I didn't have time to visit ELP during daylight hours, so I had to grab today's stone from the roadside.  I staffed the WNPS booth at the Northwest Flower & Garden Show.  While I was there for three hours, talking to people about native plants, I observed people's behavior.  Next to our booth was a booth for the rhododendron garden in Federal Way.  They brought in two rhododendrons, one that was showy white and another that was small, orange, and like an orchid.  In our booth was a healthy young hemlock tree.  No one gave our little tree more than a passing glance.  Hundreds of people stopped to admire the rhododendrons, some of them oohing and ahhing and making a big fuss.  Were the rhododendrons more attractive or better than my little hemlock tree?  Why? 

For their gardens, most people choose bright colors, simple shapes, and order.  Most gardens are unnatural.  Especially the display gardens at this show.  The ideal garden, according to the throngs of people who come to this annual event, is a perversion of nature.  Gardening, or horticulture, is the opposite of nature.  It is taking species out of nature and making them jump through hoops in tidy little circus acts.  Gardening, as practiced, is not ecological.  The gardening industry has a huge impact on the environment, shipping all those plants, introducing invasive species, disturbing native habitats, adding pesticides and fertilizers.  If all of the space used for gardens could be converted to native plant ecosystems, the world would be a much healthier place.  The book Bringing Nature Home by Douglas Tallamy describes what a benefit to our environment this could be. 

Why don't people want native plants in their yards?  Why is a flat green lawn bordered by flower beds and severely pruned shrubs considered more beautiful or desirable?  Why is it that people walk through Eagle Landing Park and ignore nature as if it was a waste of space?  Part of the reason is due to commerce and capitalism.  Demand is manufactured for unnatural landscapes through images and poetic writing.  A whole industry depends on cultivating a hatred of nature and natural beauty.  The first thing you do when you build a home is to strip away nature, even the soil.  Then you import plants from elsewhere and even import new, lifeless soil. 

Everywhere I looked at the flower and garden show, I saw the manipulation and explotation of nature in unnatural configurations and uses.  Even those displays that used native species tended to set them in neat configurations, tame, not wild.  I hope my time spent at the flower show was of benefit to the people I spoke to, because I would much rather have been in my park, in nature. 

The eagles put on a show today.  I saw them way out over the water, two small lines changing shape over the water as the flapped, basically two-dimensional.  One chased another all the way to Eagle Landing Park, where the lead eagle dropped a fish and the second eagle dove down after it.  I could not distinguish whether they were adults or juveniles.  Moments later, I saw two eagles, I assume they were the same two, land in a couple of cedar trees.  One had a white head and the other was a juvenile.  The adult then flew by at eye level.  The juvenile flew into the maple trees, a dangerous mistake by an inexperienced flier.  The adults always land in the same spots, where they have plenty of room to take off.  This juvenile amid the dense branches of the maples had to take some time to plot a course back out. 

Later, after we walked out of the park and headed north, I saw two eagles side by side in the dead tree half a mile north of the park.  Right near that dead tree, I saw a nest with fledglings in it a couple of years ago.  The two trees, the nest tree and the perch tree, are right on the southern edge of Seahurst Park, near some homes.  The homes are always quiet, as far as I have ever observed, and they probably don't shoot at the eagles.  In 2008, a local resident took a picture of 18 eagles in the dead tree.  The accompanying comments said there had been as many as 24 at one point.  They may have all been related, all offspring of the pair that first nested in ELP in 1989.  Maybe they will move back to ELP someday, or a new pair will begin nesting here.

We hurried to the beach and back without taking much time to enjoy the park.  Still, a quick visit is nice. The park can be just a place, sometimes.  Although ELP is definitely alive, many uses of the park as merely a place can have little or no impact.  Even if you are just passing through, it is a nice place to pass through. 

It's hard to say what counts as the first flower of the year in Eagle Landing Park.  A currant started blooming before the snow and the ice storm, but that is probably a non-native cultivar planted in the park by mistake.  A trailing blackberry vine has a couple of flowers, but those are probably a mistake by a confused plant that got its signals wrong.  Indian plum, traditionally the first flowering native plant in local forests, is dangerously close to blooming.  I feel like the Indian plum is teasing me with its big fat buds that won't quite open.  Any day now. 

