Tales From the Wild Side
Spring 2022
Board of Directors
President Ilka Milne
Vice-President Mike Hammond
Secretary Gaby Emond
Treasurer Henry Van Ael
Committees
Newsletter Ilka Milne & Bob Saunders
Website Ilka Milne & Bob Saunders
Events Ilka Milne & Bob Saunders
Boardwalk Ahlan Johanson & Mike Hammond
Publicity Henry Miller & Ilka Milne
Stewardship Liaison Gaby Emond
Two years have passed since we first started this website as an attempt to attract new members to the club. Three months later the Covid-19 pandemic was declared, and our hopes to do that had to be put on hold. We are now at a point where mask mandates have mostly been lifted, and many people have treated this as an opportunity to return to normal. Unfortunately, the pandemic is far from over, as much as we wish it to be. There is no way of stating when people will feel completely comfortable attending our meetings or events, so, until then, we’ll just have to enjoy nature in our own way. Hopefully we will be able to hold some field trips this spring and summer.
For many people the last two years have been a difficult time. Our concerns about the pandemic have been worrisome enough, but now we have the sad and senseless invasion of Ukraine by Russia to keep us in a state of anger and dread, along with a sense of guilt as news from Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen, Ethiopia fade from the news cycle, yet those horrors have not diminished. Throughout the world there has been as assault on democracy and even here in Canada there are those who advocate for the same. Rule by the strongest arm or the loudest voice.
I can’t help but be reminded of a line from a sonnet by William Wordsworth, “The World is Too Much With Us”, for me one of the greatest nature poems written. In it he decries how materialism brought about by industrialization has led to a break with nature, and that we need nature to progress spiritually. For me, nature is an escape from the horrors that we are constantly reminded of, from “the world that is too much with us”. I can’t imagine my life without nature. Nature is a healer; it binds our psychic wounds.
So, if we can’t meet in person, then try to enjoy nature by yourself, a friend, or a loved one. There is so much wonder to marvel at and enjoy, and for a few moments, at least, the misfortunes of the world will ebb away.
Poetry Corner
William Wordsworth (1770-1850) was one of the founders and central figures of English Romanticism. The writers of this period were very much concerned with spirituality in terms of more than one deity and one religion. They thought it could be best be understood by immersing oneself in nature and by expressing those feelings through natural speech. They felt most of the ills of society were caused by urbanization and industrialization. Although that period is generally considered to have lasted from approximately 1780 to 1830, those themes don’t seem that different from today.
Among Wordsworth’s most well known poems are “The World is Too Much With Us” and “I Wandered Lonely As a Cloud”, also known as “Daffodils”. The latter poem was the poem that ruined my appreciation of poetry for many years. Well, not the poem itself, but my Grade Five teacher who made us memorize the poem. But in this case, she insisted that we no only learn the words but also the punctuation . In order to avoid the wrath of the teacher and a bad mark, I memorized the poem in this way: “I wandered lonely as a cloud (new line) That floats on high o’er vales and hills (comma, new line)” and so on. If that doesn’t ruin a child’s appreciation of poetry, I don’t know what would. Teachers could do no better than take the advice of Billy Collins from his poem, “Introduction to Poetry”, “I ask them to take a poem and hold it up to the light like a colour slide……but all they want to do is tie the poem to a chair with rope and torture a confession out of it. They begin beating it with a hose to find out what it really means.”
The World is Too Much With Us William Wordsworth
The world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending we lay waste our powers;
Little we see in Nature that is ours;
We have given out hearts away, a sordid boon!
This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon,
The winds that will be howling at all hours,
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers,
For this, for everything. We are out of tune;
It moves us not. -Great God! I’d rather be
A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;
Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea;
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn.
I Wandered Lonely As a Cloud William Wordsworth
I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o’er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.
Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.
The waves beside them danced; but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:
A poet could not be gay,
In such a jocund company:
I gazed – and gazed – but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:
For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.
