The Great Golden Swallow Gear Review: Part 1

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A sea cave on the northern coast of Jamaica, where Cave Swallows nest.

We’ve finally put our heads together and written all our thoughts on the various articles of gear we brought with us to Jamaica for two months! Overall we were pretty pleased with everything we used, and would recommend them to the average backpacker except where it’s clear that we weren’t very satisfied.

GSI Outdoors Pinnacle Dualist Cookware Set:

Justin:  This cookware set has some big pro’s and some big con’s.  The fact that everything fits nicely together, and the entire unit is lightweight is definitely a plus.  However, a rogue surge of flame from our stove one night that came up high on the sides of the pot caused the pot to warp in shape (which is surprising because of its constant tolerance to high heat from below).  Therefore the lid never fit correctly again.  The bowls are solid and the two that come with a foam/elastic band around them are effective in keeping you from getting burned from hot contents within.  The folding handle of the pot is hazardous – perhaps there is a locking mechanism that we are unaware of or did not receive.  The two retracting sporks that come with the set are complete garbage.  The minute you attempt to ‘pierce’ a piece of food, the spork will retract and become useless.  Best to pawn these sporks off as a gift to a friend that you really don’t like much.

John: Hey, Seth, want a spoon?

Seth: Heck yeah! … … … hey, Justin, want a spoon?

Continue reading →

Kathryn Schulz, Come To Kerala

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Past invitations have been sent to environmentally-oriented illustrators, to entrepreneurial conservation artists, to sandplay free spirits, to wildlife management scientists, and to food prodigies; but not enough attention has been paid, in our invitations, to word specialists. So, moving right along, Kathryn please be our guest. We would love to host you here and/or here and/or here.

We have not read the book in the link above, nor even a review of the book, but we are linking to its homepage because there you will find not only information about her book but also links to the two TED talks given by the author, whose profession is listed as Wrongologist. Catchy titles are not what catch us. Scintillating writing on the meaning of words does. For that, you could not do much better than starting here, which will also justify our invitation, as wordplay appreciators, to one of the best:

What Part of “No, Totally” Don’t You Understand?

BY KATHRYN SCHULZ

Not long ago, I walked into a friend’s kitchen and found her opening one of those evil, impossible-to-breach plastic blister packages with a can opener. This worked, and struck me as brilliant, but I mention it only to illustrate a characteristic that I admire in our species: given almost any entity, we will find a way to use it for something other than its intended purpose. We commandeer cafeteria trays to go sledding, “The Power Broker” to prop open the door, the Internet to look at kittens. We do this with words as well—time was, spam was just Spam—but, lately, we have gone in for a particularly dramatic appropriation. In certain situations, it seems, we have started using “no” to mean “yes.”

Here’s Lena Dunham demonstrating this development, during a conversation with the comedian Marc Maron on his podcast “WTF.” The two are talking about people who reflexively disparage modern art: Continue reading →

Danish Can-Do Greenery

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Read a bit about their work, mission and invitation, and contagion takes on a new meaning:

Sustainia is a think tank and consultancy headquartered in Copenhagen, Denmark. We identify readily available sustainability solutions across the world and demonstrate their potential impacts and benefits in our work with cities, companies, and communities.

By focusing on innovative breakthroughs, inspiring alternatives and new opportunities, Sustainia is shaping a new narrative of optimism and hope for a sustainable future that seeks to motivate instead of scaring people with gloom and doomsday scenarios. Continue reading →

Working To Survive, Alternate Edition

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The St. James vineyard at the Abbey of New Clairvaux. The 20 brothers of the abbey belong to an order with a tradition of winemaking that dates back nearly 900 years. Lisa Morehouse for NPR

Thanks to the folks over at the salt, at NPR (USA):

Nuns On The Ranch Give A Heavenly Twist To Beef

In a tiny Northern California town called Vina, there’s a winery that’s definitely off the beaten track. That might be because this region’s better known for olive groves and cattle ranches than grapes. For these, vintners, though, it’s spiritual work.

When I visit New Clairvaux winery, two people are filtering wine, getting it ready for bottling. On the surface, they make an odd pair. One is Aimee Sunseri, the winemaker heading up operations here. The other is Brother Christopher Cheney, a monk. He grew up in California’s wine country, but never thought he’d make the stuff, until a religious conversion led him to the Abbey of New Clairvaux in 2004, just a few years after the brothers planted grapes.

“Actually, the winery and my vocation have grown up together,” he says.

The 20 brothers of New Clairvaux are Trappist monks, a subset of Cistercians. They live in a walled-off cloister, and rarely leave the property.

“There’s people who don’t understand that. They think, ‘What are you guys doing? There are so many needs in the world, and here you guys are wearing your pajamas, singing in a barn,’ ” Brother Christopher says with a laugh.

