Thinking about Migration

I have emulated the fair weather birds and temporarily migrated to warmer climates – Florida!  My family has temporarily become a “snow bird” and escaped the Chicago winter in favor of the beach and the pool, if only for a week.  And it got me thinking about migration.

The energy it takes to move a body hundreds if not thousands of miles to find food and stay warm is immense.  Migratory birds have physical as well as behavioral adaptations that allow them to complete this momentous feat twice every year.  Some birds lose over 50% of their body weight burning fat to make an uninterrupted trip.  Other species fly the same route seasonally, and certain plants even time their flowering to coincide with the journeying pollinators.  Birds that migrate during the day take advantage of thermal currents over land.  Those that migrate at night avoid predators and overheating.

Human bodies have adapted to almost every climate on this planet through fat and our brain’s ability to manufacture clothing and artificial heating, but those with the means still find a way to migrate to warmer climates, if only for a short winter break.  While our bodies are fed and warmed through the long winters, it seems it heals the spirit to visit the sun.

Changes in the Prairie Over Time

I've been visiting our local prairie preserve for a couple of years now and the summer of 2012 was different. It was a summer of drought, and when I visited this summer, the changes were noticeable.

Springbrook Prairie in April 2012

In our Tallgrass Prairie biome, the grasses should have been at least up to my chest and the majority of them were at my knees.  Certain areas that weren't burned have tall stands from last year next to the short ones of this year.  There are no credit cards in nature, so if the heat and drought were too much for one season, the grasses go dormant and wait for the following season.  Unlike our economic system, there is no unlimited growth in nature.

(re)connecting with the genius of our place

Springbrook Prairie, Naperville llinois

One of my favorite things to do is go on long bike rides through the prairie – the sights, smells, and sounds of natural environments reconnect me with why I have dedicated my career to creating sustainable environments.  Getting outside allows me the freedom to explore and observe and inspires me to think of new possibilities.

As someone trained in the science (and art) of biomimicry, I have learned to look to natural environments as more than beautiful vistas and peaceful respites.  I’ve learned to look to them as a mentor through which I can learn new ways of thinking about the problems we face.  Through this lens, we can look to leaves as inspiration for more efficient photovoltaic cells, spider silk as inspiration for strong, light-weight materials with benign manufacturing, termite mounds for bioclimactic, adaptive architecture, and our native ecosystems for lessons in creating resilient businesses and communities.  Biomimics across the world are looking to nature for inspiration, harnessing 3.8 billion years of experience, and finding innovative solutions to the problems that we face.  You can do this too.

This fall, go outside as much as you can.  Observe and reconnect with the reasons you chose to work in sustainability, and begin to look to the “genius of our place” as inspiration for new ways of thinking and creating.  From observation comes inspiration and innovation.  The possibilities are endless!

Studying a Flower - the Plumeless Thistle

Here is the problem with a novice naturalist walking through a restored prairie and seeing pretty flowers - I assume they all should be there!  It turns out that the pretty pinkish purple flowers I saw on a walk I did way back in July (how summer flew by!) were actually Plumeless Thistle, an invasive weed, and it was everywhere, at least near the walking path I was on. One invasive species on another - a Japanese beetle on a Plumeless Thistle bud.  From Prairie Flowers in July.

While walking through the prairie on bright July day, I wanted to observe the prairie species mix to see if I would find any patterns.  The main pattern I found was centered around water availability.  The highlands where there was no standing water found home for yellow coneflower, wild carrot, thistle, some milkweed, and turf grass gone to seed.  The lower areas where the creek ran through hosted cattails, grass, a spiky purple plant that looks like salvia, and some strange broadleaf species that seemed like it would be more at home on the forest floor.  Near the paths in higher elevations, I was taken by a pretty purple flower that I found and thought I could learn a little more about it.

Being Present

Photo by Amy Coffman Phillips.  

Have you ever tried to just sit and be still for 25 minutes?  Without thinking about anything in particular?  Or without really moving?  Well, I tried.  And it's hard.  On a recent trip to the Springbrook Prairie Preserve I completed a BPCP iSite where I was to "Sit and Be Here."  Being present is so hard to do, especially for someone so used to multi-tasking.  Sitting still and observing is a form of meditation, and I found it extremely relaxing but also irritating. 

It felt relaxing because I was alone, my children were being cared for by our babysitter, and I had the luxury to just sit down and look at a field of green and yellow prairie flowers.  That experience alone made the time worthwhile.  But the multi-tasker in me wanted to be doing something else at the same time - walking or running so that it would count as my exercise for the day; naming the grasses, birds, and bugs I see and remembering the ones I couldn't name; thinking about what I see and practicing my biomimicry translation skills...  I find it almost impossible to turn off the part of my brain that tells me what I am doing now is not as important as what I should or could be doing.

After "quieting my cleverness," I came away from the experience with a feeling of vitality, both of the prairie and in myself.  The prairie looks like plain grassland to many people, but by sitting down and just observing I know that this place is alive in ways I never imagined.  I saw a black crow perched on top of a grass swaying in the wind.  I heard bugs buzz by my ear and saw butterflies, moths, and dragonflies - and a few mosquitoes.  I heard the grass rustle against each other and I saw critters scatter.  Hundreds of species call that patch of grassland home and by sitting down to observe them, I became a part of that system.  I felt renewed and connected to something much larger than myself.  And it felt great.  I will continue to return to the prairie and other environments and I will practice my skills of sitting and being fully present.  I hope that one day I will be able to accomplish the task.

Reading the Sky

Photo by Amy Coffman Phillips

How much of fifth grade science can you remember?  What are the different cloud types called?  My knowledge was tested today on the most gorgeous day we've had in months when I was lucky enough to be at the Morton Arboretum with my friend and our kids.  The children's garden was complete chaos with every child in the five surrounding communities all congregating there for the day, so we decided to climb a little hill and sit and watch the clouds.  I have fond memories of staring at the clouds on a pretty day and trying to guess what shape they were making.  My daughter humored me a bit in between trips running up and down the hill and found a snake that the cirrus clouds created (I thought it looked like a spine).  My friend found a stingray made of puffy cumulus clouds.  And I seemed to find mostly fish of different sizes and shapes, a group of cumulus clouds that looked like airplanes flying low, and one space ship.  A psychologist has probably developed a way to analyze what we see in clouds as some type of Warshak test, but I prefer to leave that at the surface.  

July's Prairie Flowers as Design Inspiration

Today was a beautiful sunny day for a bike ride through the Springbrook Prairie Forest Preserve.  It was hot today.  Very hot.  But the flowers in the prairie were in full bloom, and I was curious about the plants I found there.  What are their names?  Where do they grow and why?  Is there anything we can we learn from them that could influence design?  To try and answer these questions, I took a collection (which doubles as an interesting wildflower arrangement) and have attempted to classify a few of the flowers I picked.  I did a little research on the natural history of each and then have extrapolated a few questions as to how each plant may inspire design.  What questions do you think the plant could help us answer?