Night Sky
MESSIER 51 THE WHIRLPOOL GALAXY
Article by Fred Pugh
Messier 51, also known as the Whirlpool Galaxy, was discovered by Charles Messier on October 13, 1773 in the constellation Canes Venatici (figure 1). Messier had been observing a comet when he noticed an object which he described as a very faint nebula. He would later add this object to his catalogue as M51. At magnitude 8.4 and an angular size in the sky of 11 x 7 arcminutes, The Whirlpool is one of the brightest and most famous galaxies in the northern hemisphere and under a dark sky can be seen with binoculars but is too small to photograph without a telescope. It is about 1/3 the size of our Milky Way Galaxy at 43000 light years in diameter, lies 23million light years from Earth and contains 160 billion solar masses.
M51 is a grand design spiral galaxy that is seen face on from Earth and was named the Whirlpool Galaxy because of its winding structure. It is classified as a Seyfert 2 galaxy, a galaxy with high surface brightness, a bright core and very prominent in the infrared spectrum. The Whirlpool is interacting with a smaller companion galaxy called NGC 5195 and there is a tidal bridge containing dust and stars that appears to connect the two galaxies. It is thought that NGC 5195 approached M51 from roughly along our line of sight from Earth and is now behind the larger galaxy. The disc of the smaller galaxy has been highly distorted and now is classified as an irregular galaxy. NGC 5195 was not discovered until 1781 by Pierre Mechain. The interaction between the two galaxies has set off a large amount of new star formation within The Whirlpool and 3 supernova have been observed by astronomers. Eventually M51 and NGC 5195 will merge as one galaxy after a few more passes. The best months to observe the Whirlpool are April and May when Canes Venatici is highest in the sky. I took this photo of Messier 51 on May 9, 2021 (figures 2, 3). I had photographed this object before but under conditions that were less than ideal and also with fewer frames than I would have liked so was never very happy with the final picture. I had managed to get my setup polar aligned the night before in anticipation of some good nights ahead and was very anxious to get started because there was no moon and the sky was gorgeous. This was my first attempt at astrophotography for the season and I wanted to take as many 5 minute exposures as possible in one night, hoping for at least 18-20 good shots for stacking. Unfortunately I was very rusty and just about everything that could go wrong, did go wrong. After working my way through several minor problems that were all caused by my hurry to start taking photos, I ran into a major problem. The mount was tracking poorly which caused me to abandon my first 5 pictures part way through the exposures. I had lost at least an hour by this time and could not figure out what was causing the mount to drift so badly. I tried several things which did not fix the problem before finally realizing that I had forgotten to check the balance of the telescope. The telescope was seriously out of balance which was causing undue strain on the workings of the mount. After re-setting the counterweight the mount was finally tracking properly and ready to take photos with round stars but by this time almost two hours were lost. Fortunately the rest of the night went much better but I was only able to get 10 light frames before morning, no where near the 18-20 that I was hoping for. My expectations for improving on my earlier photos were not very high due to the low number of light frames but I was pleasantly surprised with the final result, probably because the sky was so pristine that night. On close inspection in the cropped view, several pink nebula are visible. These are the stellar nurseries where new stars are forming as a result of the collision with the companion galaxy. The wispiness, especially around the companion galaxy, is caused by the millions of stars as well as dust that have been gravitationally drawn out.
Telescope – Stellarvue SVA130T 5.1” Apochromatic Refractor
Focal length – 650mm
Focal ratio – f5
Camera – SBIG STF 8300C
Camera Temperature – set to -23C
Mount – Celestron CGEM DX
Light Frames – 10 at 5 minutes each
Dark Frames – 16 at 5 minutes each
Flat Frames – 20 at .01 second each
Dark Flat Frames – 20 at .01 second each
Inspected 10 light frames and used all in the stack
Converted all frames from RAW to FITS files
Stacked in deepskystacker to reduce noise and enhance signal
Imported into Photoshop to stretch data, smooth remaining noise, enhance color and sharpen
Clear Skies!
From the Homestead
Fallin’ In Love
Aaron Wenger
Back in another space and time going to work meant walking ’bout three-quarter of a mile out a logging road to where we kept a car, well a Volkswagan anyway. In the Spring especially, the logging road broke up into mud and sticks. It was too thin to drive on and too warm to hold a snowshoe path, so we hiked out to 613, drove to Fort Frances, and then to Int’l Falls and teaching physics at the college.
This was about mid April, most of snow gone, just a hit of green coming on in the aspen trees, warmer air sliding up from the South, and a general feeling that there would be a Summer one of these days. I was young enough back then to to fall in love with all this, even though it was dead certain that April would be unfaithful to a physicist and bring back one more snow.
Some folk believe that us smart apes are the only thinking things on planet. All else operates with just some kinda instinct they’d say. Not me. I’ve had a wolf consider me, my dog, and his options as I considered his eyes. I had a mama bear nearly run into me while I was looking for morels along with my love and my son. That too was in the Spring, momma bear was hungry and the dog was easy meat. Instead she considered us, and she left the dog with me and took her cubs away. Neither that wolf nor the bear operated on instinct any more than me. There are real differences in what all of us Earthlings can be and do, but at our deep bases we share layers of heart, or if you want soul with other creatures of the same planet.
With such a belief I watched that April as two ravens indeed fell in love. The road from our log house there on Northwest Bay to town led me through some scrub farm country along the way. Early Spring like this the hay fields were just the Winters beaten down grass. Anyone who’s farmed knows that you leave the the hay field alone after one maybe two cuttings to allow the grass to recover enough to keep from freezing out come Winter. Snow bends the standing grass over and makes a kind of blanket to keep the minus forty at bay. This April day had a warmed sun shining, and a kind of promise in the air.
Over to my left above the field were two ravens feeling the sun on their black backs. It was a kind of dance in the sky as first one then the other would barrel roll, or pull up nearly vertical and fall off on a wing in a stall. They did near loops, but fell out into a down swoop near the top of the loop. They’d bank so sharp that the air couldn’t hold them, and they’d lose a hundred feet of altitude. I stoped the car and got out, and I imagined myself among them, I whooped in appreciation just to be alive on this planet with such creatures and such artistry.
Suddenly one of them rolled and got inverted, on its back, and the other flew within an inch I swear of the inverted raven. They clasped talons. Neither could really fly now, wings were entangled. They began to fall out of the sky that had been holding them. It seemed they knew what they were doing, both held their wings loose but outstretched, they were in a slow flat spin to the ground. I was silent, maybe scared for them. Some seconds passed, who knows no one was counting, I was barely breathing, they hit the ground, but gently it seemed and the winter’s flattened grass caught them like a deep bed. They were maybe ten yards from where I stood.
I didn’t write this to lie to ya, and I’m not gonna censor myself, so I’ll tell ya believe me or not. Each disentangled from the other, turned toward me, gave two wingbeats and flew off within a foot of my head. I whooped some more and gave thanks for love that I had been privileged to be a very small part of that Spring day in April of about 1978.
Avian Influenza
Wild birds are playing a key role in the spread of a highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI, commonly know as bird flu) outbreak in North America this spring. The first 2021/2022 detection of Eurasian strain (EA) highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) H5N1 in North America occurred in December 2021 in Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada. Subsequently, HPAI EA H5 and EA H5N1 viruses have been confirmed in wild birds, backyard flocks, and commercial poultry facilities in both Canada and the United States (Figure 1.)
The Canadian Wildlife Service (CWS) cautions that this HPAI outbreak is “rapidly evolving” and says it expects more detected cases over the following weeks as migratory birds return to their northern haunts. HPAI is highly transmissible and poses the greatest threat to domestic poultry, where it can cause high rates of disease and mortality. Infected birds may show lack of energy, movement or appetite, decreased egg production, swelling around the head, neck and eyes, coughing, gasping for air or sneezing, nervous signs, tremors or lack of coordination, diarrhea or sudden death.
Wild birds, especially certain species of waterfowl, shorebirds and gulls, are considered to be natural reservoirs for avian influence viruses. The subtypes that naturally occur in wild species usually cause little or no disease. In domestic birds, however, some AI viruses can be most pathogenic and mutation or recombination of a virus acquired from wild birds can increase disease potential. During 2015 HPAI virus, subtype H5N2 was associated with a large domestic poultry outbreak in North America that affected over 49 million domestic birds. That outbreak cost approximately $1 billion and was the most expensive animal health emergency in the USDA history.
Avian influenza viruses are classified by a combination of two groups of proteins found on the surface of the virus: hemagglutinin proteins (HA), of which there are 18 (H1-H18), and neuraminidase proteins (NA), of which there are 11 (N1-N11). Many different combinations of HA and NA proteins are possible. AI strains are divided into two groups based on the pathogenicity of the virus, or the ability of the virus to produce disease. Most AI strains are classified as low pathogenic avian influenza (LPAI) and cause few clinical signs in infected birds. LPAI generally does not pose a significant health threat to humans. However, LPAI is monitored because two strains of LPAI— the H5 and H7 strains–can mutate into highly pathogenic forms. On the other hand, highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) strains frequently fatal to birds and easily transmissible between susceptible species.
Eurasian strains of avian influenza viruses enter North America predominantly through the Pacific Flyway (Figure 2). However, AIV also infects poultry and wild ducks in Europe and migrating wild birds that use the east Atlantic flyway also risk introducing AIV to North America. In fact, the first 2021 detection in North America occurred in Newfoundland and Labrador. Even though the viruses likely evolved in Asia, they easily infect and spread among North American wild birds.
The majority of AI viruses naturally found in wild birds do not consist of H5 or H7 subtypes. These viruses are not classified as LPAI or HPAI, but they can exchange genetic material with LPAI and HPAI viruses to create new strains of pathogenic viruses. Wild waterfowl are often infected with AI viruses and do not usually show signs of disease. However, active infection of Eurasian H5 HPAI has been confirmed in several Canada geese and have shown clinical signs of the disease (swimming in circles, twisted necks, tremors) prior to death. Some raptor species appear to be highly vulnerable, and their deaths are most likely caused by eating infected birds
Wild waterfowl and other species shed the virus into the environment through their oral and nasal secretions and feces. Although it is possible for domestic poultry to become infected with AI from direct contact with wild birds, the actual method of transmission is not well known. Data to date, however, suggest that it is more likely that AI viruses are spread indirectly to poultry on contaminated feed, clothing and equipment. The CWS recommends that members of the public should not handle live wild birds or those found dead. If contact with wild birds is unavoidable, the CWS advises to wear gloves or use a doubled plastic bag and to avoid contact with blood, body fluids and feces. This should be followed by a thorough hand washing with soap and warm water.
The CWS asks those who observe sick or dead birds and suspect that disease may be involved, contact the Canadian Wildlife Health Cooperative at 866-673-4781 or report online at cwhc.wildlifesubmissions.org Regarding bird feeding, the Ministry of Environment and Climate Change is advising people not to handle or feed any wild bird by hand. Feeding encourages wild birds to congregate around food sources and can increase the probability of transmission among wild birds, both within and among species.
Having said that they still say the use of bird feeders is safe but advise to remove feeders from areas that are open to poultry and other domestic animals. They also advise those who care for poultry to prevent contact between wild birds and poultry by removing exterior/outdoor sources of food, water and shelter that attract wild birds. It is advised to use a weak solution of domestic bleach (10 per cent sodium hypochlorite) to clean bird feeders. Ensure they are well rinsed and dried before re-use.
Sources: The Times, Minden, Ontario; USGS; CWS