Whales were reported at Vashon Island and West Seattle.  I looked, but I couldn't see any from Eagle Landing Park.  I have lived near Eagle Landing Park much of my life, and I've never seen a whale in person.  I did see ducks and cormorants, and I heard a loon.  A hummingbird was chirping while dive-bombing in a territorial display. 

Red elderberry is starting to leaf out.  The tips of the red huckleberry are swelling.  Some of the snowberry bushes are leafing out while others look totally dormant. 

I wasn't the only one happy about the clouds, rain, drizzle, mist, and fog today.  Many birds twittered about, filling the forest with sound.  I heard flickers, jays, pileated woodpeckers, eagles, wrens, nuthatches, chickadees, towhees, and the varied thrush.  The Indian plum is just about to bloom.  One trailing blackberry bloomed, but it may have been just one confused plant.  I brought all four dogs, knowing the trail would be less crowded on such a nice gloomy day.

stone 39 in the middle

And now, a word about dog poop.  If it was just one or two dogs, it wouldn't be a problem.  When people bring their dogs to the park, they only see one or two dogs, and they might think it won't hurt anything if they don't pick up after their dogs.  Well, it's not just one or two dogs leaving a mess.  It's dozens every day.   Dogs like to use their noses, especially my youngest, and he points out every pile of poop on our usual two mile walking loop.  It's a lot.  I mean, like, alarming.  When you actually notice how much canine feces there is in one little neighborhood, and you multiply that by all the little neighborhoods in the Puget Sound watershed, that is a mountain of poop.  No wonder the whales are sickly and declining. 

Walking along the trail in Eagle Landing Park, you can't go ten feet without encountering a pile of crap.  If you don't look down along the edge of the trail, you might not notice it.  I have to watch the edge of the trail because I have to make sure that none of my four dogs eats a cigarette butt or any other detritus along the way.  Especially on days with sunny weather, I'm looking at a parade of poop.  Maybe this has something to do with my general dislike of people.  Once you get to the beach, you are going to find poop there as well even though the tide washes it away twice a day. 

Cleaning up after a dog isn't the most fun thing in the world, but if you adopted or bought a dog, that's what you singed up for.  It's a shame that, after reading Jennifer Hahn's book on foraging, I can't sample a little bit of the seaweed in Eagle Landing Park just to see what it tastes like.  The ducks and the fish and the little crabs and sea creatures don't have a choice.  They have to feed in these shallow waters no matter how much dog poop washes into their home.  And it all washes down there eventually.  Even if you let your dog out into your back yard and don't clean up after him, it ends up in the storm drain and eventually empties into the Sound. 

Many people let their dogs swim in the Sound at Eagle Landing Park, regardless of the leash law.  If you do let your dog swim there, that's even more reason to clean up after your dog.  Puget Sound is a cesspool.  Besides the dog waste, there is all the oil from dripping cars, the equivalent of an Exxon Valdez oil spill every other year.  Also, all the brake dust from a million cars winds up in the sound, with copper and other toxins.  If you let your dog swim in the Sound, be sure to give him a bath later.  And clean up after your dog. 

I don't like warm, sunny days like today.  I prefer rain.  I am more comfortable in the rain, and it keeps the crowds away.  On sunny days, more damage happens to the park.

I have been told I am too negative, that if I want to rally people to the cause of protecting the park, I should focus on the park's positive attributes, make people fall in love with her.  Well, I have been doing that for five years with the web site dedicated to the park, www.EagleLandingPark.org.  That web site has hundreds of pretty pictures of the native plants of the park, and pages of helpful information.  If it has had a positive impact, then that must mean the park really would have gone to hell without the web site.  If people cause unnecessary damage to the park and I try to stop it, I am viewed as being too negative.  If I would speak for the park, serve as her voice, what should I say?  Should I say that nature is happy to be degraded if it gives a fleeting thrill to a thoughtless person?  Even if we forget about what nature wants, there are other park patrons to consider.  Some people, a few or many, come to Eagle Landing Park to enjoy nature.  We can't do that at the skate park or the basketball court or the soccer field.  If I tried to build a native plant garden in the middle of the baseball diamond, I would be arrested for vandalism.  If I walked into a bar and started planting trees, I would be thrown out.  The only local place that nature lovers can feel at home is in quiet places like Eagle Landing Park.  Yet, if I dare to ask people to ride their bikes, swing their sticks, drink their beer, smoke their drugs in some more appropriate place, then I am the bad guy.

