Nature Close to Home: Signs, Seasons, and Stories

I am struck with wonder and awe when I think of how large scientists believe our universe is. According Professor of Astronomy TX Thuan we know the universe to contain at least 100 billion galaxies, with each galaxy containing 100 billion stars.

The enormity of these numbers is very hard to comprehend when I go out on a moonless night in the mountains, and see thousands upon thousands of stars, and realize, according to Cosmologist Dr. David Schraum said, that every star I can see with my normal eyesight is part of our own Milky Way galaxy. Beyond that, the next nearest galaxy (Andromeda) is 230 million light years away. And beyond that is about 100 billion more galaxies, with each one containing a 100 billion stars, many of which are brighter than our sun.

What strikes me as I gaze at the stars and think of the immensity of our universe, is the mysterious nature of it all.

Scientists say that the universe started with a explosion about 15 billion years ago, a 'big bang.' Background radiation from this explosion is still present everywhere in the universe. Ok, but what was there before the big bang?

For ten days in December of 1995 the hubble space telescope was pointed into a tiny region by the big dipper. 100 deep field photographs were taken of this area, about 1/30th the size of the moon. The photographs were merge and was found was hundreds of galaxies that we never knew to exist.

Dr. Schramm said during his August 11 lecture at the Denver Museum of Natural History, that as far as cosmologists can tell, based on extending our looks into the edge of space, the universe is infinite. It has no end.

In some of my recent nature programs I have been trying to explain to the children how large our universe is. I then ask them to hold that idea of our large universe, and then look down here at these common ants, that are everywhere: in deserts, in alpine tundra, in our homes, under our feet.

We hardly pay any attention to them.'

With all of our technology, we are not able to make something the size of the ant that is a complex as the ant is, and which has the motor capabilities of the ant.

And these little ants are amazing creatures. They are extremely clean. Ants take secretions from a gland near their head and rub it all over their body, keeping their clean and germ free. Many species of birds have been seen landing on ant piles, fluffing up their feathers and letting the ants cover them. They have even been seen taking ants in their beaks and stroking them through their feathers. It is thought that whatever the ants use to keep their own bodies so sanitized, also works for the birds.

Ants are extremely strong for their size, capable of lifting and carrying the equivalent of us lifting and carrying elephants.

Some ants tend fungus gardens underground from which they harvest their food.

The universe is a wonderful place, large and small, full of beauty and mystery. On two days last week when I walked in the early morning, just as the sky was brightening before dawn, I watched a little Goldfinch flying around in curving, rhythmic flight, singing continuously. Mating and nest making seasons is done. I have to conclude that this little bird was taking pleasure in being here to see another day begin.

It is inherent in wild things that they seem to appreciate each day of life, and take it as it comes. And that is the lesson that I take from my walks in nature, with my dogs, along the river, in dense spruce fir forests, on mountain peaks, across alpine meadows, beneath cottonwoods. And that is what the goldfinch was celebrating in his late summer morning song:

the gift of being present for another dawn, hopefully to last until dusk on this beautiful earth.

It is a blessing to quietly cherish and to also wildly shout for joy about, from the first rays of sunlight to the last stream of light angling over the mountain horizon.

When the last bit of color fades from the sky, when night falls and reveals to us how rare life in our universe is, among the thousands and millions and billions of stars and galaxies, then we might be able to understand the miracle of the ant.