Acacia sapiens

While I was sitting in the dentist’s chair recently, preparing to have some work done, he asked me what I had been up to lately? I said that I have been spending a lot of time sitting near my pond, feeding the birds and fish. A short time later, when his assistant was spraying water in my numb mouth, he said that he thought that he’d like to have a pond on his property. He began to ask a series of questions, about where and how he should have a pond dug.

My ability to provide meaningful information was compromised, of course, by both the feeling that my mouth was swollen, and choking on the water. However, I was finally able to say that if they would stop water-boarding me, I would tell them the secrets to making a pond. He asked if I was okay, and I attempted to explain that I had been making an attempt at humor. Both of them forced a laugh, proving that when one has to explain a joke, it is a sure sign that joke was not funny.

Like one of my friends – a professor at a area state university, who also wants a pond of his own, after spending time at mine – the dentist is an intelligent man, who spent most of his life in New York City, before moving to this rural upstate region. Both have an appreciation for the beauty of the land here. And although "city life" had removed them from the more intimate relationship that the small, family farmers and others have with nature, both provide evidence that human beings have a "green consciousness."

In planning a pond, there are a number of "clues" to look for, in order to choose the best spot – which, of course, is equally true for digging a well. I had several open springs in the area where my pond is; they ran throughout the year, even in the driest parts of August. A marsh or swampy area is usually a good place for a pond, though not for a well.

Rushes and/or cattails indicate that there is water close to the surface; reeds are evidence of high quality water near the surface. Pickleweed indicates salty water near the surface; saltbush suggests surface water of a lower quality. Elderberry bushes mean that good water is found about 10 feet underground. Rabbit brush will only be found where there is a good water supply no more than 15 feet deep. Mesquite indicates water will be found from 10 to 30 feet down, and black greasewood shows that highly mineralized water lies 10 to 40 feet under the surface.

It’s easy to see how knowledge of plants has been important to human beings who have lived on this land for centuries. As environmentalist Charles Lewis has noted, with water, anything is possible; without it, nothing is possible. Or as Onondaga Chief Oren Lyons notes, water is the first law of life.

In his wonderful book "Green Nature/ Human Nature" ( University of Illinois; 1996), Lewis speaks of how the understanding of plants played an important role in human evolution, long before people mastered the cultivation of plants for food. The most fascinating example he provides involves the preference that the majority of people have for the savanna biome. (A biome being the community of plants and animals inhabiting a specific region that is defined by its climate.)

A study by psychologist John Balling and ecologist John Falk showed that people of all age groups, who live in the northeastern US, express a high degree of preference for savannas. Children under the age of 12 having the highest rates of preference, which the researchers believed indicated that humans are born with a genetic predisposition for this type of biome.

Further evidence of this can be found in the parks in our nation’s urban areas. The most popular types of trees for parks tend to be the smaller types, with a trunk that branches out close to the ground, which spread into a multi-layered canopy. These are, of course, very similar to the Acacia tortilis that are found on the African savanna. We often think of these trees as providing a degree of safety for our early ancestors, but there is something that is equally, if not more important: these trees have a distinct relationship with water. In the areas of the savanna that have more ground water, the trees grow significantly higher, and feature a taller canopy. In the dry areas, the smaller, umbrella-shaped trees are found; more, they grow in spots where water is available. Thus, early humans recognized that the shape of the tree was associated with the water necessary for survival in the savanna biome.

As human culture has evolved, there has been an unfortunate tendency to take water for granted. This is evident in urbane areas, where people’s relationship to water comes out of a faucet, or a plastic bottle in a store. But just as our ancestors learned to read the signals from the Acacia, and then the weather patterns, we must become fully aware that there is a storm brewing on the horizon. And, for many parts of this country – and indeed the world – that storm is already posing a serious threat to people’s existence. Clean water cannot be taken for granted.

What we dump into the water, for example, flows downstream to the next community. This is not only true in the sense of distance, but also in the context of time: what was done yesterday, and the day before, is reaching our communities today. And what we do today will impact the community tomorrow.

