, differences in phenotypic variation, as determined using Levene’s test, were significantly larger in partial albinos compared to nonalbinos in males, but not in females, even though the null expectation would be the opposite due to the lower mean phenotypic values of partial albinos. Although small phenotypes were commonly associated with germline mutations, there was no general decrease in overall body size during the period 1991–2000, implying that small individuals were selected against. Because partial albinism is disfavored by natural selection, the effects of mutations are deleterious, giving rise to a balance between mutation and selection.
This article is cited by:
• A. P. MØLLER, T. A. MOUSSEAU, G. MILINEVSKY, A. PEKLO, E. PYSANETS and T. SZÉP. (2005) Condition, reproduction and survival of barn swallows from Chernobyl. Journal of Animal Ecology 74:6, 1102–1111
Abstract Abstract and References Full Text Article Full Article PDF
• Gary R. Bortolotti, Kimberly J. Fernie and Judit E. Smits. (2003) Carotenoid concentration and coloration of American Kestrels (Falco sparverius) disrupted by experimental exposure to PCBs. Functional Ecology 17:5, 651–657
Abstract Abstract and References Full Text Article Full Article PDF
• A. P. Mosller AND T. A. Mousseau. (2003) MUTATION AND SEXUAL SELECTION: A TEST USING BARN SWALLOWS FROM CHERNOBYL. Evolution 57:9, 2139–2146
Abstract Abstract and References Full Article PDF
October 30th, 2007
The Birmingham News - al.com, AL - Oct 27, 2007
Saturday, October 27, 2007
A.While not being an exact science, attracting birds can be done most anywhere as long as you spend a little time and effort understanding what birds want and need. A well-planned landscape that provides the proper habitat is the key. Providing food, water, shelter and a place to nest will reward you with lots of backyard birds.
A good idea is to research what species of birds are likely to be found in your area. While researching, note whether the birds are ground feeders, the kinds of food they eat, their choice of water sources, and the shelter and nesting sites they prefer. This will allow you to plan a landscape accordingly.
Without doubt, the greater variety of plants you grow will result in a greater number of birds. A plus or a minus may be that other wildlife will also be attracted.
The best plants for birds will be those that produce fruit and berries along with those that may be insect hosts (can you say balanced diet?). Also important is that your garden design provide year-round food, even if it requires using feeders.
Just as important to our feathered friends is having “edges” in the landscape. Edges are those spaces where trees and shrubs border open spaces, allowing birds to have a protective cover to roost, nest and raise their young while being near an open area to feed. Evergreens and deciduous plants should be added to provide nesting sites, perching places and protection. The evergreens are important for the birds to have winter cover. Shade and protection from wind and rain should not be forgotten.
Each bird species should be treated individually. A design that has multiple attractions (i.e., food, cover, climate modification, perching sites, etc.) will give you a greater variety of species. Birds visualize their environment primarily toward site and sound, so if they like what they see and hear, they may decide to stay.
Patience is a must, as attracting birds for the long run will not be an overnight success. We must remember that no matter how good we make it, birds are wild creatures and are not easy to predict. Our hope is that they will fly by, check it out and decide to hang out for a while. If this happens, you have done your homework and can expect to be entertained for years to come. Garden Talk is written by David Hubbard of the Alabama Cooperative Extension System, which is based at the Birmingham Botanical Gardens. This column includes research-based information from land-grant universities around the country, including Alabama A&M University and Auburn University. Call 879-6964 or mail questions to 2612 Lane Park Road, Birmingham, AL 35223.
October 29th, 2007
DAVID E. SAMUEL Biology Department, West Virginia University, Morgantown, West Virginia 11
kb.osu.edu
determine whether wing length (measured on museum skins), tail length (measured on museum skins), breast color (observed in the field), or behavior (observed in the field) could be used to sex Barn Swallows. Differences in wingchord lengths of male and female study skins were not significant.
