Wild Memories

The more you read environmentally inclined literature, the less you are surprised by the details tracing the downward spiral of the planet’s ecological health. And yet the world is wide enough, nature fathomless enough that, given time to do the research, a good writer can still surprise you. J.B. MacKinnon’s The Once and Future World: Nature As It Was, As It Is, As It Could Be sets a high mark. There are astounding images and facts on nearly every page. One of them nearly got me run over.

“It can take fifty years for a huge carcass to fully decompose, meaning that a whale can ‘live’ after death as long as it did in life.” Walking while you read has its dangers, but usually I can reserve enough consciousness to handle downtown traffic. Whales, though, have a way of filling up the mind. With the massive carcass there at the bottom of the sea in my brain releasing its carbon...