CONSIDER THE FLOUNDER

“Orange_ watercolor by kayti sweeetland rasmussen

Would you be better off not knowing?

Baby flounders look like any other normal fish, swimming upright with one eye on each side of their face. Then they undergo a bizarre transformation: one eye migrates to the other side of the face. It’s like a fishy facial reconstructive surgery. No scalpels or sutures, though I haven’t talked to anyone willing to try it out.

While you’re digesting that information, it doesn’t take long to accomplish this act. Five days in some cases and less than one day in some species. If a fish can have an awkward adolescence, this is it.

In exchange for this indignation, flounders get fabulous binocular vision. Great if you were scuba diving. You would have advance notice of any possible predator coming your way. Binocular vision would be useful for a lifestyle of lying in wait on the bottom of a sandy or stony bottom dressed in incomparable camouflage watching for an opportunity to snatch an unsuspecting shrimp or other unfortunate passerby.

In addition to the miracle of vision exchange, flounders have the enviable ability to mimic their background. Think of the advantage this might bring to those of us humans who might prefer to remain in the background? In a high school biology example of a flounder who had been placed on a checkerboard, the change began within minutes; the flounder had produced a believable rendition of a checkerboard on its back.

This ability to mimic background by changing their distribution of skin pigment is poorly understood. If one of the flounders’ eyes is damaged or covered by sand, they have difficulty matching their colors to their surroundings, which hints at some level of conscious control by the flounder. These guys may be smarter than we give them credit for.

My grandson is a wildlife biologist, and a world class fisherman. I wonder if he knows all this.

Selected from new book What a Fish Knows by Johathan Balcombe

THE PLUM BEAR OF RANCHO SAN JULIAN

THE ROAD HOME

On the rancho, grizzly bears were considered the outlaws of the animal world. They lived in the nearby foothills, too close for anyone’s comfort, especially since it was easy for them to pay a call at the back door or saunter down the main street of the then pueblo, looking for snacks. When they were hungry, almost nothing stopped them from plundering. Grizzlies were frightening and scary, but no one had been eye to eye with one until the Plum Bear came along.

A plum tree right next to the kitchen adobe was so heavy with fruit its boughs were hanging near the ground, where the bear could have picked all the plums he wanted. But no, our bear climbed the tree, not an easy task for a bear. The Plum Bear decided that he wanted the plums on the end of the bough on top of the roof. Anyone who knew anything about fruit knew that the ripest ones were at the top. Our bear was a fruit expert, and his only choice was to climb the tree and climb onto the roof of the adobe so he could get the best plum. The roof of the old adobe was not made to support bears.

HOUSE TODAY

Some women were busy cooking when the bear fell through the roof. His descent into the adobe must have surprised him as much as it surprised the women making tortillas. They ran screaming out of the little house, leaving it to the perplexed bear.

Horses were always kept ready, with riatas coiled at the saddle bow. Upon hearing the screams of the women, several men jumped on their waiting steeds and surrounded the Plum Bear, who had made his way out of the house. He was swiftly lassoed and tied up to a nearby sycamore tree, the best kind of tree for securing bears.

Whenever I heard this story as a child, I felt immensely sorry for the bear who had only wanted to get the perfect plum at the top of the tree. I wondered then, and still do today, if he ever got the plum.

CATTLE GRAZING IN PEACE

Today, instead of Grizzlies, the rancho is home to wild boar, wild turkeys, and white tailed deer. My grandson, a wildlife biologist, takes care of the wild boars, and takes paying customers to cull the deer population when necessary.

THE PURPLE HORSES

Sculpture by kayti sweetland rasmussen

You can find amazing and wonderful stuff when rummaging about in old files.  The story was written by my grandson, a wildlife biologist, when he was twelve years old.  I was struck by the compassion, imagination and sensitivity he showed even at that young age.  As I watch him with his small children and hear stories about his work today, I think the seeds of a good man were sprouted early in his life.

  THE PURPLE HORSES

Derick Mitchell had cerrebral palsy.  The other children cruelly made fun of Derick  because he was different from themselves.  He had no friends at all, but he always imagined that he had one special friend whose name was Wyatt.  He hoped that Wyatt would come true one day.

Derick and his parents decided to go on a trip to Yosemite.  His mom was very excited, as the family was very poor and money for trips was scarce.