Outer rectrice lengths of male study skins were significantly longer than females; thus, tail measurements could prove quite useful as a sexing technique in the field. Differences in breast color (measured visually as buff, light orange, medium orange, or dark orange) could not be correlated with sex. Breast colors of 24 males which attempted to copulate with a mount placed in the field were equally buff, light orange, medium orange, or dark orange. Copulatory behavior was used to sex paint-marked birds in the field, and indications are that other behavior patterns, such as that of following, may also be useful. Usual field methods for sexing passerine species involve coloration, brood patch, or feather length. While carrying out a study on the breeding biology of Barn Swallows {Hirundo rustled) (Samuel, 1969), it was desirable to sex birds in the field without sacrificing them. Proposed methods for sexing Barn Swallows include differences in breast color (Bent, 1942; Chapman, 1912) and in tail length (Vietinghoff-Riesch, 1964). It was the purpose of this study to determine whether these or any other methods could be used to sex Barn Swallows. METHODS A total of 118 Barn Swallows was mist-netted during this study. These birds were captured in study areas near Bruceton Mills and near Terra Alta, Preston County, West Virginia. All birds were banded, and paint-marked for identification after release (Samuel, 1970), and some were also behaviorly sexed (based on copulation attempts on a mounted Barn Swallow) in the field. In addition to copulation, other behavior patterns which might be used to sex adult Barn Swallows were observed. Male birds follow females during activities around the barns, and while feeding, so observations were kept on perching and following in marked Barn Swallows where pairs had been sexed on the basis of earlier obof copulation attempts. Measurements taken at the time of banding were: (1) wing-chord length, measured by placing the carpal joint of the closed wing on a metric rule and pivoting the wing downward until the tip of the tenth primary touched the rule; (2) tail length, measured by inserting a metric rule to the base of the outer rectrice; and (3) breast color, measured visually as buff, light orange, medium orange, or dark orange. The accuracy of these color assignments was checked as marked birds were recaptured; four of 35 recaptured birds (14 percent) had been placed in the wrong category, but none had been misplaced by more than one category (e.g., light orange to dark orange). Measurements of wing length, tail length, and breast color were also made on known-sex museum specimens. These included 40 known-sex birds in the Carnegie Museum collections (Pittsburgh, Pennsy.vania). In addition, breast colors were recorded for those live males which were captured, which were observed in the field in pairs, and which attempted to copulate with the Barn Swallow mount. Manuscript received February 9, 1970. 2 Present address: Division of Forestry, West Virginia University, Morgantown, West Virginia.
DAVID E. SAMUEL Vol. 71 RESULTS AND DISCUSSION Wing-lengths measurments of study skins of male and female Barn Swallows were not significantly different (p>.05) (Table I). The lengths of outer tail feathers reportedly (Vietinghoff-Riesch, 1964) can be used to sex Hirundo in Europe. In this study, measurements of museum skins revealed that males did indeed have longer outer tail feathers than did females, so this method should give good results when sexing Barn Swallows in the field.
In terms of breast color, significantly more light-orange-breasted birds were observed, both as captures in the study areas and as study skins in the Carnegie Museum (Table II). Of pairs of birds observed perching together, more lightorange-breasted birds were observed (Table II). A mount of a female Barn
SEX DETERMINATION OF BARN SWALLOWS 127 Swallow was placed on a fence once per site visit and counts of attempted copulations were made. Males in the area immediately responded with copulation attempts, at which time breast color of these males was visually recorded (Table III). Because the sample size is small, no definite conclusions can be drawn. However, some birds with buff- and light-orange-colored breasts did attempt copulation. This does not support Bent (1942) and Chapman (1912), who report that male Barn Swallows have dark-orange breasts. Vietinghoff-Riesch (1964) has suggested that, in Europe, breast color differences may be due to a number of different races of Hirundo. However, the fact that male birds with differentcolored breasts were found in the same barn or seen paired makes the hypothesis doubtful. Rather, all the above data support the idea that breast color is not a good indication of sex.