There are already "water wars" taking place in America. Corporations are attempting to impose unnatural "water rights" on communities of human beings. In this context, those running these companies are seeking to create corporate biomes that deny access to water to all other living things: the plants and animals that are part of the web of life that support all life on this earth. In his book "Angler: The Cheney Vice Presidency," author Barton Gellman documents how VP Cheney and his side-kick Ron Christie lead the efforts to twist our nation’s environmental laws, to provide "water rights" to favored corporations.

The answers to these challenges will not be found in unnatural settings. This is a good time to seek out those natural settings that communicate with our green/human consciousness.

Recommended.

... that makes me want to sun myself on one of those flat rocks on a 85-90-degree day. Bucolic. When I was in my early teens, summers skinny-dipping in the creek were HEAVEN. There's nothing that money could buy that match the sheer pleasure of such times.

K&R

. . . is astounding.

I remember when we found our well and large pond in the Penn. hills had been polluted from several sources. It looked like water, but you couldn't drink it or swim in it. A flock of geese landed on the pond the last time I was able to camp out there before the property was sold (I had been up walking to meet the dawn after an agonizingly sleepless night of rain under my lean-to). The birds broke the perfect silence with a thunderclap of noise and almost immediately a couple of the larger ones spotted me squatting down a bit off to the side of them, broke off from the rest and swam a ways toward me - checked me out - then returned to the rest who started up honking even louder. As I watched, they formed a rough circle on the water around a pair who, at first glance, looked to be fighting. As they flapped their wings to suspend them upright on the surface of the pond, honking loudly, they moved close to one another and partly entwined their graceful necks together as they glided on the water.

A short eternity of this and they were gone, the pond silent and still again.

I wonder what became of that pond? I can only imagine the worst.

I stopped feeding the lawn, even with the little fertilizer I had been using. I tore up the perfect grass and planted perennials instead after I saw the algae explosion in the lake down the path at the bottom of our street. Most of the houses surrounding it have these huge lawns in front of their homes which get all of the lawn-doctoring feeding they can afford. In our suburbs and elsewhere in my region, its the threat from high nitrogen and potassium from lawns and farm fertilizers which is the most immediate threat to our lakes and ponds.

(I read that, in Vietnam, about 70% of their water sources are polluted with ammonia. That, on an island.)

Thanks for the read.

Description of the birds. That was so lovely and true.

I too am horrified about how much of the natural world is routinely killed off. When pesticides were first marketed, the farmers still added lime and potassium and other elements onto the land. Now people only use the pesticides and herbicides.

Nowadays, everyone just sprays that crap constantly. There are no microbes below the grass blades thrumming with their aliveness and doing their thrilling work. It is all about chemicals and more chemicals. Since that is so unhealthy, nature will attempt to send even more weeds up into the lawn area, trying to rebuild what the chems have devastated.

Showing their disconnect from where their water comes from, people tend to hate rain.

But then, water is a dry subject, eh?

Not big enough to swim in, but entirely organic, no chemicals.

Our yard has become a bird sanctuary. It's especially fun to watch the male hummingbirds arguing about who's territory our small fountain is. I suppose if you are a male hummingbird who controls the territory that includes the water fountain you get all the hot babes.

My wife's parents have a place very similar to the one in your photo.

Ron Christie who also at Cheney's behest did his best to steal the Native Americans blind. Wonder what all his skulduggery gained him. Respect? BFF? Cash on the barrel-head?

for a moment. Thought you were referring to me.

He is the perfect under cover malefactor. People look at him spouting the company ;one and think he's a stupe. His appearance aids and abets that notion. The truth is he is a really scary guy who doesn't mind doing some heavy lifting and very dirty work for his lord and master Cheney.


As for you, malefactors and clowns shouldn't be fooled by the fact that you have a deep appreciation for and understanding of what's important in life.

Great post, thank you...

thank you!

Bernd Heinrich's writings on his observations of the natural world. Have you ever read any of his books?

http://books.google.com/books?as_auth=Bernd+Heinrich&source=an&ei=T1kVSo-nEtG_twfu_vX6DA&sa=X&oi=book_group&ct=title&cad=author-navigational&resnum=4

:kick: