Unseen City

by Nathanael Johnson

  As more people have moved to cities, a romantic mode of thinking about nature has grown more dominant. If you ask city dwellers if they want to preserve biodiversity, the vast majority say yes, but that’s very different from truly valuing the natural world. It’s all very well to romanticize nature when it is far away, but the real test comes when nature asserts itself in our lives. Then we remember that nature is not only awe-inspiring, but also annoying, capricious, deadly. We are alienated from the natural world, and so we long for it—or at least for an Edenic version of it that never existed. However, if we can see the urban wilderness all around us, I think we will engage with nature more realistically. Instead of glorifying only untouched wilderness, we might build an environmental ethic that allows humans and nature to live together, an ethic that—instead of telling us to stop spoiling nature—would tell us how to use nature to support ourselves.

  We might begin to honor and respect the people who deal directly with the natural world—the farmers, the miners, the loggers—who make our lives possible. City dwellers often denounce these people for defiling nature while simultaneously demanding the raw materials they provide. If we had a more realistic sense of the give-and-take necessary for living with nature, we might begin to value their hands-on experience. We might see that we need their practical knowledge to guide us to true sustainability.

  How do we reach that place where we might use nature carefully, mindfully, to meet the needs of humanity? The first step is to stop thinking of nature as something far away that we must save from someone else and start seeing it all around us. The first step is to open our eyes to the existence of nature in our daily lives.

  All this talk of accepting the reality of nature might sound as if I’m arguing for disenchantment. My purpose is precisely the opposite: The point of this book is re-enchantment. Instead of glorifying some distant and mythologized version of nature, I argue for the magic of the real.

  It only makes sense that my daughter inspired this project: It is clear to a child that we live in a world full of magic. As we grow older, tedium and laziness erode this sense of wonder. We get used to things. We stop seeing them.

  Rachel Carson wrote that she wished for all children “a sense of wonder so indestructible that it would last throughout life, as an unfailing antidote against the boredom and disenchantments of later years.” Parents who are able to nurture that sense of wonder give their children a great gift. And for those of us who feel it slipping away in ourselves, it’s not too late. The cure is to simply watch the natural world closely and patiently until your eyes burn through the scrim hung by your expectations and you catch sight of something wholly unexpected.

  This act of wizardry, of re-enchantment, takes work. You can’t do it all the time. It’s simply not possible to always see the world fresh and in full, like a child, while also making money, paying bills on time, and taking care of a family. There’s a reason my brain had created a shorthand for noting and dismissing “generic” trees: They are not important in meeting my immediate needs, are not a threat, and are not going to make the rent more affordable. It would be hard to function if like a two-year-old I became so transfixed by a seedpod that I forget to go to work.

  But doing this work and occasionally acting like a two-year-old pays dividends of awe and pleasure. It doesn’t take very much time to notice that you live within nature: It can happen while you’re waiting for the bus in the morning, or eating lunch, or walking home in the evening. Wonder doesn’t come from outside after driving somewhere spectacular, it comes from within: It’s a union of the natural world and the mind prepared to receive it.

  “A person with a clear heart and open mind can experience the wilderness anywhere on earth. It is a quality of one’s own consciousness,” the poet Gary Snyder said. “The planet is a wild place and always will be.”

  If we come to love nature not only when it is rare and beautiful, but also when it is commonplace and even annoying, I believe it will heal the great wound of our species: our self-imposed isolation from the rest of life, our loneliness for nature. We might remember that we are no different from our surroundings, that the trees and birds are as much our neighbors as other humans. We might remember that before the land belonged to us, we belonged to it. We could belong again.

  ENDNOTE

  In the time it’s taken me to write this book, its inspiration—Josephine—has grown from a chubby arrangement of dimples and curiosity into a slender girl with adamant opinions, a distinct sense of fashion, and an overriding conviction that she is right about everything. As she developed her earliest interests, it seemed that she was not cut out to obsess over weeds and squirrels like her father. I could live with that. After all, my definition of the natural world leaves out a lot. For example, I’ve neglected the microscopic in this book; what about gut bacteria, and houseplant mycelium, and the mites that live on our faces? And why stop at biology? What about the geological formations beneath our feet, the movements of water and weather all around us? What about the properties of starlight? And aren’t our bodies part of the natural world? What about the chemistry of wonder, the inspiration and exhalation of breath? And is there any reason to exclude the art, music, and religious traditions humans have created to make sense of all this? It’s hard to prove that anything, no matter how lowbrow or arcane, is not the study of nature.

  So when Josephine entered a girly phase I wasn’t too disappointed. But I was a little disappointed. Every once in a while she’d see me examining something and ask me what I was looking at. She was interested; it’s just that she was a lot more interested in dancing like a ballerina and dressing like a princess. When I suggested that she might want to be a scientist instead, she would tell me that that was not for girls.

  Then one morning as we set out on our walk to daycare, Josephine spotted a line of ants crawling across our driveway. They stood out in the low-angle light, casting shadows that moved with them. Josephine was pleased with herself for discovering the ants. Then she asked me if they sleep at night. I had no clue.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “But I can ask my friend. She’s a bug scientist.” I was talking about ant scientist Eleanor Spicer Rice.

  The word “she” paired with “bug scientist” seemed to strike Josephine.

  “Your friend the bug scientist is a girl?” She pondered silently. A few minutes later she twisted around in her stroller and announced: “I changed my idea, Papa. I don’t want to be a ballerina. Can I be a bug scientist?”

  “You can be anything you want,” I told her as evenly as I could manage. My heart did a secret victory dance.

  This is probably just another phase, but it’s one with some staying power. She borrows my hand lens to peer at spiders, stops every day on the way out the back door to check on the paper wasps’ nest under the railing, and eagerly calls me over to identify insects she’s found. The other day she pointed out a big snail making its way over a slender bridge of grass stems. She swept a hand over it and crowed with delight as it retracted its horns.

  “This is a good adventure for a bug scientist,” she exclaimed.

  I’ll admit to feeling immoderately pleased. I fear I will always be a poor and bumbling naturalist, forever in the awkward early stages of a relationship with nature. But perhaps there’s hope for the next generation.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  This book is largely a collage: I searched out the brightest bits from other people’s hordes of knowledge, pilfered them, and pasted them here. I’m indebted to those who provided material for the pilfering. Steve Barley indulged me by engaging in an earnest correspondence about videos of squirrels running obstacle courses. Philip Stark took me foraging, and has become a wise counselor on topics ranging beyond weeds. Charlie Walcott and Daniel Haag-Wackernagle directed my search on pigeons, and Haag-Wackernagle even sent me a copy of his beautifully illustrated book, all the way from Switzerland, complete with a translation from the German. Michael Steele and Mikel Delgado gave me w
ith more charming squirrel facts than I could use. Nathan Talbot provided the mystery that gave me a reason to listen to birds, and Mike Nelson was there to offer pragmatic guidance when birdsong became overwhelming. I am lucky to live in the same place as the world authority on turkey vultures, John Long, a busy man who doesn’t care much for e-mail or telephone interviews, but who may be lured into conversation with good beer. John Marzluff helped me understand the dynamics of birds around cities, and Kaeli Swift spend several hours patiently debunking my assumptions about crow behavior, and nudging me toward much more interesting facts. Josh Klein was wonderfully insightful, and tremendous fun to boot. I owe special thanks to Eleanor Spicer Rice, who probably spent more time than any other expert in helping me understand my environment. To all the people who shared their stories with me, I offer my sincere thanks, especially those who reviewed the chapters and corrected mistakes. Any errors that remain are mine alone.

  I’m also grateful to all the authors and scientists who wrote the books I drew from. They are noted in the text and in the bibliography. I hope readers seek them out. To casual readers, I especially recommend Superdove and The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating. So good!

  My agent Nicole Tourtelot nurtured this book from conception to completion. My editor Alex Postman launched the project, and when she moved on to other things, Mollie Thomas gracefully stepped in to bring it home. There are several more people at Rodale whose names I don’t know, who understood the book deeply and found exactly the right way to express its tenor in design, and transform it into a physical object. I appreciate all the magic that this team has worked.

  Many thanks to Jennifer Kahn for spending all those Tuesdays in the teahouse with me, writing and talking about writing. To Daniel Herman, a tip of the hat for introducing me to Vast Aire.

  My colleagues at Grist were an unstinting source of good humor and good company. Special thanks to the editorial team: Brentin Mock, Greg Hanscom, Ben Adler, Eve Andrews, Darby Smith, Ted Alvarez, Scott Rosenberg, Amelia Urry, Daniel Penner, Lisa Hymas, Andrew Simon, Katie Herzog, Amelia Bates, Mignon Khargie, and Heather Smith.

  My family deserves special credit for this book. Josephine inspired the whole thing of course, and kept me honest by being a mostly uncooperative collaborator. That is, she was like herself rather than the character who would have fit more easily, but also more tritely, into these pages. I don’t know if I can make the case that her little sister, Jules, assisted in this project as there are several hundred hours of lost sleep weighing the scales in the other direction. But I suppose a good lawyer would point out that she could have woken up more in the middle of the night, and that, all things considered, she did everything that could be reasonably asked of a baby. I’m grateful for that, and for her enthusiastic embrace of the world’s minutiae. My greatest partner was my wife, Beth, who made this all possible in a thousand tiny, and several large, ways.

  BIBLIOGRAPHY

  INTRODUCTION

  Hartop, Emily A., Brian V. Brown, and R. Henry L. Disney. “Opportunity in Our Ignorance: Urban Biodiversity Study Reveals 30 New Species and One New Nearctic Record for Megaselia (Diptera: Phoridae) in Los Angeles (California, USA).” Zootaxa 3941, no. 4 (April 2, 2015): 451–84. doi:10.11646/zootaxa.3941.4.1.

  Stegner, Wallace, and T. H. Watkins. Where the Bluebird Sings to the Lemonade Springs: Living and Writing in the West. Reprint ed. New York: Modern Library, 2002.

  Sullivan, Michael. The Trees of San Francisco. San Francisco: Pomegranate Communications, 2004.

  On Annie Dillard:

  Saverin, Diana. “The Thoreau of the Suburbs.” The Atlantic, February 5, 2015.

  PIGEON

  I drew primarily from:

  Blechman, Andrew D. Pigeons: The Fascinating Saga of the World’s Most Revered and Reviled Bird. New York: Grove Press, 2007.

  Humphries, Courtney. Superdove. HarperCollins e-books, 2009.

  Johnston, Richard F., and Marián Janiga. Feral Pigeons. New York: Oxford University Press, 1995.

  I also relied on:

  Haag-Wackernagel, Daniel. “Culture History of the Pigeon—Kulturgeschichte Der Taube.” Accessed August 17, 2015. https://anatomie.unibas.ch/IntegrativeBiology/haag/Culture-History-Pigeon/feral-pigeon-haag.html.

  ———. Die Taube: Vom heiligen Vogel der Liebesgöttin zur Strassentaube. Basel: Schwabe, 1998.

  On passenger pigeons:

  Price, Jennifer. Flight Maps: Adventures with Nature in Modern America. New York: Basic Books, 1999.

  On Cher Ami:

  Lane, Rose Wilder. “A Bit of Gray in a Blue Sky: The Beautiful Story of the Bird That Saved the Lost Battalion.” Ladies’ Home Journal 36, no. 8 (1919).

  On pigeon’s mediating human relationships:

  Jerolmack, Colin. The Global Pigeon. Fieldwork Encounters and Discoveries Series. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2013.

  On pigeons as messengers for China’s military:

  Jiang, Chengcheng. “China’s Most Secret Weapon: The Messenger Pigeon.” Time. Accessed August 17, 2015. http://content.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2049569,00.html.

  See also:

  Abs, Michael, ed. Physiology and Behaviour of the Pigeon. London; New York: Academic Press, 1983.

  Gibbs, David, Eustace Barnes, and John Cox. Pigeons and Doves: A Guide to the Pigeons and Doves of the World. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2001.

  Goodwin, Derek. Pigeons and Doves of the World. 3rd ed. [London]: British Museum (Natural History); Ithaca, NY: Comstock Pub. Associates, 1983.

  WEEDS

  I drew primarily from:

  Gibbons, Euell. Stalking the Wild Asparagus. Woodstock, VT: Alan C. Hood & Company, 1962.

  Lerner, Rebecca. Dandelion Hunter: Foraging the Urban Wilderness. Guilford, CT: Lyons Press, 2013.

  Wong, Tama Matsuoka, Eddy Leroux, and Daniel Boulud. Foraged Flavor: Finding Fabulous Ingredients in Your Backyard or Farmer’s Market, with 88 Recipes. New York: Clarkson Potter, 2012.

  On the (potentially) positive effects of plant toxins:

  Velasquez-Manoff, M. “Fruits and Vegetables Are Trying to Kill You,” Nautilus, no. 15 (July 3, 2014), http://nautil.us/issue/15/turbulence/fruits-and-vegetables-are-trying-to-kill-you.

  On the relationship between poverty and obesity:

  Drewnowski, Adam, and S. E. Specter. “Poverty and Obesity: The Role of Energy Density and Energy Costs.” The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition 79, no. 1 (January 1, 2004): 6–16.

  These guidebooks also proved useful:

  Thayer, Samuel. Nature’s Garden: A Guide to Identifying, Harvesting, and Preparing Edible Wild Plants. Birchwood, WI: Forager’s Harvest Press, 2010.

  Tredici, Peter Del, and Steward T. A. Pickett. Wild Urban Plants of the Northeast: A Field Guide. Ithaca, NY: Comstock Publishing Associates, 2010.

  Zachos, Ellen. Backyard Foraging: 65 Familiar Plants You Didn’t Know You Could Eat. North Adams, MA: Storey Publishing, 2013.

  SQUIRREL

  I drew primarily from:

  Steele, Michael A., and John L. Koprowski. North American Tree Squirrels. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Books, 2003.

  On the campaign to bring squirrels to cities:

  Benson, Etienne. “The Urbanization of the Eastern Gray Squirrel in the United States.” Journal of American History 100, no. 3 (December 1, 2013): 691–710. doi:10.1093/jahist/jat353.

  On Seton and Roosevelt:

  Seton, Ernest Thompson. Animal Heroes, 2000. http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/2284.

  ———. Wild Animals I Have Known, 2002. http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/3031.

  Watts, Sarah. Rough Rider in the White House: Theodore Roosevelt and the Politics of Desire. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2006.

  See also:

  Adler, Bill, Jr. Outwitting Squirrels: 101 Cunning Stratagems to Reduce Dramatically the Egregious Misappropriation of Seed from Your Birdfeeder by Squirrels. 2nd ed. Chicago: Chicago Review Press, 1996.

  Appleman, Philip. “Darwi
n’s Bestiary.” Accessed August 17, 2015. http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/175912.

  Barkalow, Frederick Schenck. The World of the Gray Squirrel. Philadelphia: Lippincott Williams & Wilkins, 1973.

  Thorington, Richard, Jr., and Katie E. Ferrell. Squirrels: The Animal Answer Guide. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2006.

  BIRD LANGUAGE

  I drew primarily from:

  Young, Jon. What the Robin Knows: How Birds Reveal the Secrets of the Natural World. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2012.

  See also:

  Krause, Bernie. The Great Animal Orchestra: Finding the Origins of Music in the World’s Wild Places. New York: Little, Brown and Company, 2012.

  Walker, Matt. “Noise Pollution Threatens Animals.” BBC, October 14, 2009, Earth News sec. http://news.bbc.co.uk/earth/hi/earth_news/newsid_8305000/8305320.stm.

  GINKGO

  I drew primarily from:

  Crane, Peter. Ginkgo: The Tree That Time Forgot. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2013.

  On ginkgo’s missing seed distributors:

  Del Tredici, Peter. “Ginkgos and Multituberculates: Evolutionary Interactions in the Tertiary.” Biosystems 22, no. 4 (1989): 327–39. doi:10.1016/0303-2647(89)90054-3.

  ———. “The Phenology of Sexual Reproduction in Ginkgo Biloba: Ecological and Evolutionary Implications.” Botanical Review 73, no. 4 (October 1, 2007): 267–78. doi:10.1663/0006-8101(2007) 73[267:TPOSRI]2.0.CO;2.

  On Oliver Sacks:

  Sacks, Oliver W. The Island of the Colorblind and Cycad Island. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1997.