The Lone Ranger
11-22-2004, 07:31 PM
A recent encounter with someone who obviously thought I was clearly a bit . . . weird . . . got me thinking. How often has it occurred that the things you do make people question your sanity? It seems to have happened to me on a number of occasions. Interestingly, a lot of the incidents revolve around my botanist friend Chris.
Chris, like me, loves nothing more than to spend time roaming around in the woods, looking for neat critters. As it happened, the state of North Carolina hired him to do a survey of the flora and fauna of the Yadkin River Valley, and so for awhile, he’d spend every weekend hiking along the banks of the river, documenting every plant and animal he could find any traces of. On several occasions, I accompanied him on these jaunts.
On one such occasion, he and I were heading to a likely field site when we both happened to catch a glimpse of pink in the field we were driving past. Chris turned to me. “Was that what I think it was?” “I think so,” I replied. Chris immediately slammed on the brakes, and came to a halt; we both leaped out of the truck and ran into the middle of this field. We were too engrossed in what we were looking at to pay attention to the sound of a car door slamming behind us. A few seconds later, however, we looked up to see a rather portly man in his late 50s or early 60s running toward us. He arrived, sweating profusely and very red in the face, and demanded, “What is it? What’s going on!?” Pleased to have an apparently appreciative lover of flora on our hands, Chris and I excitedly began to point – “Look! Can you believe it? Monarda fistulosa! I’ve never seen it growing in this part of the state! Have you?” The man stood there for a few seconds. He looked at us. He looked down at the flowers. He looked back at us. “You slammed on your brakes and went running out of your truck and made me think a bomb was about to go off because you wanted to look at some flowers?” He stomped back to his car, muttering some rather unpleasant things as he went.
Not long afterward, I was invited to give a talk at the University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa. Chris and I drove down together. I gave my talk, and afterwards, we were invited to go on an exploration of a nearby natural area with several members of the school’s Biology Department. So, the bunch of us piled into a van and we were off. We arrived at the park and set out to explore the area – me, a sort of jack-of-all-trades ecologist/zoologist, Chris, a botanist/ecologist, and three guys from the U. of A. – a herpetologist, an entomologist, and a botanist. We were combing the area, turning over every rock and log to look for snakes, lizards, salamanders, and interesting insects; looking into every pool of water for frog or toad eggs; wading into the stream to look for aquatic insects; examining every single plant, and generally having a good time, when this man and his son approached us. “Are you guys university?” the man asked. We said that we were. “I thought you probably were. We saw your van with ‘University of Alabama, Department of Biology’ on it, and we figured you’d be the people to ask.” All our ears pricked up – there’s nothing a teacher loves more than a good question. “We saw this weird salamander a few minutes ago, and maybe you can tell us what kind it was.” So, we asked them to describe it. “Well, it was black with white stripes, and had a bright blue tail –” We stopped him. “Oh, that was no salamander, that was a lizard! It was a skink, to be specific, in the genus Eumeces, probably Eumeces fasciatus or maybe Eumeces inexpectatus –” I was holding forth on the differences between reptiles and amphibians while the herpetologist in the group was demanding to know exactly where they’d seen this “salamander,” so that we could try to find it and show them that it wasn’t a salamander. “Oh no, really, that’s all right,” the man said as he and his son slowly backed away, clearly convinced that they’d run into a nest of lunatics.
