Standing Broom Only

I'm both embarrassed for and angry at my former hometown TV station, because the world is laughing. Buzzfeed has a list of the 15 funniest local TV news stories of 2009, one of which features WSFA TV 12 News (Montgomery) breaking a story about the universal laws of physics being violated in a soon-to-open consignment shop (needing publicity, no doubt) in Prattville, Alabama. Apparently it's been going around on the interwebs for a while, but I just saw it for the first time. This is not journalism; it's an insult to the intelligence of the viewers (and the onscreen caption, "Standing on it's [sic] own" only makes it worse). This is just a broom with the bristle ends cut flat, so it's standing on end just as a two-by-four might. The center of gravity is low, making the lean of the lightweight handle seem odd. Did it even occur to reporter Bryan Henry to pick up the phone and call a physics professor, or maybe even try it with a similar broom from Wal-Mart? No, that might ruin the story. The problem is, many gullible people will view this and actually believe something supernatural is going on. The store owner even says the "holy spirit" might be involved. Why do these news outlets treat such oddball stories with credulity? What do you suppose they would do if they saw one of these on a slow news day?

In the follow-up banter with the anchors, Bryan Henry actually claimed he felt something like "a magnetic pull." Isn't gravity something like that, Bryan? Senior anchor Bob Howell, whom I've met, is a veteran journalist, and knows what is and isn't newsworthy, but he just chuckled. Co-anchor Valorie Lawson was somewhat skeptical, however, and for that I give her credit. Oh, for more skepticism in our public airwaves. With some modifications this piece could still have been aired, but as an entertaining learning experience.

And the phenomenon spreads! Here's another newscast (South Haven, MN) that reported the same thing (but with three brooms). At least this station followed up its original piece with an interview with a local university physicist (if WSFA did, I can't find it). But then they just had to follow him with a psychic, and it's downright irresponsible to "balance" science with woo-woo.

Sigh.

Happy (and Skeptical) New Year.

The fact that a believer is happier than a skeptic is no more to the point than the fact that a drunken man is happier than a sober one.

-George Bernard Shaw

Bat Heaven

Click image for detail

I didn't think I'd be posting again so soon on bats, but this is a really neat cave I was in yesterday and the day before. It's in Monroe County, Alabama on a 4,000 acre private tract for which I'm doing the conservation easement baseline documentation. The owner casually mentioned there was a cave there, and upon investigation I was pleasantly surprised by its character and contents. I can find no documentation of it (although NSS has another one recorded from elsewhere on the same property), and I suspect it's "new to science," as they say. Local lore says it was once a hiding place for both Indians and Confederate soldiers, and that it contains a lost cache of gold coins guarded by rattlesnakes "as big around as your neck," but no evidence of any of these was seen. The bats visible on the ceiling appear to be Myotis austroriparius, and this is likely a maternity cave for the species. Eric Spadgenske and I conservatively estimated 2,000 animals, but that could be off significantly. I went back in yesterday to get this photo, catching the light as it was reflecting off the small stream to the ceiling. Although bats and caves are often associated with the dark underworld, a friend I shared this with said it looked like "bat heaven," and I have to agree!

As for the lost gold, next time I'm bringing one of these gadgets...


And one final note: I love palindromes. I actually own this book. My daughter is named AVA (and was born in 2002). Well, last time I failed to talk about entering a cave with Eric (mentioned above) and Eva Kristofik (also of USFWS), but you see them briefly in the video. How on earth I failed to remember my all-time favorite at that particular moment I'll never know. But here it is:

EVA, CAN I STAB BATS IN A CAVE?

It would have been so cool if I'd said it at the time, pocketknife in hand, poised menacingly over a bat. See, I would actually be asking a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service agent named Eva about the legality of stabbing bats right there on the cave wall. Not that I'd ever have done it, of course. But I missed that opportunity and I fear it will never again come up again in regular conversation without seeming somehow contrived. Oh well.

