The Interconnectivity of Our Nature

As a bee goes from flower to flower collecting pollen, I have gone from

opportunity to opportunity presented to me as a Gulf of Maine Institute intern, and collected knowledge that accompanied me through all aspects of GOMI, and into my life beyond. Each opportunity has allowed me to meet a vast network of hard working individuals who truly care for the environment. Through meetings, books, gardening, workshops, and interviews, I learned a vast array of concepts, facts, and personal lessons that benefit me not only as a student, but more importantly, a member of our community.

Similar to an organization relying on its members, flowers rely on

pollinators to fertilize the seeds of the next generations. Little do the small creatures know the irreplaceable role they play in furthering the species of every flowering plant, or 90% of all Flora (Tallamy, 9). Flowers depend on pollinators to transport pollen between males and females of their individual species. Pollinators are drawn to certain flowers by their sugary nectar that secures their calorie intake for the day. Unknowingly, pollinators pick up pollen as it sticks to their bodies while they feed. As they traverse flower to flower, the pollen rubs off on other plants, fertilizing seeds and allowing them to successfully grow into adult plants. Without pollinators, the natural reproduction of plants is impossible.

Much like a garden full of flowers, a human community can only succeed

and expand with the sharing of resources necessary for success. As a summer

intern for the Gulf of Maine Institute (GOMI), I witnessed firsthand the

effectiveness of GOMI’s ecosystem of knowledgable scientists, teachers, and

students. I was exposed to a garden full of opportunity rather than flowers

(although there were plenty of those, too). We, as GOMI interns, were encouraged to fly head first into every bloom and take away as much knowledge as possible. Each new concept or lesson I learned was a pollen particle, sticking with me as I moved on to face new challenges.

My supervisor, John Terry, the leader and founder of The Gulf of Maine

Institute, gifted me the book Nature’s Best Hope by Douglas Tallamy at the

beginning of the summer. My required reading proved to be an indispensable source of information, opening my eyes to the native plant movement I had heard virtually nothing about. The book informed me of how our degrading ecosystems are becoming overrun with non-native plants. Ornamental plants from faraway corners of the Earth are commonly planted by homeowners in the U.S. Unfortunately, since non-native plants did not evolve with the other organisms in our region, it severely limits their interactions with organisms in the ecosystem. Ecosystem success relies on the relationships between different species. When you introduce plants from other eco-regions that do not benefit local insects, animals, or plants, it destabilizes the ecosystem. Additionally, introduced plants often become invasive as they have no natural predators or other natural factors to control their population. Invasive overpopulation soaks up resources that many other plants rely on. These resources often include water, ground space, nutrients, sunlight (if the invasive grows over other native plants), etc. Common invasive plants I see where I live in Massachusetts include Japanese knotgrass, oriental bittersweet, and purple loosestrife.

On top of the non-native plant crisis, another detriment of American

landscape I learned about in Nature’s Best Hope are mass manicured lawns.

Lawns take up almost 40 million acres of the United States. While optically

pleasing, every acre of lawn is practically uninhabitable for the majority of insect, animal, and plant species, as it is devoid of the other organisms they rely on, and a death sentence for most organisms. How many times have you looked at your lawn, saw the tips of wild grass poking up above your desired lawn length, and immediately trekked out to trim it down? Or how often do you see ‘weeds’ spotting your lawn and decide to make a run to the store to buy more pesticide? Organisms that travel onto a lawn are often killed either by a lawnmower or pesticide. Tallamy’s two-ended solution to our lawn and native plant crisis is to dedicate a part of your lawn to native plants. Planting just a small plot of native plants can wondrously rehabilitate the populations of insects, plants, and animals in your own backyard. If every American homeowner followed this approach and gave half of their lawn to native plants, 20 million acres of land would be returned to their natural environment, allowing native plants to thrive once again (Tallamy, 62). If you are interested in this approach or issue, I’d highly recommend reading Nature’s Best Hope - I loved it.

After reading Nature’s Best Hope, I was inspired. I immediately pitched

Tallamy’s approach to my parents, hoping to convince them to allow me to plant natives in our considerably sized lawn. One large concern that my father brought up was the tick population. Of course this is an important issue, as ticks - many of which are invasive - are a growing health concern in modern America. Well don’t fret, as Tallamy has a solution for this as well. Instead of having a large, thickly packed block of native garden, you can mow paths a couple feet wide between sections of plants to allow you to walk through the plants without brushing up against the stalks that might have ticks poised to latch on to you. After we discussed this measure to prevent ticks, my parents quickly and enthusiastically came on board. My family and I plan to plant natives in place of a section of lawn this spring, ultimately demonstrating another impact of my internship. Similar to a flower, Nature’s Best Hope was a wonderful resource, providing information that I carried back to my own garden.