On another occasion, Chris’ mother-in-law told him that she’d seen a strange bird flying over the field behind her house just after sunset. From the way she described it, it sounded like a Short-eared Owl (Asio flammeus), which wasn’t supposed to live in that part of North Carolina. So naturally, Chris and I were determined to see if we could find it. We figured that if it was a short-eared owl, the best way to confirm this would be to get it to come to us, since there’d be essentially no chance of us locating it. If you play a recording of an owl calling or imitate an owl calling, local owls of that species will sometimes come right to you, to investigate the “intruder” in their territory. (I’ve gotten quite good at imitating the calls of Great-Horned Owls, Barred Owls, Long-Eared Owls, and even Eastern Screech Owls; the kids at the Girl Scout Camp used to love it when I’d get owls to call back to me and sometimes even come to us.) Now, there’s no way that any mere human could imitate the call of a Short-Eared Owl, which sounds something like a cat trapped inside a set of bagpipes, only a lot less melodious, so we got a portable tape recorder and a recording of Asio flammeus calling, determined to find proof that the critter inhabited western North Carolina. We drove way out into the country, stopped at a few likely places, and played the tape. Nothing called back or approached us. It was about 11:30 at night when we decided to try one last place. We were on a dirt road, miles from anywhere. We set up the tape recorder and it began emitting these weird hisses and screeches. We waited for a response. Presently, a pickup truck came around the bend, and drove past slooowly while the two gentlemen inside gave us good, long, hard looks. We waved politely. They drove past, stopped about a quarter mile up the road, then turned around and drove slowly past again, looking at us long and hard. We took note of the well-stocked gun rack and decided that maybe it was wisest to get a move on.
Then there was this time I was on a frog-hunting expedition in southeastern North Carolina. I was out with a herpetologist, and my goal was to catch some bullfrogs (Rana catesbeiana) to examine for parasites. We had headlamps on, and the way you catch a frog at night is this: you shine the light in its eyes so that it can’t see you, and while it’s blinded, you net it or grab it with your hands. The water in these farm ponds was quite muddy, and so the only part of any animal in the water that you could see was that part that was sticking out of the water. As I was prowling along the shore, looking for frogs, I saw a snake in the water. More precisely, I saw part of its head sticking out of the water; the rest of it was submerged. Knowing that Agkistrodon piscivorous occupies eastern North Carolina, I was a little hesitant to approach it. “Hey, what species of water-living snake do you have here?” I asked John, my herpetologist companion. “Oh, we’re west of the Fall Line, so the only species we have around here are Nerodia,” he immediately replied. So, I reached out to grab this specimen of Nerodia sipedon in front of me. I figured I’d take a quick look at it, then let it go about its business. Nerodia are notoriously bad-tempered, but harmless snakes. As I reached down to grab the snake, it must have sensed some vibration in the water, or reacted to my body heat, because it turned toward me and lifted its head out of the water so that I could clearly see it. It wasn’t Nerodia sipedon at all, it was Agkistrodon piscivorous, the deadly-venomous water moccasin! I decided that I didn’t need to examine the snake after all and that, in fact, I’d seen it at quite close-enough range to be satisfied – what I really needed to do was explain to John in great detail that he should update his notion of where Water Moccasins do and don’t live.
One of my favorite hobbies is photographing wildflowers, and most weekends during the Spring and Summer find me wandering through fields and forests looking for neat flowers. On one occasion, I was at Hanging Rock State Park in western N.C. photographing flowers. I was carefully adjusting the focus on my camera, trying to get the False Solomon’s Seal (Smilacina racemosa) flowers perfectly framed and focused when I heard a cheerful feminine voice behind me say, “I’m so pleased to meet you; you’re my favorite wildlife photographer!” I turned to find myself confronted by a very pretty young woman in her early- to mid-twenties, smiling broadly. She went on to tell me that she’d seen me on television, and was simply thrilled to meet me in person. The thought occurred to me to say, “Why, thank you very much, would you care to discuss this further over dinner?”, but I politely informed her that I was neither a professional wildlife photographer nor a television personality. “Oh,” she replied. Then she smiled again and said, “but I still love your work!” before striding off. A most peculiar experience; to this day, I have no idea who she thinks I was.
Then there was the time I was exploring an area, looking for specimens of Lycopodium. I climbed to the top of a cliff, and as I hauled myself up over the lip of the cliff, found myself face to -- well, another body part -- with a couple who were deeply involved in enjoying nature au naturelle, as it were . . .
