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| Sunset on a winters day on the beach |
I generally like to look at life as a glass
half-full but In light of recent events of the port authority “wildlife specialist”
exterminating snowy owls.
I would like it to be safe too.
But I agree with this statement from Erin Crotty
Executive Director
Audubon NY
“A need to protect airline and passenger safety. We
believe there are non-lethal control strategies that are equally effective,
including trapping and releasing, and have been used successfully at other
airports, including Logan Airport in Boston.”
I believe that it has been the easy way to just
eliminate any critter that may get in the way but there is always an
alternative to this. I am not saying that it's an easy one but at this point in
time perhaps a necessary one to save the wildlife and let them live wild and
free.
Otherwise what will be left?
Here is a link to sign a petition about the
owls.
Here's a link to learn more about the owls and
airports”.
Here is my story about the snowy owl:
On The Wildside
Searching for the Snowy Owl,”
Fist printed in the Enterprise Pilot Oyster Bay, New York, August
19, 2004
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| Me and my friend a Barn Owl |
Searching for the snowy owl
It must've been about 10° out, but it felt like
20 below. I was at Jones Beach on one of the coldest days of the year. What was
I doing there? I was looking for bird.
Now most people would be wondering (like most
of my family) that I must be crazy, or at least a little weird. What kind of
bird would be worth getting up at 6 o'clock in the morning and spending the day
in the freezing cold?
Well, for me it was the snowy owl. The snowy
owl winters on the shores of Long Island from November to March.
This magical creature migrates from places like
Alaska, Greenland and Iceland. It is the official bird of Québec (sounds
impressive doesn't it). I've always dreamt of going to places like Alaska.
Seeing the snowy owl would be like having a small piece of that dream.
I wish I could be like Dr. Doolittle and talk
to the owl. I would ask the owl about its travels, things like did he have many
stops or did he fly direct? Maybe you could tell me where I could go to see a
lot of wildlife? But I have been searching for weeks and have not seen one.
Needing someone to share my joy with (if I ever found the owl) I took anyone
that would go.
One day I went to work on my then 16-year-old
daughter, as we walked on the beach I torture her with my bad impression
of Arnold Schwarzenegger, over and over again, I would say “I am looking for ta snowiee owl –have you seen ta snowiee owl?”
(she
found my Arnold imitations amusing)and when she got bored, to keep her going I
would tell her things about the snowy owl, things that I learned, things like it was the only owl that hunts in
the daytime. That it had a wingspan of about 52 inches (she wasn't sure how
wide that was, so I told her she would be really impressed when she saw it).
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| My daughter at the beach with me |
She said cool, which meant she would go on this
adventure with me.
It was late in the day, half frozen and feeling
defeated; we headed for the parking lot. Will we ever get to see the snowy owl?
Maybe I would just have to go to Alaska after all. The sun had begun to set. The
winter sunsets are so beautiful that we stopped to take a photo. Then out of
nowhere, like a ghost in the sky, the snowy owl stopped to rest on a dune right
in front of us…
Hues of orange and pink softly reflected on the
snow white feathers of the owl. He looked at us, with large haunting bright
yellow eyes, it seemed to be indifferent to our presence. Captivated we stood
there shivering. My daughter's eyes wide with awe said everything. We were
crazy for being out here. It was the timeless allure of nature that brought us
here. As we sat waiting for the car to warm up I thought maybe the owl and I
will meet again someday perhaps in Alaska.
Winter Retreat
__________________________________________
Although I never got a photo of the owl that
day it had made such an impression and I painted that which lived forever in my
memory and which happen to be the painting that was featured in this NY
Times article.
This is part of a personal study about
migratory birds and here is the link for the New York Times article about that
study.
Capturing Long Island's Wildlife, in Oil and Ink
By BARBARA DELATINER
Published: December 15, 2002
OYSTER BAY COVE— JOANNE
SULLAM has sketchpad, pencils and camera in hand. At the sound of what she
called a ''rare bird alert,'' she will gather her tools and rush to any place
on Long Island where an unusual species has been sighted.
