The Urban Pantheist

On an invasive species walk on Jersey.

My dad and I got up from our hotel, took a cab up the windy windy narrow roads up to the "village" of Trinity (not much village to speak of really--a pub, a church) to Durrell Wildlife, which most people still know as The Jersey Zoo. They changed their name in 1995, after founder Gerry Durrell died. We hurriedly met some people, figured out where our dorm room was, dropped off our bags, and dad and I went our separate ways--he went back to St. Helier to do some tourism. I dug out my notebook and handouts and started up some school. Good introductory lectures (made even better by British accents, I confess) and then a tour of the zoo!


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I held a mushroom class at Drumlin Farm yesterday.

By most measures it was a success.  The weather was pretty much perfect; as I said to many, I may be the only person on the East Coast that was excited to see three straight days of rain in the forecast.  The class was full--in fact we allowed it to go over by two.  Everyone, seemed to like the lecture okay, and the chance to view the spore bearing surfaces through the "magiscopes." 

We explored a very short area between the Pond House and the Ice Pond.  In that short distance we found violet-toothed polypores Trichaptum biforme, mazegills Daedalea sp., coral mushroom Clavulina cristata, birds nest fungi Cyathus striatus, tons of orange jelly Dacrymyces palmatus, and tons of cap and stem mushrooms, none of which we could really identify.  And that bothered me, and I think it was a bit of a let down for some of the class, but it reflects a reality about mushrooms: they're really hard to identify to species.  It would have been nice if I'd had an hour or more to scout out the place and get a jump on the difficult ones, so that the process of identifying as a group would have bee more fruitful.

I was discussing it with Alexis this afternoon, and came up with some improvements for the next class.  When we get to the field walk part of the class, each student will have a small paper bag and something to write with.  They'll be instructed to collect a mushroom as we go, and write down the conditions that it was found in: on the ground or on wood, what kind of trees are around, etc.  Then when we get back, they'll have a whack at IDing it themselves, and I'll help out if and when they get stumped.  They may have to do it in pairs, unless they all bring field guides, because I have about 5 guides that have useful keys in them, and the class may be as many as 10 people.  Also, since I started the class outlining the goals I had, I will check in at the end, to see if those goals were met.  And I'll bring copies of my handouts, rather than relying on the easy-to-jam/no-one-to-fix copier at Drumlin.

Thanks to hissilliness  andyagagriswold  for coming!  You guys (and anyone else who likes nature and lives near Boston) should join Urban Nature Walk!

One of the best things about the new (8 months new) job is that I get to take (zoo)keeper training classes. This past week was an anatomy class, which, since it was only a single two hour session, was necessarily brief. Nonetheless, I learned some interesting stuff, and absorbed some cool facts, many of which are about sex:

Most male birds don't have penises. Only the 'primitive' orders do: the ratites (ostriches and emus and such), the cranes, the waterfowl, and the chickens (pheasants, turkeys, peacocks etc.) What was not discussed was why the penis was lost in more 'advanced' bird orders. I suspect it's all about minimizing weight for flight.

Most male reptiles are fitted with a pair of hemipenes, a forked appendage that mostly stays tucked in their cloaca (the single opening to the genital, urinary, and reproductive tracts). The hemipenes are not a penis in the sense we understand it: there is no internal channel; semen flows along grooves on the outside of the hemipenes. The hemipenes are simply a way for the male reptile to convey semen into the female's cloaca, rather than inject it.

Many male amphibians can be distinguished from females during the breeding season by the presence of nuptial pads, dark and rough patches of skin on the limbs which grasp the female during amplexus. Amplexus, for those who don't know, is what passes for mating in amphibians that lay eggs in the water (which is most of them). The male holds onto the female waiting for her to release her eggs in the water; when she does, he releases his semen. The nuptial pads provide much-needed traction, as anyone who has tried to hold onto a bullfrog can attest. The males only have these non-skid surfaces during breeding season. Sometimes people ask me the difference between a newt and a salamander. Newts are aquatic as adults, and the males develop nuptial pads for breeding. Males of other salamanders (it was explained to me) deposit a spermatophore, a packet of semen, and the female passes over it and draws it into her cloaca.

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Happy springtime to you!