Anyway, those are just a few of the adventures and encounters I’ve had in the past couple of years. I’m sure other people have had similarly amusing, interesting, or enlightening encounters. Care to share?
Cheers,
Michael
Chris, like me, loves nothing more than to spend time roaming around in the woods, looking for neat critters. As it happened, the state of North Carolina hired him to do a survey of the flora and fauna of the Yadkin River Valley, and so for awhile, he’d spend every weekend hiking along the banks of the river, documenting every plant and animal he could find any traces of. On several occasions, I accompanied him on these jaunts.
On one such occasion, he and I were heading to a likely field site when we both happened to catch a glimpse of pink in the field we were driving past. Chris turned to me. “Was that what I think it was?” “I think so,” I replied. Chris immediately slammed on the brakes, and came to a halt; we both leaped out of the truck and ran into the middle of this field. We were too engrossed in what we were looking at to pay attention to the sound of a car door slamming behind us. A few seconds later, however, we looked up to see a rather portly man in his late 50s or early 60s running toward us. He arrived, sweating profusely and very red in the face, and demanded, “What is it? What’s going on!?” Pleased to have an apparently appreciative lover of flora on our hands, Chris and I excitedly began to point – “Look! Can you believe it? Monarda fistulosa! I’ve never seen it growing in this part of the state! Have you?” The man stood there for a few seconds. He looked at us. He looked down at the flowers. He looked back at us. “You slammed on your brakes and went running out of your truck and made me think a bomb was about to go off because you wanted to look at some flowers?” He stomped back to his car, muttering some rather unpleasant things as he went.
Not long afterward, I was invited to give a talk at the University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa. Chris and I drove down together. I gave my talk, and afterwards, we were invited to go on an exploration of a nearby natural area with several members of the school’s Biology Department. So, the bunch of us piled into a van and we were off. We arrived at the park and set out to explore the area – me, a sort of jack-of-all-trades ecologist/zoologist, Chris, a botanist/ecologist, and three guys from the U. of A. – a herpetologist, an entomologist, and a botanist. We were combing the area, turning over every rock and log to look for snakes, lizards, salamanders, and interesting insects; looking into every pool of water for frog or toad eggs; wading into the stream to look for aquatic insects; examining every single plant, and generally having a good time, when this man and his son approached us. “Are you guys university?” the man asked. We said that we were. “I thought you probably were. We saw your van with ‘University of Alabama, Department of Biology’ on it, and we figured you’d be the people to ask.” All our ears pricked up – there’s nothing a teacher loves more than a good question. “We saw this weird salamander a few minutes ago, and maybe you can tell us what kind it was.” So, we asked them to describe it. “Well, it was black with white stripes, and had a bright blue tail –” We stopped him. “Oh, that was no salamander, that was a lizard! It was a skink, to be specific, in the genus Eumeces, probably Eumeces fasciatus or maybe Eumeces inexpectatus –” I was holding forth on the differences between reptiles and amphibians while the herpetologist in the group was demanding to know exactly where they’d seen this “salamander,” so that we could try to find it and show them that it wasn’t a salamander. “Oh no, really, that’s all right,” the man said as he and his son slowly backed away, clearly convinced that they’d run into a nest of lunatics.