Continue reading →

From The Department Of Save It For Later

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Anyone, anywhere, who believes that something is worth saving (preserving, conserving, protecting, etc.) enough to dedicate time and effort, among other resources, we are likely to support it however we can. Our Bird of the Day feature is an example that goes back to one man’s collection of photographs he took personally containing all the birds, endemic and otherwise, that inhabit and/or migrate through south India. This collection is part of his passionate commitment to wilderness conservation in Kerala and other neighboring states.

We asked, in 2011, if Vijaykumar would allow us to publish his photographs in the interest of promoting conservation. He said yes. By now we have probably published all of the collection as it was in 2011, but he is still photographing and contributing. And four years later we have talented birders, many of whom are also exceptional wildlife photographers, contributing their photographs from all over the world. Seth became an employee of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology that same year, and that has led to a whole bunch of other interesting bird-related posts that we host.

Meanwhile New York City has rarely been a subject we cover from a conservation perspective, though its Public Library is of special interest to us. We have not linked to Jeremiah’s blog previously, but it is the type we favor, as you might have noticed, so here goes. Maybe there is more NYC in store for us.

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Golden Swallow Expedition Back in Ithaca

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A moon rises in the Blue Mountains

Photo by Justin Proctor

It’s been a while since you last heard from us, but not because we’re lost in the Jamaican wilderness!

We arrived back in Ithaca, NY a week ago, and have been hard at work processing our data, photos, videos, and thoughts from this past trip to the Blue Mountains. In addition, we’ve had to analyze our data from both trips combined, trying to seek out patterns in aerial insectivore sightings and making maps of all our point counts with different species seen in both Cockpit Country and the mountainous eastern portion of the island.

We’re also looking up references to all information on Cave Swallows, Antillean Palm Swifts, and White-collared Swifts in either Jamaica, the Caribbean, or the world, depending on what kind of journal articles have been published about them in the past. Other research we’ve been doing involves Barn Owls and Turkey Vultures, which will be the subject of spin-off Continue reading →

Ecological Intelligence, Desperately Needed, Requires Social Intelligence, The Foundation Of Which Is Individual Emotional Intelligence

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To do what we do, at Raxa Collective, and to do it well, and to succeed, requires alchemy. We are neither sure we are doing it, nor how to do it, nor whether it can be explained; thus, alchemy. No formula. For those of us with management education, of a certain age, there was a certain author who brought alchemy closer to theory, and so closer to the grasp. A conceptual grasp more often than an actual grasp. Mastery? Not even close. But try? Yes. In the beginning it was all about emotional intelligence, but expanded in interesting directions to now include even ecological. Important ideas. Powerful tools. In the current Education section of the New York Times, a small dose that helps understand why:

How to Be Emotionally Intelligent

By DANIEL GOLEMAN

What makes a leader? Knowledge, smarts and vision, but also the ability to identify and monitor emotions and manage relationships.

Northern California’s Public Media Shares Art History With Communities Local And Global

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Sonya Noskowiak, Calla Lily, 1932. (Courtesy Center for Creative Photography)

Sonya Noskowiak, Calla Lily, 1932. (Courtesy Center for Creative Photography)

Thanks to KQED (Public Media for Northern California, including National Public Radio and Public Broadcasting System, both of which would have the Raxa Collective seal of approval, if such a thing existed, for their excellent service to their communities) for this story of a not well enough known photographer:

Sonya Noskowiak: A Groundbreaking but Forgotten Photographer

By Matthew Harrison Tedford

…Another photograph, Calla Lily(1932), also possibly shown at the de Young, demonstrates Noskowiak’s thoughtful treatment of light. The flower’s milky white spathe is set against a vacuous black background. The flower appears as if floating, but the light falls on the veins of the leaves, grounding the luminous spathe.

A work titled Sand Pattern (1932) looks like aerial photographs of the Sahara or a satellite image of some uncharted Martian desert. Tentacles of sand stretch out in all directions as if they’re grasping for a nearby oasis. The sand resembles the aluminum powder found in an Etch A Sketch, almost shimmering. In actuality, the patterns might cover an area no larger than a footprint, possibly on a Carmel beach. Continue reading →

The Rare Bird That Makes The News

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RARE FIND: Chestnut-breasted Partridge. Photo: Gururaj Moorching.

We most love the online edition of the national Indian newspaper, The Hindu, for its occasional willingness to put news like this on the same footing with the “noise” of the more typical “real” news:

Bengaluru shutterbug captures rare Partridge

Mohit M. Rao

Immense patience and a stroke of luck granted wildlife photographer Gururaj Moorching a two-minute encounter with the rare bird.

Continue reading →

Wild, Walk, Wonder

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12onnature1-mediumThreeByTwo210-v2Keeping it wild is a wonder of its own. Thanks to Britain for that; and to the New York Times for bringing it to our attention:

The Living Beauty of Wicken Fen

In one of Britain’s oldest nature reserves, Darwin collected beetles and Saxon warlords hid from invaders. But walking there now is more than a visit to the past.