Take the snowy owl, for instance. An increasingly infrequent visitor to
these parts, the owl was spotted at Jones Beach State Park one day last winter
and off Ms. Sullam went to the beach for a look. For weeks she got there just
after dawn to sit in the dunes, binoculars at the ready, until the bird finally
appeared again, at sunset one day.
''It landed on a dune in front of me,'' recalled Ms. Sullam, a 44-year-old
artist who is a native Long Islander and lifelong animal lover. ''And while I
couldn't get any good photos, I did see it up close, catch the color
variations, the shape of its eyes.''
Ms. Sullam's adventure with the snowy owl led to a portrait in oil, part of
her project, ''Wild on Long Island,'' in which she is recording local
landscapes and the migratory birds that visit them. Twelve of her oil paintings
and pen-and-ink sketches are being exhibited at the Theodore Roosevelt
Sanctuary and Audubon Center in Oyster Bay Cove. As Ms. Sullam completes more
bird portraits and incorporates botanical species, butterflies and animals like
deer and foxes in her paintings, she hopes to expand the show and move it to
other venues on the Island.
The goal is to raise awareness of the Island's endangered species by showing
people the wildlife around them.
''So many species are threatened by changes in their migratory and breeding
habitats that it's important to raise public awareness about what's
happening,'' Ms. Sullam said in an interview at the Roosevelt sanctuary, where
she is a volunteer.
Trish Pelkowski, director of research at the sanctuary, is collaborating
with Ms. Sullam on the project. ''Knowing what a bird might look like and where
to look for it is the first step to awareness,'' Ms. Pelkowski said.
Completing the project may take a few years, Ms. Sullam estimated, because
painting wild creatures takes time.
''The early bird artists, like Audubon himself, worked from stuffed birds,''
said Ms. Pelkowski, who helps Ms. Sullam locate the species. ''Art and nature
conservation have evolved so much that this would no longer be acceptable.''
Most of the time, Ms. Sullam's subjects are literally on the wing. As she
did with the snowy owl, she waits for hours, days or weeks in dunes, woods,
grasslands or marshes to capture the birds in their natural habitats. Sometimes
she uses captive animals as models, like a disabled bald eagle and peregrine
falcon that live at the sanctuary and are always ready for a close-up. Backyard
bird feeders also provide a steady supply of subjects.
Ms. Pelkowski and her colleagues at the center, the oldest sanctuary of the
national Audubon Society, often invite the artist when migrating birds are
caught in nets and tagged before being returned to the wild.
''I get as much as 15 or 20 minutes and can really get a sense of the bird
-- like the shape of its feathers, its colors, the tilt of its head -- and then
put all the components, including their usual habitats, together,'' Ms. Sullam
said.
Raised in Long Beach and later a resident of Oceanside, Ms. Sullam and her
family moved to Brookville seven years ago because ''the wildlife is much
better on the North Shore,'' she said.
She attended the School of Visual Arts in Manhattan; her paintings and
sculptures, mostly of animals, have been shown in local galleries. Her current
project unites both her interests.
''The entire U.S. warbler population has declined by 30 to 40 percent,'' Ms.
Pelkowski said. ''And the number of short-eared owls is down 70 percent in the
U.S. So JoAnne has to see them soon and paint them before they all disappear.''
''Wild on Long Island'' is at the Theodore Roosevelt Sanctuary and Audubon
Center, Cove Road, Oyster Bay Cove, through Jan. 11. Information: (516)
922-3200.
Photos: Joanne Sullam, holding a peregrine falcon at the Theodore Roosevelt
Sanctuary and Audubon Center in Oyster Bay Cove, paints portraits of Long
Island wildlife, like the snowy owl, below, and the bald eagle. Her paintings
and pen-and-ink sketches are on display at the sanctuary through Jan. 11.
(Maxine Hicks for The New York Times)