No. 2 SEX DETERMINATION OF BARN SWALLOWS 127 Swallow was placed on a fence once per site visit and counts of attempted copulations were made. Males in the area immediately responded with copulation attempts, at which time breast color of these males was visually recorded (Table III). Because the sample size is small, no definite conclusions can be drawn. However, some birds with buff- and light-orange-colored breasts did attempt copulation. This does not support Bent (1942) and Chapman (1912), who report that male Barn Swallows have dark-orange breasts. Vietinghoff-Riesch (1964) has suggested that, in Europe, breast color differences may be due to a number of different races of Hirundo. However, the fact that male birds with differentcolored breasts were found in the same barn or seen paired makes the hypothesis doubtful. Rather, all the above data support the idea that breast color is not a good indication of sex. TABLE III The Number of Breast Color Classes For 24 Adult Male Barn Swallows Which A ttempted Copulation With A Taxidermy Mount Breast Color Class Number buff 4 >non significant difference light orange 8 >non significant difference medium orange 6 >non significant difference dark orange 6
DAVID E. SAMUEL Vol. 71 thesis that older birds have both darker breasts and longer tails. However, more data would be needed to demonstrate the validity of these hypotheses. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Financial support was provided by the American Museum of Natural History through Frank M. Chapman Memorial Grants in 1967 and 1968. Additional support was provided by a National Science Foundation Summer Traineeship in 1967. The manuscript was typed by Miss Charlotte Lemley. This study would not have been possible without the constant support and advice of Dr. W. N. Bradshaw. LITERATURE CITED Bent, A. C. 1942. Life histories of North American flycatchers, larks, swallows, and their allies. U. S. Natl. Mus. Bull. 179: 538 p. Chapman, F. M. 1912. Color Key to North American Birds. D. Appleton and Co., New York. 356 p. Samuel, D. E. 1969. The ecology, behavior and vocalizations of sympatric Barn and Cliff Swallows in West Virginia. Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, West Virginia Univ. — 1970. Banding, paint-marking and subsequent movements of Barn and Cliff Swallows. Bird Banding 41(2): 97-103. Vietinghoff-Riesch, A. 1955. Die Rauchschwalbe. Dunker und Humblot, Schleisheimer Strasse 68, Munchen 13, Germany. 302 p.
October 25th, 2007
jeb.biologists.org
Kirsty J. Park1,*, Mikael Rosén2 and Anders Hedenström2
1 Department of Biological Sciences, University of Stirling, Stirling FK9 4LA, UK and
2 Department of Animal Ecology, Lund University, SE-223 62 Lund, Sweden
*Author for correspondence (e-mail: k.j.park@stir.ac.uk)
Two barn swallows (Hirundo rustica) flying in the Lund wind tunnel were filmed using synchronised high-speed cameras to obtain posterior, ventral and lateral views of the birds in horizontal flapping flight.
We investigated wingbeat kinematics, body tilt angle, tail spread and angle of attack at speeds of 4–14ms-1. Wingbeat frequency showed a clear U-shaped relationship with air speed with minima at 8.9ms-1(bird 1) and 8.7ms-1 (bird 2). A method previously used by other authors of estimating the body drag coefficient (CD,par) by obtaining agreement between the calculated minimum power (Vmin) and the observed minimum wingbeat frequency does not appear to be valid in this species, possibly due to upstroke pauses that occur at intermediate and high speeds, causing the apparent wingbeat frequency to be lower. These upstroke pauses represent flap-gliding, which is possibly a way of adjusting the force generated to the requirements at medium and high speeds, similar to the flap-bound mode of flight in other species. Body tilt angle, tail spread and angle of attack all increase with decreasing speed, thereby providing an additional lift surface and suggesting an important aerodynamic function for the tail at low speeds in forward flight. Results from this study indicate the high plasticity in the wingbeat kinematics and use of the tail that birds have available to them in order to adjust the lift and power output required for flight.
