[Odonata-l] More on getting people outside

[Kirkpletho@aol.com]

In the United States, I think our approach to urban land use and our  more 
cautious parenting are contributing to the decline in unstructured  experiences 
in nature.
 
I grew up in Portland, Oregon, USA -- then a small city of about  350,000.  
My earliest unstructured experiences in nature were in the early-  and 
mid-1950s.  Back then mothers allowed young children to wander the  neighborhood 
unsupervised -- there was little fear of kidnapping or sex abuse,  and we already 
knew how to stay out of traffic.  Within two blocks of our  house was a large 
field of perhaps four or five acres.  We spent much  of each summer there 
catching garter snakes and grasshoppers.  A  half-mile from our house was a spring 
brook and artificial pond on the Reed  College campus -- we were allowed to go 
there when accompanied by an older  child, and spent as much of our time 
there as we could trying to catch turtles,  salamanders, and dragonflies.  My 
father regularly took my brother and me  to more distant undeveloped areas where 
we were pretty much free to do what  we wanted.  One of my favorites was a 
large, concrete "flycasting pool" at  a city park, where odonates abounded.  We 
also went to a floodplain  area near the confluence of the Willamette and 
Columbia Rivers, where we caught  treefrogs and saw turtles.
 
Today the field we loved is covered with a grocery store and its attendant  
parking lot.  The flycasting pool has been drained (supposedly to maintain  
water quality for endangered salmonids in the stream from which it drew  water).  
The floodplain is an industrial park.  The Reed College  campus still has the 
spring brook and pond, but parents are reluctant to allow  their young 
children to go there because of the heightened awareness of sex  abuse and other 
threats, and also because parents are held to a higher standard  of parenting and 
might be prosecuted, or at least persecuted, for letting their  children roam 
as freely as we were allowed to roam.  The vast majority of  neighborhood 
parks are fully developed, with no undeveloped areas for children  to explore.  
Public areas that are undeveloped are posted with many use  restrictions -- a 
child entering those areas with a dip net or sweep net almost  certainly would 
be admonished by "environmentally sensitive" folks against  collecting 
anything -- nature is to be seen, not touched (this attitude may be  derived in part 
from the perspective of bird watchers, who far  outnumber other amateur 
naturalists).  Local and regional land use  management favors "infill," so any 
remaining privately-owned undeveloped  areas within the urban growth boundary are 
not likely to last long.
 
I think a partial response to this trend is to expose urban children to  
microscopy and allow them to explore life in a puddle, aquarium, backyard fish  
pond, moss on a wall, etc.  Nature survives in a completely urban  setting -- 
you just have to look more closely.  While many lousy  microscopes are sold for 
use by children, truly usable microscopes are available  for about the price 
of a high-tech game system.  What we need are people  who know something about 
how to use a microscope and something about  "micro-nature," plus a forum in 
which those people can communicate  that information to children -- and then 
stand back to assist only  when a child asks for help.
 
Jim Kirk
5003 SE 45th Avenue
Portland, Oregon, 97206 USA
_kirkpletho at aol.com_ (mailto:kirkpletho at aol.com) 
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