Earthcare means getting to know our `larger self '

by Fran Palmeri
Sarasota (Fla.) Friends Meeting

…the earth is our larger self, in whom
we live and move and have our being.

—Angela Manno

I've known this since early childhood, when I gardened with my grandmother. In spring we planted tiny seeds in the warm, brown earth and watched green shoots appear—a kind of miracle. I was growing taller and so were the plants. We seemed to be one and the same.

Realizing this connection to our "larger self" is vital if we want to preserve this beautiful earthly home of ours. Unknowingly, I began doing this several years ago, photographing in Oscar Scherer State Park near my home in southwest Florida. Glorious vistas, huge ancient Live Oaks, sunsets, and the more glamorous residents: Florida Scrub Jays and Gopher Tortoises attracted me first. Then it was insects, fungi, mushrooms, moss, algae, animal tracks, spider webs, and small and large burrows on the sandy trails that drew my attention. At night, I'd download photos to my computer and identify them from reference books and websites.

I started volunteering at the state park and sent articles and photographs to local papers. I made friends at the state park. One of them, Laurel Schiller, became an invaluable mentor and friend.

As I became invested in the state park I wondered about the stark differences of the landscapes inside and outside the gates. I'd accepted unthinkingly the narrow construct that certain animals like Florida Scrub Jays belonged in the 1,382 wild acres of the state park while humanity outside the gates spread out on asphalt and turf in ever widening circles, eradicating natural habitats. How artificial the boundaries soon seemed!

I started looking at local ecosystems. Reading Florida history, I learned how people who have moved here over the past four centuries have drastically altered the land. They cleared the land, lot line to lot line. They planted cash crops or built their dream houses with lawns and plantings of mostly imported species, which drove out native plants and animals

On a bigger scale, they re-channeled rivers (the Kissimmee), dug canals, tore up sacred shell mounds of native peoples to build roads, dammed Lake Okeechobee, and cut down old-growth cypress trees to sell as mulch. The list goes on and on. If it weren't for the persistent voice of Margery Stoneham Douglas (who said her Quaker ancestors inspired her) sounding the alarm, we would have lost forever that beautiful "river of grass," the Everglades.

The destruction continues. Every acre that's cleared hastens extinction of native species. Ninety percent of the Scrub, the most endangered ecosystem in Florida, is gone. Loss of habitat equals loss of species. According to researchers at the Archbold Biological Research Station in Lake Placid, Florida, we lose one species a day. The existence of the Florida Scrub Jays is tenuous. If we don't do something in the next five years in Sarasota County, says John Fitzpatrick, Director of the Ornithological Laboratory at Cornell University, they'll be gone from here by mid-century. But we're not talking just birds here. We're talking ecosystems. We are talking the planet. We're talking our "larger self."

What can we, as Friends and humans, do? Start with asking ourselves these questions:

What's in my yard? Lawn? Shrubs? Flowers? Native? Non-native? What can I do to improve matters? Make an assessment. If you're heavy on lawn, consider taking out it out, bit-by-bit, and planting native species. Start small in the back. Work from the edges of the property in.

What's under the sink? Pesticides? Think about where they end up. Toss out the can of Raid. If you don't like a bug in your house, remove it or squash it. For larger problems you can find less poisonous natural alternatives on the Internet or in books than you would get from a pest control service.

What ecosystem do I live in? What was here? What's here now? State departments of natural resources and local universities have this information. What plant species are native to my area? Is there a native plant society or a native plant nursery?

How can I preserve, conserve, and restore natural ecosystems in my area? Can we integrate the natural world with the artificial? This is already being done in many places. A good example is Sirius, an intentional community near Amherst, Massachusetts, where Quaker friends of mine live.

How can I educate myself and others? Read, join with others, take a master naturalist or master gardening class, volunteer at schools or with Earth-based organizations. Our Earthcare Committee at Sarasota Monthly Meeting is getting together with other churches to see what we can do collectively. From my work at the state park, I've learned about the huge negative impact on natural resources by invasive exotic plants and animals. Feral cats are one of the leading causes of bird extinction.

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