Letter 9 - The Gift of Extinction

Dear reader,

Hello. How have you been?

If you work with nature, you will feel a sense of joy. Fresh air can do wonders, as can sunshine and the loveliness of nature. But, if you work with nature, you also can’t escape a sobering thought. And that is extinction. Sparrows from your childhood, the butterflies that you marvelled at, the plants that lined your path on a walk - do we stop seeing them, or do they stop being part of the ecosystem??

Is extinction a gift? Many believe that extinction is a gift if it means the earth is reclaimed by the creatures who roamed it first. You'll see what I mean if you’ve seen the Bored Panda articles about nature taking over. Here’s one. For others, the fact that the threat of extinction brings people together and rallies the troops is a cause for celebration.

Humans have brought back some animals from the brink of extinction.?

Sea otters were ruthlessly hunted for their fur, but a ban on hunting has helped raise the numbers of the endangered species.??

By banning the synthetic pesticide DDT, which contaminated the diet of peregrine falcons, humans gave them better odds of survival.

There are hopeful stories associated with the fen orchid, the Rodrigues fruit bat, the blue whale, and the Mallorcan midwife toad. You can read more about these efforts here.?

I also enjoyed this story about frog saunas helping green and golden bell frogs survive a fungal disease that has already driven six amphibian species to extinction and threatens many more. The saunas, made of brick and PVC, work as hotspots, allowing the frogs to 'bake off' the infections.?

Efforts to fight extinction are always vital, but especially today. According to Professor Daniel Simberloff, the director of the Institute for Biological Invasions at the University of Tennessee,? the extinction rates today are comparable to the biggest past extinctions. There’s also that unbelievable but sadly real statistic that 99 % of all living things that have ever lived on Earth have become extinct, as author Pranay Lal tells us in his incisive work, ‘Indica – A Deep Natural History of The Indian Subcontinent’. We are in the sixth mass extinction.?

Here are some suggestions from us if you’d like to read more about extinction:

The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History by Elizabeth Kolbert?

You’re likely to find this book on every list about extinction. It is equally scary, fascinating, and a convincing treatise for even the loudest naysayer.?

The Bones Are There - Kate Sutherland

You might not expect to see a poetry book on this topic, but here we are. The book celebrates extinct animals, drawing parallels between their loss and human activity, including capitalism and gender wars. It’s a moving, unusual look at the subject.?

Animals of a Bygone Era: An Illustrated Compendium by Maja S?fstr?m

Perfect for that curious little one you know, the book features illustrations that take you into the lives of some pretty unusual creatures, including terror birds and tiny horses. It’s a great way to introduce children to this topic.?

We’d love for you to read more poetry, especially this one- Deathbed Dream with Extinction List by Claire Wahmanholm, “(...) Most people die within a day

of waking from this dream, but if life on Earth

were a day, we have only been awake for one minute

and fifteen seconds of it. Long enough to erase

the large sloth lemur and the Mariana mallard

and eighty-three percent of everything else.

On balance, it’s unnatural to be living. A statistical

impossibility. Extinct means extinguish means quench,

but what mouth is so thirsty for our deadness? (...)”

Read the entire gorgeous poem here.?

My favourite story about the gift of extinction has to be this one - Did you know that the spread of grapes worldwide and the extinction of the dinosaurs are connected? The earliest known grape seeds date back to 66 million years, the same time an asteroid hit earth, triggering mass extinction. Dinosaurs were among the 95 % of species that were wiped out. The lack of dinosaurs meant the tropical trees could flourish, creating a lush canopy and allowing some plants - like grapes- to use vines to climb trees and thrive. Utterly fascinating stuff, this.?

I am ending this letter with a poem from Team Mycelium.?

Let it not rain by Srividya Sivakumar, PhD

I

The tyranny of taxidermy fills my window boxes of sorrow.

The rose bushes are pestilent. Rose rosette and mosaic. Powdery mildew and blackspot.

The bushes are home to the Japanese beetle and leaf-cutter bees.

And it's not just in my garden, too dry for weeds, too sad for spring.

But this, though painful, is not loss.?

A broken heart, on schedule every seven years. That well-worn record that keeps us company.?

II

Sometimes it feels like I am the only one here.

III

These root bridges are broad and slippery, and my clumsy feet often get caught between my mouth and the road that rises to meet me.

This love is a river that flows and goes where a few have gone before.

IV

This is hardly virgin territory.?

There are no undiscovered jungles to fill. They are all gone.?

No unknown water body to rejuvenate. We know them all.?

No fish that need saving.? They’ve all been poached (fine dine spaces=demand).?

No roots that need rotting. They’re hanging tough.?

V

The Kirabati wonder about the sea’s slyness. Each year, it inches closer to them.

In the Northern Nevada, tribes look at the Truckee River and sense its growing distance, its despair.

The Middle Belt in Nigeria is red with the blood of conflict. Where is the water? Where is the land? How will the crops grow?

In Puerto Rico, families cross swollen rivers teeming with hurricane water.

VI

In every corner of the world, loss is a friend for all seasons.?

Here for the dry, cracked earth. Here for the excessive rainfall. Here for the swollen bellies and crusted eyes. Here for the brown water. Here for the farmer’s despair.

Loss is in the unopened bird’s nest. In the blazing fields of wheat. In the bundles of clothes and belongings in which families pack hope for a better day. In calloused feet and barely getting by.?

Loss dictates history, geography, life, lives.

This loss is as generous as a long-awaited rain.?

From the basking in moonglade bunch at Mycelium, till next time, cheers, and bye for now.

A note about the design: Roshni Daniel says she had fun with this, adding, “(...) in the foreground I've placed a bird character as a stand-in for the reader, introspecting about extinction and their place in time. Behind them is a snippet from a classical painting that features dead birds. And to add some visual interest, I've overlaid a record of extinct birds I chanced upon from the extensive archives of the Smithsonian. Purposely kept the lil' guy isolated to create the sense of being lost in thought.”