Another invaluable mentor and source of information has been Carol

Decker. Carol, a former sanctuary director at Mass Audubon, has been a

fantastic teacher always eager to help me satisfy my curiosity. At the beginning of my summer, Carol graciously gave Zoe Wegryzen (my fellow intern) and I a tour of her stunning native garden. Her garden became the inspiration for the garden soon to planted on my family’s land, as it is beautifully managed and organized while functioning as a lovely intact native ecosystem. While she was showing us her garden, I couldn’t help but notice the abundance of pollinators on each plant. Carol explained to me the importance of native pollinators. Recently, social media has been extremely useful in spreading awareness of the importance of bees. But lacking in this information has been a focus on native pollinators. Almost every message, ad, or slogan to save the bees is focused on non-native European honey bees! Carol connected the native plant movement I had read about with the native bee movement and created the complete image of the importance of the survival of native ecosystems.

As previously discussed, plants that did not evolve within an ecosystem

are generally less beneficial than a native species, as a native species will offer a larger range of benefits. This applies not only to plants but also to other classifications of organisms, especially insects and pollinators. Pollinators that evolved within an ecosystem are much more helpful to its plants than the generic European honey bee, as they have specific behaviors and chemicals suited towards their own ecosystem. That being said, honey bees are essential to the health of most American ecosystems, and are irreplaceable. The need for the growth of native bee population should not accompany a decline in honey bee numbers.

Another common misconception is that bees are the only effective pollinators. There are actually a multitude of pollinators, including bees, wasps, butterflies, flies, moths, beetles, birds, bats and more. If we continue to lose the hundreds of thousands of species of native pollinators across the world, we will lose even more native plant species with them.

I believe Carol’s wholehearted love for nature and passion for spreading her love to the people around her is a perfect example of GOMI’s dedication to their students. Carol referred me to more resources to continue my research, offered to give me plants to plant in my own native garden (and helpfully instructed me when it was best to plant them), and through her every action demonstrated how GOMI diligently encourages students to pursue their individual interests.

GOMI’s main purpose is to integrate courses into schools that include

hands-on education outdoors. The model of outdoor learning has proven to be more effective than sitting in a classroom hearing about natural phenomenon. Actually experiencing the natural world adds colorful depth and personal connection to learning. As a GOMI intern, one of my main duties was to help develop the “Classroom in the Woods” at my middle-high school. At Pentucket, we have one high school GOMI course: Freshwater Ecology. Taught by Walter Soule, my freshman biology teacher, the course involves exploring the frog-filled stream hiding behind our school. In collaboration with Pentucket and its students, GOMI created a circular “classroom” at the edge of the woods to be utilized by Pentucket teachers and students. Shaded by glorious maple and oak trees among others, the classroom in the woods is a beautiful spot for students to learn about the environment. GOMI intern Zoe, a Pentucket alumni, and I spent much of our summer developing the classroom for optimal learning opportunities. We cleared various plants, and planned ways to make the classroom more accessible for current and future students. Our plans include to build a ramp to make the classroom wheelchair accessible, as well as create a harder surface in the circle itself to accommodate wheelchairs. Effective education must not only be available to the majority, but every student, to truly make an impact.

Developing the outdoor classroom at Pentucket gave me hands on

experience in gardening, as well as valuable experience separating native plants from invasive plants. Even though I was not taking a class in the classroom in the woods, simply working there benefitted me extensively. I could study guides to identifying plants all I want but when it comes down to it, actively experimenting in the forest and guessing which plant was which with the guidance of my GOMI mentors solidified my learning. I now know the difference between jack-in-the-pulpit and poison ivy (“three leaves, let it be” didn’t do it for me…) or the distinctions of stinging nettle (and how to uproot it without feeling its burn) and jewel weed. I learned to identify native spice bush, skunk cabbage, and Joe Pye weed among many others. Identifying invasive like Japanese knotgrass, oriental bittersweet, and purple loosestrife suddenly became an easy feat.

Based on my experience, GOMI’s model of hands-on education works.

No wonder I couldn’t tell the difference between different marsh grasses when I had never actually been shown them before. Learning through textbooks has its time and place, but the minute I got to learn outside my brain practically expanded with new facts. Evidently, giving students the option to learn about the environment through outdoor exploration is imperative to cultivating a society of young stewards dedicated to our native environments. Thankfully, GOMI’s reach extends to many schools in Nova Scotia, Canada, as well as the American states of Maine and Massachusetts.

(insert picture of Gulf of Maine)

Working outside taught me another important lesson: my fear of ticks is

valid, but not a valid reason to avoid fully immersing myself in nature. I believe some people’s supposed solution to ticks, to either get rid of all plants in the radius you regularly occupy that might harbor ticks (by creating gigantic lawns), or to simply never go outside, are terrible habits that demonstrate mindsets closed by unrealistic fear. These habits are detrimental to the environment and to the individual’s health. Time and time again studies have shown the enormous positive benefits nature has on overall well-being and health. Avoiding all of nature out of fear of small inconveniences that can easily be remedied is not the solution.