Mothers are the worst.  You expect vandalism from boys of a certain age because that's what they do.  Mothers, however, have the shield of motherhood, and because they are ostensibly caring for children, you are expected to accept anything and everything they allow their kids to do.  Parents have allowed or encouraged their children to trespass on neighboring property, tear out plants, trample sensitive areas, and take home bags full of rocks and shells that they are just going to throw out sooner or later.  Mothers look on with pride as their children blaze new paths through the native plants or hack up a sword fern with a stick.  They encourage their children to scream.  If you dare to suggest they ask their children not to damage or disturb the park, you will be greeted with scorn or rage.  There are certainly parents who teach their children respect for nature, but they are not in the majority.  Most of the mothers expect their children have a right and even a duty to destroy public property.  That's what it's there for, so their children can have a moment's idle entertainment.

Today, two women walked up the trail with three boys flailing at the bushes with sticks.  My youngest dog tends to get excited when people make sudden, inexplicable movments near him, so I moved to the side to get my two dogs far away from the stick-swinging boys.  One of the women made a comment about one of my dogs.  I kept my attention on the dogs in order to help the puppy feel calmer in the presence of the boys, and also to avoid telling the mothers they ought to respect nature.  For keeping quiet, I got told I was rude.  In the eyes of many, the family is so sacred that any transgression must be overlooked.  In fact, we are supposed to praise the disruption a family causes because they are happy, which is the important thing.  Okay, then, what about the family of eagles that has to abandon a place named Eagle Landing Park in order to find a little peace?  What about the families of the Douglas squirrels and the robins and the flickers?  Oh, only human families count.  And if I even dared to think otherwise, it is proof of my antisocial behavior.  People who destroy nature are normal, and people who think nature should be protected are negative.

I can certainly put it in a positive way, as I have been doing for five years.  If you treat nature with respect, then it will still be here for you to visit in the future.  If you would like to engage in sports where you can throw things and swing sticks, the taxpayers have provided facilities exactly for that purpose.  If you would like to do illegal drugs, no one will know or care if you go to your own home and do them.  If you want to have sex, then I think that's great!  You can have sex with any man or woman who consents, and you can go do it at home where you don't have to trample a restoration project.  And I applaud your use of condoms as long as you don't leave your used condoms in the park for any child or dog to find.  I think it is great that you are riding a bike, and there are miles of road where you can do that.  If you want to ride your bike on dirt trails, nearby facilities have been created just for that purpose.  I want you to engage in any recreation that pleases you, and you will better be able to enjoy that sport if you go to the facility expressly created for that purpose.  If you want to enjoy recreations specifically suited to a nature park, you can engage in bird watching, geocaching, beach combing, or simply walking in peace and quiet.  You can walk your dog on a leash, which keeps him safer.  You can take your dog to the off-leash park if you want him to run free and play.  I suggest people learn to treat nature with respect for their own benefit and enjoyment.  Nature is endlessly wonderful and fascinating, and the more you appreciate it, the richer your life will be.

If I were to speak for nature and be the voice of Eagle Landing Park, I guess I should say something like this.  "All are welcome here.  If you treat me gently, I can be a benefit for you in the future.  I am utterly at your mercy, and I hope you will take advantage of the opportunity to enjoy my many unique features found nowhere else in the city.  We can work together, and I can benefit you as you benefit me.  Any damage you cause me will take years to reverse, and I will appear degraded in the mean time.  If you help keep this a beautiful place, then you will always have a beautiful place to come to.  If you want this forest to look like a junkyard, then that is your choice.  I can only be of value to you if you treat me as valuable.  This fragile beauty is yours to embrace or discard.  If you hurt me, you are only hurting yourselves, depriving yourselves of something that cannot be found elsewhere."

stone 37