Key words: flight, kinematics, wind tunnel, flap-gliding, barn swallow, Hirundo rustica.
October 24th, 2007
Cyprus Mail, Cyprus - Sep 30, 2007
By Jane Stylianou
The amazing movement of birds around the globe has fascinated people for centuries
BIRD MIGRATION has fascinated people for centuries. No humans can equal the movements of some birds on migration. For example, no human population moves each year as far as the Arctic Tern (Sterna paradisaea) which breeds in the Arctic and winters in the Antarctic, travelling between the poles twice a year.
As long ago as Old Testament times, people were aware that some birds came and went according to the seasons. The best evidence can be found in this quote from the book of Jeremiah: ‘Yea, the stork in the heaven knoweth her appointed times; and the swallow and the crane observe the time of their coming.’ It also appears that migratory quails provided food for the Israelites as they wandered in the Sinai desert.
Both ancient Greek and Roman writers commented on the movement of birds. Homer described the Trojan army as being like ‘cranes fleeing from the coming winter and sudden rains’. Aristotle was one of the first writers to make a serious attempt to explain migration: he realised that some birds remained throughout the winter while others moved south.
Aristotle may have been observant, even noticing that birds put on weight before setting off on migration, but he didn’t quite get it all right. He seemed to believe that some birds turned into others – for example redstarts (Phoenicurus phoenicurus) became robins (Erithacus rubecula) in the winter. His belief that swallows (Hirundo rustica) hibernated during the colder months was still a common explanation for their disappearance in autumn right up to the nineteenth century. The fact that they were often seen over water as autumn approached led to this theory. It was believed that the birds congregated on reeds until finally their accumulated weight bent them into the water, submerging the birds, which then settled for a long winter’s (underwater!) nap. To support this, it was claimed that fishermen sometimes found swallows in their fishing nets.
Even where it was accepted that large birds such as storks and cranes moved between continents it was not believed that small birds could do so. Another theory was that the larger species carried smaller birds such as warblers and thrushes on their backs. Native Americans believed that geese carried tiny hummingbirds in this way.
Eventually, such myths were dispelled and it was shown that all kinds of birds could make huge journeys in search of the right conditions to ensure the correct food supplies at all times of the year. As bird specimens were collected for museums, the general patterns became known. The places where swallows were shot in Europe and Africa showed the progression of their journeys. However it was not until birds were marked in an individually identifiable way that exact patterns were revealed.
At the start of the twentieth century, a scientific programme of bird ringing was introduced. This began a worldwide ‘field experiment’ that is still in progress and expanding more than 100 years later. This system of marking an individual bird has made a great contribution to clarifying facts about migration. Over 200 million individual birds have been ringed worldwide, helping to reveal a network of migration routes encompassing the globe used annually by over 50 billion birds.
Ringing can only be carried out by certified, trained and licensed ‘ringers’. They usually work at places where lots of migrants pass, and use nets with a very fine mesh, which they set up between bushes to catch the passing birds. Unlike their illegal Cyprus counterparts the bird-trappers, ringers employ skill and experience to ensure that the birds are not harmed or distressed. They are untangled from the nets carefully, identified and a small number-bearing, aluminium-alloy ring is fitted onto one leg. There are different sized rings for different birds. Each number is unique, showing where and when the bird was found. Before the bird is released it is measured and details about its size, weight and age are recorded. The rings are lightweight and have no adverse effect on the birds. This means that when a ringed bird is re-trapped or found dead it can be identified.
A ringing scheme has operated here in Cyprus for many years. Hundreds of birds are usually ringed each year – ranging from birds of prey to warblers. Local populations of some birds e.g House Martins (Delichon urbica), Cyprus Warblers (Sylvia melanothorax) and Sardinian Warblers (Sylvia melanocephala) have also been ringed to help with population studies. Birds ringed in other countries have been recovered here. In 2005, a Bee-eater (Merops apiaster) ringed in Israel was discovered, as was a Barn Swallow from Finland and several warblers ringed in Hungary.
