Protective Measures

Day 284: Jack. His name is Jack, and he assured me the logs have been on either side of his dock for at least fifteen years. That's how long he's lived there.

After making enquiries of two different neighbors from my kayak, one beckoned to Jack who was sitting on his deck out of my line of sight. "Could you come down and talk to me for a minute?" I hollered up, feeling like he probably thought I was going from dock to dock handing out religious tracts. Hastily, I added, "I want to show you something," which undoubtedly only bolstered his suspicions. When he got within range where I could speak without yelling, I said, "Do you know what you have here? Were you aware that these two logs are absolutely covered with a fairly rare little plant?"

He bent down as if he intended to pick one. "You mean these things that look like Venus Fly-Traps?"

"YES!" I yelled. "They're only found in a few places in Washington! The Lake St. Clair drainage is one of them." I think he heard the panic in my voice because he stood up rather quickly.

As I engaged him in conversation in the hopes of instilling the importance of protecting his Sundew garden, I learned that he'd first spotted them six or seven years ago and had no recollection of seeing them prior to that time. I also learned that when young alders sprout on the logs, he goes out and cuts them down, "because they'll tip the log over if they get too big, and then that tears up my dock."

He seemed to have a rather short memory for names. "Sundew" didn't want to stick, so I didn't try "Drosera" as I had done with two ladies sunning on their dock. They wanted to see pictures, so I paddled over to Jack's logs and took a few quick shots. When I showed them the photos, one of the women said, "I think I've seen those somewhere else on the lake. I thought they were moss." She couldn't remember where.

Suffice to say that at least some of the residents of Lake St. Clair's southeast arm know more than they did when they got out of bed this morning. As for me, there are worse ways to be remembered than as "that crazy naturalist lady who holds people hostage while she gives botany lectures." Jack, as friendly as the women told me to expect of the people who live on the lake, gave me permission to go behind the logs and said, "You can come back and visit them any time."