GrrlScientist is an evolutionary biologist, ornithologist, aviculturist, birder and freelance science and nature writer. A native of the Pacific Northwest, she relocated from Seattle to NYC with her parrots after earning a BS in Microbiology (emphasis in Virology) and PhD in Zoology (Ornithology) from the University of Washington. In NYC, she was the Chapman Postdoctoral Fellow at the American Museum of Natural History for two years, pursuing part of her "dream" research project by reconstructing a molecular phylogeny of the parrots of the South Pacific islands. GrrlScientist and her five parrots are currently relocating to Germany, where she will continue writing her blog while also writing a book and learning German. (Meanwhile, her parrots will continue to nibble on her extensive personal library.) If you appreciate GrrlScientist's writing, you can help pay her living expenses by hiring her to "blog" your conference, speak at your club or write articles for your publication (or by clicking on the Paypal button below). If you read an essay on this blog that you especially enjoyed, please nominate it for inclusion in 
River kingfisher, Alcedo atthis.
Orphaned image. Contact me to receive proper credit.
As long as you send images to me (and I hope it will be for forever), I shall continue to share them with my readership. My purpose for posting these images is to remind all of us of the grandeur of the natural world and that there is a world out there that is populated by millions of unique species. We are a part of this world whether we like it or not: we have a choice to either preserve these species or to destroy them in search of short-term monetary gains. But if we decide to destroy these other life forms, the least we can do is to know what we are destroying by learning that they exist. If you have a high-resolution digitized nature image (I prefer JPG format) that you'd like to share with your fellow readers, feel free to email it to me, along with information about the image and how you'd like it to be credited.
More below the fold ..
The Kingfisher
The kingfisher rises out if the black wave
like a blue flower, in his beak
he carries a silver leaf. I think this is
the prettiest world -- so long as you don't mind
a little dying, how could there be a day in your whole life
that doesn't have its splash of happiness?
There are more fish than there are leaves
on a thousand trees, and anyway, the kingfisher
wasn't born to think about it, or about anything else.
When the wave snaps shut over his blue head, the water
remains water -- hunger is the only story
he has ever heard in his life that he could believe.
I don't say he's right. Neither
do I say he's wrong. Religiously he swallows the silver leaf
with its broken red river, and with a rough and easy cry
I couldn't rouse out of my thoughtful body
if my life depended on it, he swings back
over the bright sea to do the same thing, to do it
(as I longh to do something, anything) perfectly.
-- Mary Oliver from House of Light(Boston: Beacon Press, 1990)
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Comments
What an exquisite photograph! I take photos of Belted Kingfishers here on the Olympic Peninsula. They are not the easiest things to photograph, as they are pretty active. This is really a fantastic image.
Posted by: robin andrea | February 14, 2007 5:00 PM
Oh, I meant to say what a gorgeous Mary Oliver poem to accompany the photograph.
Posted by: robin andrea | February 14, 2007 5:02 PM
Great picture, thanks for posting it. But the bird in the photo is actually a River Kingfisher, Alcedo atthis.
Posted by: Charlie Porter | February 14, 2007 7:17 PM
Beautiful shot and poem. I believe, though, that it's a River Kingfisher (A. atthis).
Posted by: Carel | February 14, 2007 7:22 PM
Ha! I should have known you'd correct that before me, Charlie!
Posted by: Carel | February 14, 2007 8:03 PM
Yep, another great photo!
But what's the fish species?
Bob
Posted by: Bob O'H | February 15, 2007 1:17 AM