On another occasion, Chris’ mother-in-law told him that she’d seen a strange bird flying over the field behind her house just after sunset. From the way she described it, it sounded like a Short-eared Owl (Asio flammeus), which wasn’t supposed to live in that part of North Carolina. So naturally, Chris and I were determined to see if we could find it. We figured that if it was a short-eared owl, the best way to confirm this would be to get it to come to us, since there’d be essentially no chance of us locating it. If you play a recording of an owl calling or imitate an owl calling, local owls of that species will sometimes come right to you, to investigate the “intruder” in their territory. (I’ve gotten quite good at imitating the calls of Great-Horned Owls, Barred Owls, Long-Eared Owls, and even Eastern Screech Owls; the kids at the Girl Scout Camp used to love it when I’d get owls to call back to me and sometimes even come to us.) Now, there’s no way that any mere human could imitate the call of a Short-Eared Owl, which sounds something like a cat trapped inside a set of bagpipes, only a lot less melodious, so we got a portable tape recorder and a recording of Asio flammeus calling, determined to find proof that the critter inhabited western North Carolina. We drove way out into the country, stopped at a few likely places, and played the tape. Nothing called back or approached us. It was about 11:30 at night when we decided to try one last place. We were on a dirt road, miles from anywhere. We set up the tape recorder and it began emitting these weird hisses and screeches. We waited for a response. Presently, a pickup truck came around the bend, and drove past slooowly while the two gentlemen inside gave us good, long, hard looks. We waved politely. They drove past, stopped about a quarter mile up the road, then turned around and drove slowly past again, looking at us long and hard. We took note of the well-stocked gun rack and decided that maybe it was wisest to get a move on.
Then there was this time I was on a frog-hunting expedition in southeastern North Carolina. I was out with a herpetologist, and my goal was to catch some bullfrogs (Rana catesbeiana) to examine for parasites. We had headlamps on, and the way you catch a frog at night is this: you shine the light in its eyes so that it can’t see you, and while it’s blinded, you net it or grab it with your hands. The water in these farm ponds was quite muddy, and so the only part of any animal in the water that you could see was that part that was sticking out of the water. As I was prowling along the shore, looking for frogs, I saw a snake in the water. More precisely, I saw part of its head sticking out of the water; the rest of it was submerged. Knowing that Agkistrodon piscivorous occupies eastern North Carolina, I was a little hesitant to approach it. “Hey, what species of water-living snake do you have here?” I asked John, my herpetologist companion. “Oh, we’re west of the Fall Line, so the only species we have around here are Nerodia,” he immediately replied. So, I reached out to grab this specimen of Nerodia sipedon in front of me. I figured I’d take a quick look at it, then let it go about its business. Nerodia are notoriously bad-tempered, but harmless snakes. As I reached down to grab the snake, it must have sensed some vibration in the water, or reacted to my body heat, because it turned toward me and lifted its head out of the water so that I could clearly see it. It wasn’t Nerodia sipedon at all, it was Agkistrodon piscivorous, the deadly-venomous water moccasin! I decided that I didn’t need to examine the snake after all and that, in fact, I’d seen it at quite close-enough range to be satisfied – what I really needed to do was explain to John in great detail that he should update his notion of where Water Moccasins do and don’t live.
One of my favorite hobbies is photographing wildflowers, and most weekends during the Spring and Summer find me wandering through fields and forests looking for neat flowers. On one occasion, I was at Hanging Rock State Park in western N.C. photographing flowers. I was carefully adjusting the focus on my camera, trying to get the False Solomon’s Seal (Smilacina racemosa) flowers perfectly framed and focused when I heard a cheerful feminine voice behind me say, “I’m so pleased to meet you; you’re my favorite wildlife photographer!” I turned to find myself confronted by a very pretty young woman in her early- to mid-twenties, smiling broadly. She went on to tell me that she’d seen me on television, and was simply thrilled to meet me in person. The thought occurred to me to say, “Why, thank you very much, would you care to discuss this further over dinner?”, but I politely informed her that I was neither a professional wildlife photographer nor a television personality. “Oh,” she replied. Then she smiled again and said, “but I still love your work!” before striding off. A most peculiar experience; to this day, I have no idea who she thinks I was.
Then there was the time I was exploring an area, looking for specimens of Lycopodium. I climbed to the top of a cliff, and as I hauled myself up over the lip of the cliff, found myself face to -- well, another body part -- with a couple who were deeply involved in enjoying nature au naturelle, as it were . . .
Anyway, those are just a few of the adventures and encounters I’ve had in the past couple of years. I’m sure other people have had similarly amusing, interesting, or enlightening encounters. Care to share?
Cheers,
Michael