Water And Its Discontents

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The California drought has prompted Governor Jerry Brown to mandate a twenty-five-per-cent reduction in the state’s water usage. CREDIT PHOTOGRAPH BY FREDERIC J. BROWN / AFP / GETTY

The California drought has prompted Governor Jerry Brown to mandate a twenty-five-per-cent reduction in the state’s water usage. CREDIT PHOTOGRAPH BY FREDERIC J. BROWN / AFP / GETTY

Thanks to this post we learn that writers from one of our most valued sources of cultural and environmental long-form journalism and rapid-fire website posts sometimes travel to Costa Rica, and we can only hope they will consider Xandari a home away from home on such travels. But more importantly, in this post, we are reminded that the environmental footprint of the foods we eat is a relatively new topic for most of us. Did you consider the almond, the way you consider beef, to be one of the greedier foods, in terms of the water-intensity of its life cycle? Until reading this post we were clueless on that topic:

Drought City

BY DANA GOODYEAR

“Los Angeles Residents Walk Up to 4 Hours Per Day to Look for Potable Water”: I read this headline in a small monthly that covers the coastal province in northwestern Costa Rica where I was travelling, but it took me a moment to realize that this was not about the city of nearly four million where I pay my water bill, and not a joke, though it was April 1st. Los Angeles, in this case, referred to a fifteen-family town in the Central American highlands. But my Los Angeles is in for it, too, and it is a measure of how imminent and ominous these changes feel that my mistake seemed, for a moment, plausible—a new extreme in a year’s worth of shocking news about the effects of the California drought. Continue reading →

Finding Solutions In The Wild, And Out Of The Wild

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We normally do not link out to stories of man and wild animal bonding. But occasionally the story has more than aw shucks or just aw value; this is one of those. So is this one. Thanks to the BBC’s magazine for this story:

The lion hugger

By Jason Caffrey BBC World Service

In 2012 Valentin Gruener rescued a young lion cub and raised it himself at a wildlife park in Botswana. It was the start of an extraordinary relationship. Now an astonishing scene is repeated each time they meet – the young lion leaps on Gruener and holds him in an affectionate embrace.

“Since the lion arrived, which is three years now, I haven’t really left the camp,” says Gruener.

“Sometimes for one night I go into the town here to organise something for the business, but other than that I’ve been here with the lion.”

The lion he has devoted himself to is Sirga – a female cub he rescued from a holding pen established by a farmer who was fed up with shooting animals that preyed on his cattle.

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Disrupting The Odds

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An entrepreneur uses his laptop near graffiti-decorated walls at Hubspace in the Khayelitsha township. Emily Jan/NPR

An entrepreneur uses his laptop near graffiti-decorated walls at Hubspace in the Khayelitsha township. Emily Jan/NPR

Entrepreneurship always catches our attention, especially when the odds appear long from the standard perspective:

Far From Silicon Valley, A Disruptive Startup Hub

EMILY JAN & ADAM SEGE

Starting a business is tough anywhere.

But when you live in a place where many people lack basic services, such as electricity and toilets, it’s even harder.

These are the obstacles facing new business owners in South Africa’s townships — sprawling communities designated for nonwhites during apartheid. Apartheid may be history, but two decades into democracy, townships remain overwhelmingly disadvantaged.

Internet service and office space are difficult to come by. There are few sources of investment from within the community, and if you manage to interest a potential funder who is an outsider, you have to hope you can manage to travel to a meeting.

Continue reading →

Inspired By Libraries Without Borders

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from a series on libraries by Jacob Lawrence.

What a wonderful surprise, to come across this talk by Kenan Malik, on a topic that has been of interest to us for some time:

I gave a talk at the launch at London’s Institut Français of Libraries without Borders, the charity inspired by Patrick Weil that aims to increase global access to books and libraries. Also speaking were Ian McEwan, Lisa Appignanesi, Barbara Band and Patrick Weil himself. Here is a transcript of my talk.

Let me begin with a story not of a library or a book but of a grand piano. The one grand piano in Gaza, that was discovered still intact in a theatre destroyed by an Israeli missile during last year’s war. A piano that has been restored string by string, hammer by hammer, by Claire Bertrand, a young French music technician who travelled to Gaza specially to bring the piano back to life, in a project financed by Daniel Barenboim. Continue reading →

Be Wary, Is The Point

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What would the opposite of a blog-crush be called? Whatever that is, we may have it for Amazon, not least because of their various commercial practices we cannot admire–though we admit to finding Jeff Bezos one of the most fascinating individuals alive today. But also because of our resistance of the standard rush to advance consumerism, and our wariness of innovations that make consumerism more difficult to resist, which this blog post explores in punchy terms:

The Horror of Amazon’s New Dash Button

BY IAN CROUCH

Amazon’s new Dash Button, which will allow shoppers to reorder frequently used domestic products like laundry detergent or paper towels with the click of a real-life button, is not a joke. Many people assumed it was, mostly because the announcement came the day before April Fool’s, but also because the idea seemed to poke fun at Amazon’s omnipresence, making it visibly manifest with little plastic one-click shopping buttons adhered to surfaces all over your home.

There was also something slightly off about the promotional video. Continue reading →