Glynn Wilson

David Underhill of the Mobile Sierra Club paddles around an ancient cypress tree in the Mobile-Tensaw Delta

The Big Picture
by Glynn Wilson

MOBILE BAY, Ala. — The sugar ants have overrun Meaher State Park on the old causeway connecting Mobile and Baldwin Counties in the middle of Mobile Bay and on the edge of the Mobile-Tensaw Delta. As I sit here sipping the morning coffee listening to the birds and watching the alligators hunt in the morning still waters, I can’t help but wonder what Alabama’s premiere scientist, E.O. Wilson, would say about the massive sugar ant invasion.

They are marching through this place like the cars and trucks that form a constant line across the new causeway off in the distance. Surely Wilson would not suggest just feeding these ants some peanut butter, his advice for people who are always asking what to do about the ants that invade their kitchens.

Wilson, a Mobile native who has been called one of the deans of American science and one of the top 100 minds of the 20th century, and a specialist in ants as well as Sociobiology, recently made a journey into the Delta with a team of reporters and photographers from the Mobile Press-Register. (See video below).

While the reporter for the conservative Newhouse paper asked about ants, and Wilson talked about water moccasins, dragonflies and why he has come home, they failed to get his assessment of the effects of the BP oil disaster on the ecosystem.

Wilson, 82 now, said the pitcher plant bogs of Mobile and Baldwin counties and the Red Hills to the north are all of a piece, according to the paper, joined by the waterways that run through them — a national treasure where the biological diversity is unparalleled. There are more species of fish, crawfish, turtles and mussels than most anywhere on the planet.

“I’m going to slow down on the books and other work,” Wilson said. “With the time I have left before they call me home, I’m going to work to protect this place. It is the culmination of my life’s work. I’ve come full circle.”

Wilson apparently feels a sense of urgency to attract the attention of the scientific community to help expose the threats to the Delta from urban development, invasive species and encroaching tree farms, what he called “biological deserts.” What, no mention of German steel mills, oil and gas drilling and other industrial development?

I wonder how Wilson feels about the Obama administration’s plan to re-open the Gulf of Mexico to deep water oil drilling after BP lost control of a well last April and flooded the Gulf and its estuaries with sweet, light crude, then dumped a massive load of chemicals to sink the oil and hide it from the press and the public as much as possible?

The paper is editorially all in favor of oil and gas drilling for the jobs it brings to the area. They give lip service on the news pages to environmental stewardship, yet printing the paper itself consumes entire forests on an annual basis. Of course they never mention that.

Canoeing in the Delta myself in the area around Bryant’s Landing and Douglas Lake on Easter Sunday with David Underhill from the Mobile Sierra Club and another friend, it was fairly easy to imagine that everything seems back to normal on the coast on the one year anniversary of what is usually called the BP Oil Spill, even though it was not technically a spill at all. But there are signs that things are not quite back to normal and may in fact never been the same.

For starters, we only saw one great blue heron in an area that should be home to a hundred of the majestic birds. Where, indeed, have all the wildlife gone?

Many birds obviously died, far more than the official count, their carcasses food for other dying creatures at the bottom of the sea.

Some independent scientists are trying to figure out a way to assess the damage. Unfortunately, most of the scientific community seems reluctant to even ask some pretty obvious questions.

Scientists who work for government agencies, including the Interior Department at the Bon Secour National Wildlife Refuge in Baldwin County, say they are too busy to be bothered with pesky reporters’ questions. They are not blocking access to the beach anymore, at least not in the afternoon when the morning cleaning crews have left for the day.

Scientists either know the news is worse than what is being reported, or they would rather not have to admit the worst case scenario. Maybe they are being told to keep their mouths shut. In any event, they refer you to a public relations person in Washington, D.C., someone who has never set eyes on the Gulf or the Delta.

But that will not stop me from asking the questions. I have a story in the works on the state of things one year after the explosion and another about the ongoing human health crisis on the Gulf. But the sun is rising over the pine trees and the canoe on top of the Chevy van behind me, obscuring the screen. So it is time to break camp and head north.

There’s another expert interview to conduct along the way. When I get back to Birmingham and have a chance to go through all the research, photos and videos, I will have a lot more to say.

This entry was posted on Monday, April 25th, 2011 at 8:31 am and is filed under Alabama's Gulf Coast, BP Oil Spill, Environment News, Glynn Wilson, The Big Picture. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.