Bat Sampling

Two nights ago I had the privilege of observing/assisting with part of a statewide bat inventory project at a cave less than 20 miles from my home. Keith Hudson, bat expert and one of ADCNR's Nongame Wildlife Program biologists, was directing (that's Keith's voice in this video), and other ADCNR and USFWS biologists were there as well. I'm not mentioning the cave by name because it's on private property, but it's one of the largest and most significant bat caves in Alabama's Coastal Plain. Keith was hoping to get four or five species, but we found just two. Southeastern myotis (Myotis austroriparius) is the most abundant, and was all we caught in the harp trap. We caught a few hundred, but there had to be many thousands of them in all, although we did not attempt even a ballpark estimate. Eastern pipistrelles (Pipistrellus subflavus) were also present in fair numbers, seen clinging to the cave wall well after most of the other bats had emerged.

The Austbat harp trap Keith uses is an amazing thing. Set up at the cave entrance (or exit, from the bats' perspective), it intercepts emerging bats after dusk, gently plopping them down into a collecting bag. Clear plastic flaps hang down on the inside of the bag, keeping them from crawling out. Incidentally, all bats were released following species ID and determination of sex and reproductive status.

This cave is in an area known as the Lime Hills, a physiographic province just south of and adjacent to the Red Hills. I've been there several times over the years, and it's really a special place. Not only is it perhaps the most important maternity cave in the state for southeastern myotis bats, it is the southernmost known occurrence for pickerel frogs (Rana palustris) in Alabama, and botanists recognize it as one of the southernmost localities for red columbine (Aquilegia canadensis).

RCW Translocation Time Again

Here's what I'll be doing again later this month. This ADCNR video is from the 2007 translocation of 7 endangered red-cockaded woodpeckers from Ft. Benning GA to Enon Plantation near Hurtsboro AL. That was the first time this was ever done on private lands in Alabama, and it's been a huge success. This year we're moving 12. A couple of weeks ago a team of 17 people installed 57 artificial cavity inserts in just a day and a half to get ready for the move.



Without the generosity, support, and conservation ethic of the landowner, Cam Lanier III, obviously this could never happen. Some of the funding is Mr. Lanier's contribution, with the rest in the form of a federal grant through the Alabama Forest Resources Center. Eric Spadgenske (USFWS) is featured, and he's really the brains behind the operation. Also featured is Mark Sasser of ADCNR. I'm in the video, too, but kind of as an "extra" in a couple of scenes. (That's me grabbing the end of the net at the beginning, and installing an insert later on.)

This could be really, really bad.

This August 2 story on introduced Amazonian apple snails from the Mobile Register is chilling. Let's hope it's not too late to stop them this year.

"When wildlife officials realized that baseball-sized Amazonian snails had colonized the main pond in Mobile's Langan Park last year, their worst case scenario involved the giant gastropods escaping into Three Mile Creek.

Now, a year later, that's exactly what's happened."

I have a bad feeling about this.


WKRG.com News

E. O. Wilson Biophilia Center

On Saturday Sept. 12 I attended the grand opening of the E. O. Wilson Biophilia Center on Nokuse Plantation near Freeport, FL. A wonderful and much-needed educational facility for the area's youth. The exhibits, classrooms, and long nature trail are first-class. MC Davis and crew have done a fantastic job of putting this place together. It was a treat to meet and hear E.O. Wilson again, as well as a number of good friends. At one point some of us were standing around talking and we realized that we had a mini-convention of south Alabama-north Florida nature bloggers. Here's a photo by Matt Aresco of yours truly (left) alongside Margaret Gunzburger (Life in the Piney Woods) and Dave Steen (Living Alongside Wildlife). Much more cool stuff on the Wilson Center is on Margaret's blog.

The Ecopassage Again

Matt Aresco in the Lake Jackson culvert.

Fair coverage in today's New York Times.