Ringing shows that most of the migrants that pass through Cyprus spend the summer in central and eastern Europe, some reaching as far as Finland. Many scientists feel that as ringing relies on the unlikely event of a bird being either re-caught or found dead, its usefulness will be superseded by other methods such as satellite or radar tracking. Yet ringing undoubtedly still has a role to play in aiding scientists solve such mysteries as how birds find their way and how they know when to time their migration.
n If you want to know more about Cyprus’ birds or are interested in joining BirdLife Cyprus please contact P.O. Box 28076, 2090 Nicosia, telephone 22455072 or e-mail birdlifecy@cytanet.com.cy
In addition join us over the weekend of 6th and 7th October at events for Eurobirdwatch. These include a display of bird ringing; also for a walk at Phassouri reed beds on 21st October. Call 99059541 for details.
Copyright © Cyprus Mail 2007
October 23rd, 2007
cubby-hole.com
Bird’s Nest Soup is reputed to have medicinal properties. It is certainly very expensive.
While on a cruise in the Andaman sea off the coast of Thailand near Phuket, we stopped at an island where we visited a cave. The cave had a very high roof on which swallows built their nests.
Men would shin up poles made from several long bamboo shafts, which had been tied together, to collect the nests. I was surprised to see that the nests that were brought down were not collections of interwoven twigs or grasses, but whitish lumps of something hard. These nest lumps were apparently dried swallow saliva.
Later we visited a restaurant to sample bird’s nest soup. We tried two varieties, each of which cost US$10 (this was in 1996). The first was warm and sweet and watery and left a slight after taste of vomit. The second was cold, glutinous, unsweetened and really didn’t taste of anything at all. It was much like eating chilled mucous, which is hardly surprising, since that is what it was.
I have often wondered who the first person was, who risked their life to collect a bird’s nest and then decided they should eat it. All I can say is that they must have been very hungry. Consuming bird’s nest soup is an experience, which I have no desire to repeat.
Copyright Cubby-Hole.com
October 22nd, 2007
North Devon Gazette & Advertiser, UK - Sep 26, 2007
THEIR nest has gone to pot, but a family of young swallows are happy in a newly improvised home.
Warren and Margaret Golder of St Giles-in-the-Wood have welcomed the swallows to nest in their “tea house” in their Japanese style garden for the past three years.
But this year the swallows came unstuck, their mud nest falling from the timber beam to which it was attached and crashing to the ground - complete with four babies.
But the couple were at hand to save the day and Warren promptly scooped up the nest and nestlings. After a quick scratch of the head he found a plastic plant pot and nailed it close to where the nest had been cemented. Within minutes the nest and its occupants were “planted” in the pot and the parent birds arrived back to continue feeding their unharmed young. The youngsters are almost fully fledged and will soon leave the potting shed - er, St Giles-in-the-Wood Japanese Tea House.
October 19th, 2007
Orlando Sentinel, FL - Oct 13, 2007
Imperiled woodpeckers are nestled in a Disney preserve.
Kevin Spear | Sentinel Staff Writer
October 13, 2007
POINCIANA - The kidnapped woodpecker awoke Friday in a stranger’s nest in the rural outskirts of Orlando.
Guided by instinct, it flitted into the sky at the first glimmer of sunrise to eat and, if all goes according to plan, find a mate and take up residence.
One of the world’s rare and most imperiled birds, the red-cockaded woodpecker and nine others had been captured 36 hours earlier in a national forest near Tallahassee.
Releasing them in the 12,000-acre Disney Wilderness Preserve was part of a broader effort to ensure that the woodpeckers outlast their brush with extinction.
“We have 10 birds flying the wild,” said Monica Folk, a biologist with The Nature Conservancy, which manages the Disney preserve where none of the woodpeckers has lived for decades. “We hope they explore the site, and they find each other.”
