Mother Nature and Equipoise

Both yesterday and today, I ventured out on my bicycle even though the forecast was for more April showers. Here, for example, is one of the views that greeted me today.

While I did have some scattered raindrops and faced a strong headwind on my return home, I was glad that I had made the effort. The gathering clouds presented some spectacular contrasts.

But most of all, I was enchanted when a red squirrel darted across my path. In this post from 2010, I wrote about experiencing a similar event. This time, however, instead of vanishing into the foliage along the path, the little creature scampered up the trunk of a nearby birch tree. I dismounted and pulled out my camera, hoping to get a shot, but the little squirrel was simply too shy. I could get occasional glimpses of its tufted ears and its russet tail, but it remained obstinately out of sight - certainly out of view of my little camera's capacities. So, I moved on, once more delighted at this rare sighting.

So this makes two sightings in little more than two years of the elusive and increasingly rare little creature. Because this location was quite a distance from my previous sighting, I dare to hope that it was an additional and not simply the same squirrel. Perhaps they are making a comeback. One can hope.

Other wildlife species considered vanished from this area also seem to be making a comeback, although not everyone is delighted by that. Thus, the Geneva Tribune reported this week that cameras positioned at various points on the Saleve, the mountain located in France that looms over Geneva and that features in Mary Shelley's novel Frankenstein, captured photos of a wolf several times at the end of March.

Those familiar with the origin of the novel may remember that Ms Shelley, at the time Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin, was spending the summer with her future husband, the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley, and other literary friends at a villa on Lake Geneva rented by Lord Byron. The weather being rainy and cold, not conducive to wandering about the countryside or other activities, the group decided to amuse themselves by having a competition to determine who could write the best horror story. Thus, this world-famous novel was born.

The cameras were placed on the Saleve in the hopes of capturing photos of a lynx. While the lynx has still proven elusive, scientist were surprised to see that there is at least one wolf there. Neighboring livestock owners are not at all excited by this, much like similar controversies surrounding the return of the wolf that continue in my own native Montana.

But I live in hope that we can all manage to find some way to coexist. Mother Nature apparently believes that we can.