#93 Gannetts
July 3, 2008
This show originally aired in April 25, 2007 and then again on July 3, 2008 on “The Rivanna Rambler,” a weekly public affairs show airing every Thursday at 11:55 a.m. on WTJU 91.1 FM or wtju.net
On a sunny Sunday in April, we finally cast the lines off the boat and leave for a trial run to the Potomac after a long marina-bound winter. With a sweet 12 knot breeze out of the east, we are soon under sail skipping across the Potomac from Virginia to Maryland. The river is mostly empty of boats, a few April adventurers and other folks who know that this can be one of the best times on the Chesapeake and her rivers. And we have other company, too.
In the distance, the dive and plunge of birds, repeated again and again, catches my attention. Instinct suggests, and my binoculars confirm, that I am seeing Northern Gannets flocking and fishing. I know these birds from my time working on the ocean, where I saw great numbers, along with thousands of other pelagic birds. It’s a striking bird, white with sharp black wingtips, and a white head with a slight buff the color of butter. Once you’ve seen one, you’ll know it forever.
Strong, large, with a n adult wingspan of over 6 feet, these birds are build to dive, and can be distinguished from ospreys who enter the water chest first. Gannetts, on the other hand, descend in a dive that remains committed to the end. During the descent, their wings are drawn alongside, bent back like a trussed chicken, so that right before impact the bird has the shape of missile. They enter the water with considerable speed and force but have a strong skull that is built for this kind of diving, and a system of air sacs to help absorb the shock of these plunges.
The Northern Gannet only comes ashore to nest, on our side of the Atlantic in the Canadian provinces and Newfoundland. They will winter as far south as Virginia but are usually found offshore. I am surprised to see them on the Potomac, but it is April, and in the animal and avian kingdoms, everything that can, is moving, migrating, and making families. The shad are running, the herring are with them, and there’s evidently good food to be had in the Potomac. We see over 50 birds, in various groupings, as they scout the surface, hover, then dive. Sometimes, they fly by, ten yards away at the level of our hull, barely skimming the surface, as they do at sea.
Seeing these birds, evidently fueling up for their migration northward, gets me thinking about the whole phenomenon of migration. Birds migrating from south to north, shad and herring running upriver to spawn, the improbable journey thousands of miles of certain butterflies. And then there are the human forms of migration. Our very distant ancestors followed the seasons and the food when necessary. Native Americans from the Piedmont traveled to summer fishing camps along our major rivers to intercept shad and herring coming upstream.
But the satisfaction of our need for food and shelter in the modern world is vastly removed from the necessities of harvesting fish or animals on the move. When we, or our food, travels the distance – like trawlers steaming to distant fishing grounds or ttrucks moving our fair weather food crops from Florida or California to eastern markets — we have the luxury – and some would say, curse – of having fossil fuels and machinery that makes this kind of travel commonplace and indeed necessary to support the so-called global market.
And we humans have found our own modern forms of migration. For food, we make the daily trip to the grocery store and the weekend jaunt for recreation, like my trip down here to sail on the Potomac. We travel to distant schools and colleges. We are “snowbirds,” wintering in Florida to escape the harsh northern winter climes. Fossil fuels make all this possible, but we now know that perhaps, we may need to start making other arrangements.
And maybe this is a good thing. Maybe we can reawaken a more animal-like sense of place that is driven more by essential needs – food, shelter, companionship — than the insatiable hunger we often suffer when we have lost the ability to know what is truly enough, and just enough, to survive and be creative and compassionate human beings. I am comforted to know that the Northern gannet, for now, has a reasonably stable population. And thrilled to watch their dramatic dives on my trip on the water. And, finally, I am appreciative that watching them fish for their next meal, I am reminded to evaluate my own life in these terms.