The repopulation effort, along with others like it in Florida, is perhaps the most demanding test yet of whether efforts to buy and restore habitat are working. The one measure key to the birds’ recovery is to provide them with large, healthy forests.
Survival of nearly any endangered species depends ultimately on whether there’s enough forest, wetlands or other habitat. That’s especially true with red-cockaded woodpeckers, whose name comes from a barely visible slash of scarlet on each side of their heads.
Left on their own, the birds are picky about the trees they select to bore into.
“Red-cockaded woodpeckers as a species have declined because they rely on old-growth pine forests,” Folk said. “They like to put cavities in trees that are at least 80 years old and more like 100 or 150 years old.”
Unfortunately, Folk said, timber cutters spared few Florida woods.
“Which means all of the old pine trees are gone, which means red-cockaded woodpeckers don’t have their preferred habitat,” she said.
The federal government lists red-cockaded woodpeckers as endangered, while Florida has placed the bird in the less-imperiled category of species of special concern.
Though healthy habitat is essential, reviving an endangered species often involves a single but critically important measure. With bald eagles, for example, it was a ban on DDT pesticides.
Alligators recovered after hunting was prohibited. Manatee survival hinges on preventing lethal encounters with boat propellers.
Red-cockaded woodpeckers also have benefited greatly from one particular response by biologists: They’ve figured out how to make nest cavities.
A pre-fabricated home is made by boring an entrance and an 8-inch-wide pocket into a block of cedar. The carved chunk of wood is then installed in a large notch, cut at least a 12 feet high into the trunk of a pine tree.
The result is a minor miracle: Red-cockaded woodpeckers readily adapt to these artificial homes.
“We are speeding along recovery with the [nest cavity] inserts, but it’s not really self-sustaining,” said Jim Cox, a biologist at Tall Timbers Research Station near Tallahassee, where the woodpeckers were recently reintroduced.
Until Florida forests mature enough to naturally host red-cockaded woodpeckers, the birds must be carefully watched, Cox said.
That’s likely to happen at the Disney Wilderness Preserve, a spread of wetlands and forest once fenced, drained and cultivated as cattle pasture. The ranch land became a preserve in 1992, a transformation primarily made possible by payments from Walt Disney Co. as compensation for development in environmentally sensitive lands.
Folk said one of her top goals 15 years ago was to bring the woodpeckers back to the landscape, an effort finally made possible by a federally supported program.
Robin Boughton, a biologist with the state Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission in Ocala, said about 50 pairs of woodpeckers are relocated each year within Florida, Georgia, Alabama and Mississippi.
Until recently, most birds were sent to forests that already had some birds “so that small populations didn’t blink out,” Boughton said.
Now, the relocation effort aims to reintroduce birds into protected forests where pine trees will have the chance to grow old. The Disney Wilderness Preserve is the fifth such site in Florida.
At sunset Thursday, five male-female pairs were taken to five areas, with each already prepared with artificial nests. When darkness came, the sleepy birds were placed into their prefab homes, which were sealed shut with plastic screening and thumbtacks.
At daybreak Friday, the same biologists tiptoed back to the trees and tugged on strings attached to the screening.
Nobody will return to the release sites for at least two months, and even then only for a quick look.
“Now that we have been managing the site for 15 years, we feel it’s back in its original condition almost, except for the old trees,” Folk said. “We’re putting that species back to see if it can thrive.”
Kevin Spear can be reached at kspear@orlandosentinel.com or 407-420-5062.
October 18th, 2007
Toronto Star, Canada - Oct 1, 2007
Oct 01, 2007 04:30 AM
Andrea Gordon
Family issues reporter
Teenage boys take up so much space. And then they go, leaving a hole so big it threatens to swallow you.
One of mine departed this fall for university – the first in the family to spread his wings and glide from the precipice. He was ready. So were we – so we thought. Our crammed house, overrun with testosterone, sprawling limbs, giant Adidas heaped at the door, can barely contain the raw energy of four kids on the cusp.