For example, I have always been afraid of ticks and the diseases they

transmit, but there are relatively simple precautions we can take to greatly lower the chances of having a tick bite us. I have had great success with tucking my pants into my socks (Socks that I have treated with an environmentally safe tick treatment to help discourage ticks from latching on) to keep ticks on the outside of my clothes where they are unable to latch on to me and more easily spotted and removed. Ticks usually wander their host’s body for about 24 hours before latching on, so if you come home from being outside and simply put your clothes in the dryer, where ticks will be killed from one cycle, and take a thorough shower to wash them off, you are safe. I have consistently done those three things all summer and haven’t had a single tick on me, despite walking through fields of tall grasses, exploring forests through bushes, traversing salt marshes, and more exploration in un-mowed or pesticide free areas. It’s unnecessary to cut all nature out of your life out of supposed precautions.

Yet another unexpected opportunity GOMI offered me was to learn how to create and run committees to plan events. In the process of planning our Gulf of Maine Institute Informational Fundraiser this September, I worked closely with Zoe, John, Mr. Soule, Carol, and Corinn Flaherty, a librarian at the GAR Memorial Library in West Newbury, MA, on a planning sub-committee. My summer was dotted with the meetings of our various planning groups. Together, we weaved all of our diverse opinions and perspectives on how our fundraiser should proceed on the event date into a functional plan of action. We divided the preparation and planning among numerous subcommittees.

At first, I was frustrated at the creation of the numerous committees. I felt as though every hour we spent discussing how to create the committees or reiterating what each committee’s purpose would be was an hour wasted that could have been spent doing all of the work ourselves. As a generally

independent person, I did not understand why we had to go about planning this way, as I was focused on simply getting the work done and being ready for our fundraiser as soon as possible.

But, as the summer progressed, I realized the point of the sub-committees

wasn’t solely to split the work, but to gain the ideas of every person involved to create a better fundraiser in the long run. Without Corinn’s idea to send a save the date, we likely would receive less attendants than we are wishing for. Without Carol’s tagline title for the event, we likely would draw fewer people who were invested in the goals of GOMI. Without Mr. Soule’s idea to have tables of students describing why GOMI matters and explaining their projects, attendants might not see the true importance of GOMI and the direct effect it has on student’s lives. And ultimately without John’s idea to have subcommittees, and the ideas of all of the invested GOMI contributors, the event would not be as effective or well rounded. While it can be a messy, somewhat inefficient and at times a frustrating process, the process is what yields a better product. I learned the important lesson that you truly cannot do everything by yourself, not only because it can become unmanageable for you, but because you need the brain power and unique ideas of others to create a more powerful result. Like our GOMI garden, we all benefit from sharing the pollen of our ideas to pull together one beautiful environment.

Similarly, our teacher workshop demonstrated the power of brainstorming and conversing with people of many different backgrounds who all want to positively impact and educate students. Every teacher that left our conference was teeming with ideas to better their school and develop the GOMI initiative in their individual communities. This once again reinforced the importance of community and letting others help you; you don’t have to be entirely independent to be successful.

While sometimes I think that I magically stumbled upon this internship in my vast search for summer opportunities, Mr. Soule intentionally recruited me as my views on the environment matched with GOMI’s, and he believed I could thrive in the GOMI garden. Clearly, he guessed correctly as my internship has been an invaluable experience and resource for me. My knowledge of our declining environment has grown immensely in just the 8 weeks I spent with GOMI. Every single person I have been introduced to has brought a new perspective to the table and enriched my view of GOMI’s mission. It is imperative to not only our native environment but local school children as well that GOMI grow in our region to reach more students and teachers. Every student, teacher, scientist, writer, gardener, school administrator, social media manager or virtually any other person involved in the community will leave a meeting with GOMI bursting with ideas that they will bring into all aspects of their lives. They take the pollen from each flower in GOMI’s garden and spread it far and wide to any task they take on in their future, not only ensuring GOMI’s message is remembered in the many projects taken on by our people, but also bettering themselves and our environment.

Each person in GOMI has a niche they are encouraged to pursue; mine

has slowly become native pollinators. Carol’s niche of native everything makes her an incredible resource for everyone - not just those involved in GOMI. Mr. Soule’s extensive biology knowledge and investment in students makes him an incredible mentor. Zoe, an environmental engineering major at the University of New Hampshire, has been an impactful role model for me (especially with her dedication to her work and studies), and has a contagious passion for improving the environment in GOMI and non-GOMI settings. Every person blooms in our community, and I am proud to say that I have grown into my role as a member of the GOMI community. The most important lesson I learned through my internship is the incomparable reliance we have because of our interconnectivity.

As is the case in nature, I cannot do everything by myself, and co-dependence is the most important factor of not only community, but success. We need nature, just as nature needs us.

Works Cited

Tallamy, Douglas W, and Timber Press. Nature’s Best Hope: A New Approach to Conservation That Starts in Your Yard. Portland, Oregon, Timber Press, 2019.

Fiona is currently a sophomore at Pentucket Regional High School. This past summer she worked as an intern for the Gulf of Maine Institute. Beyond her love for nature, Fiona enjoys competitive dancing, theatre, playing tennis, and writing in her free time.