As Derick began to pack his clothes, he happened upon a large cross and chain in his bottom drawer.  He had never seen it before, and wondered how it came to be in his drawer.  It was made of silver and was very bright and shiny, with a silver chain.  He picked it up and turned it over to see if there was an inscription on the other side.  There was no writing, but there seemed to be a tiny worn drawing.  He rubbed it on his shirt to clean the tarnish from it.  Yes, it was an engraving of a running horse.  How strange, he thought.

Suddenly,  Derick’s thoughts were interrupted by his mother’s voice calling him.  “Derick, let’s go!  What is keeping you so long?  We are all ready in the car.”

“”I’ll be right there, Mom” he called.  He put the cross around his neck and tucked it inside his shirt.  For the tme being, he would keep this his secret.

It took them about 7  hours to get to Yosemite.  Derick’s mother told him about all the beautiful mountains and streams he would see when they got there.  It made him happy to see her so excited.  Finally they arrived late in the afternoon, and it was as beautiful as he had imagined.  The air smelled fresh and new, and the streams were as clean as the air around them.

They set up their campsite and Derick began to unpck his clothes.  Some kids came up and began to call his a “retard” and some otheer bad names.  A tear trickled down his face.  “Oh look at the wimp” they laughed, and ran away.

Slowly Derick rolled off in his wheelchair.  It was not easy wheeling over the rough terrain, but concntrating on the difficulty he was having made him forget how cruel the children were.  He went along for a long time, breathing the fresh air and loving the beauty of the tall trees.  He heard the loud rushing sound before he actually saw the waterfall.  Amazed at how very beautiful it was, he stopped and stared at it.  It seemed to fall right from Heaven itself.  The basin it fell into was surrounded with large rocks, and the water boiled and churned among them before it went bubbling off down the stream to finally join the river which flowed through the valley.

As Derick gazed at the waterfall, he became aware of a movement behind it.  He moved a little closer, and suddenly two horses stepped out from behind the veil of water.  Derick could not believe his eyes.  The two horses were purple… a beautiful purple color.  He sat as still as a tombstone watching them toss their lovely manes in the rainbow of the waterfall.  Anything seemed possible in this mystical spot.

The horses looked at him and motioned for him to follow them.  He wheeled quickly over to the waterfall and went into it.  When he came out the other side there were hundreds of horses, all different colors, running and playing.  Then he saw a mother horse have a baby.   The baby tried  to stand but it was too weak.  Derick thought of himself as he watched the tiny thing struggle to stand on his weak legs.  He wheeled himself over to the little horse to try to help in some way.  Suddenly he thought of the cross around his neck.  He took it off and placed it around the young baby’s neck.  Without hesitation the colt stood, looked at Derick and began to prance.

Derick suddenly felt an unfamiliar surge to through his legs.  He could feel his feet!  He lifted first one leg and then the other.  He stood up and began to walk around his wheelchair.  “I can walk!” he shouted with joy.  The baby horse came up and nudged him  and then ran away.  Derick thought that must have been his way of saying thank you.

Leaving his wheelchair, Derick ran back to the campsite.  His Mom cried out and tears ran down her face.  “How did this happen?”  she asked as she hugged him close.  Derick looked at her and said “The Purple Horses.”

BARBEQUED RATTLESNAKE?

One of my grandsons is a wildlife biologist.  They say you can tell what sort of job a person is suited for when they are children.  Well, we should have known about this one when he drove off for college with fishing and hunting gear loaded into his small grey truck.  They didn’t have an ocean in the state where he aimed so there was no need for a surfboard.  But life is good anyway.

He hunted often in the hills near his home, so there should have been no surprise when his parents arrived home one afternoon to find the skin of a six foot rattler drying in the bright Southern California sunshine and firmly attached to their fence.  Since this was not part of the normal garden decor, they naturally sought the new designer.  He was found in the person of their ten year old son who was happily starting a fire in the barbeque pit preparing a rattlesnake picnic for friends.  He and a young friend had come upon this squirming monster under a discarded sheet of corrugated metal on the side of the hill, and being of curious nature and “just happening” to have brought along a homemade snare, they had captured their unwilling  prey.  After an agreeable time on the grill, they both agreed that it tasted like chicken.