But still.
The windup to the day of departure seems to take forever, lulling you into thinking it will never come. The information sessions, campus tours, pressing decisions follow one after another. Months of deadlines. Will he pass calculus? Where’s Jeremy going? What about Dylan?
Then it’s on the horizon. And there’s a rush of assembling towels and pillows and USB cords, changing cellphone numbers, choosing meal plans, endless circuits of goodbyes to friends going off in different directions.
Parents cram too: “Remember how lucky you are. Make the most of it.” “Look out for your friends at parties.” “Don’t forget you can go to the health centre anytime.”
My acknowledgment comes in the form of an indulgent smile. A sigh. “Yeah, we covered that.”
Best to remember the words of a wise friend: “It’s time to let go. The damage is done.”
And suddenly there you are. Helping them unpack, hugging them goodbye, trying not to give way to the uncharacteristic crack in your voice.
“Mum, it’s only till Thanksgiving. I was gone longer than that this summer.”
But I can tell this boy of mine, who has always felt each rite of passage deeply, understands this time it’s different. That things will never be the same.
Then you’re on the highway, weeping as your mind watches a PowerPoint of the childhood that whizzed by at Internet speed.
Images of his first birthday, the toothless grin, fists planted in the cake. Of him marching up the steps to kindergarten, never looking back. The first soccer goal. His squeaky voice reading Grandma and the Pirates to the little brothers. The saxophone solo that still makes you tingle with pride.
Our first-born has always moved in a swirl of energy, like Pigpen and his cloud of dust, hip-checking, guffawing, bellowing exuberance. Every balled-up pair of socks is a mock soccer ball to be dribbled through the house. No silence is too precious to be broken with the wail of a sax or a brotherly taunt.
After he’s gone, happily ensconced in Orientation Week, we are the ones most disoriented.
I’ve heard it said that the family unit is like a mobile. Move one dangling piece and the rest are sent lurching. Ours has settled into a gentle sway. But we haven’t rebalanced.
At the dinner table, we switch seats, trying to offset the strangeness of the empty spot.
Heading upstairs to bed on a Saturday evening, it’s still jarring to pass the front door and realize, oh yeah, we can lock it. We needn’t sleep with one ear open for the sound of him clomping onto the porch, slipping up to whisper good night.
I miss the comfort of those nights, with all the chicks settled into the nest, knowing that for the next eight hours, everyone will be safe and secure, the pieces all in place.
Friends ask about the transition, then add, “Oh yeah, no big deal, you’ve got three more.”
But each child-rearing experience is as unique as each child. And there’s no getting around the fact that this one is pretty much over.
Sometimes it gets you like a sucker punch. On a Saturday afternoon in the middle of errands, a jazz song comes on the car radio. It’s a tune his stage band played at their final spring concert. I find myself sniffling in the parking lot, aching for just one more of those magical nights. All those beaming, budding teenagers ready to burst across the threshold. The air ripe with possibility, the world beckoning.
Their growing up can help you come to terms with your own. As we bid goodbye, exactly 30 years after I arrived as a student on the same campus, I am blessed with a flood of memories. It is his gift to me, this unexpected reconnection and peacemaking with a past discarded long ago.
Experienced parents say it’s always hardest at the beginning. Then the offspring come home for that first weekend, bringing their mess, lugging laundry, eating the cupboards bare and driving you crazy. When they leave again, you’re over it.
In a few days, there will be wet towels and T-shirts three-deep on my son’s now pristine bedroom floor. Half-empty water bottles will be scattered like bowling pins. There will be wails of “there’s nothing to eat in this house,” ceaseless thundering of piano keys and sibling antics resembling the WWE. In a few days, he will be driving me crazy.
But when he leaves again, don’t expect me to be over it. Not yet. At least not until the next one leaves.
October 10th, 2007
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