Carol Godwin, Cycle Mania

As I was out sitting under the Piñon trees the other day, snacking on the sweet meat of the nuts, feeling the soft fall breeze on my skin, and listening to the elk bugle in the distance, I felt so incredibly grateful to be alive in this place at this time. This being the season for thankfulness and gratitude, my mind begins to explore this concept and it takes me on a much more complicated journey than planned.

I am grateful, first of all, to the Timber Knoll Piñons. Despite the abuse they have taken over the years from misguided thinning and burning, are still producing nuts every 6 or 7 years. Piñons have been producing nuts for millions of years and humans have been taking advantage of their periodic mass drops of nuts for many thousands of years. I’ve lived in the Timber Knoll area for nearly a quarter of a century and have experienced 3 productive piñon years. Every time, large numbers of native collectors arrive from surrounding areas and New Mexico to harvest the nuts, demonstrating the historical importance of the trees in this area. 

The traditional method of gathering the nuts involves laying blankets or tarps under the trees and beating the trunks and branches to release the nuts. This year, a major wind storm beat us to it and scattered the nuts far and wide, making collecting a little more of a challenge, but worthwhile nonetheless. As I gather nuts and snack on a portion of what I collect, I think about Timber Knoll and the archeological evidence I have observed over the years. The most productive trees are concentrated on the North Eastern slopes of the knoll and this is also where most of the pottery I observed was concentrated. Prior to the thinning project on Timber Knoll, there were thousands of shards scattered here, ranging from simple coil pots to complexly painted white/black and red/black shards as well as plain-ware shards representing large storage containers. I imagine that this area was central to people gathering during mast crop years and collecting nuts. Nuts can be stored several years in dry containers or pits and are highly nutritious, containing both essential fats and compact calories. In ideal conditions, one acre of trees can produce up to 250 lbs of nuts, equivalent to nearly 30,000 calories, making it an important historic staple for native peoples. 

But then I think, as I am grateful to the trees, is this gratitude misplaced? Do the trees really care about humans who, in the past, depended on their seeds for nutrition? Of course not! The trees care nothing about us harvesters. In fact, if they did, they would not put such a hard shell around the seeds and would make them available annually. It is one of the wonderful intricacies of nature that we humans enjoy eating what the tree produces. All living things require calories as energy to keep them alive. A tree provides its own calories by using photosynthesis to produce carbohydrates, which can then be stored for later use. It takes several years for a tree to gather enough carbohydrates to be able to reproduce and this timeframe is dependent on environmental conditions. Drought years lengthen the time between mast crops and good winters encourage preparation for reproductive years. The last good mast crop year was 2015, a space of time lengthened by continued drought and probably brought to an end by the wet summers of 2021 and 2022. It takes nearly 26 months for the entire seed-producing process to be completed, which would coincide with these wet summers as a trigger for trees. It is incredible to me that all the Piñons in their SW range can produce and drop nuts in a coordinated way; both wild and backyard trees reproducing on the same closely timed schedule dependent on weather and carbohydrate availability. Trees communicate using pheromones to coordinate reproductive efforts so that maximum pollen dispersal is concentrated in a short time period. This year was a great pollen year for piñons and a terrible allergy year for humans! Carbohydrates are concentrated in the seeds inside the cones and provide nutrition for the potential seedling trees. Humans have evolved with a “taste” for carbohydrates and thus enjoy eating and harvesting the nuts. The trees care nothing for us.

Listening to the elk sing makes me realize that the silence surrounding the bugling is a little too silent. Where are the flocks of screeching jays that normally accompany a Piñon mast crop drop? Piñon Jays are an essential part of the Piñon life cycle in that they store the nuts in the ground, and those that are not eaten can sprout the next spring. Scientists are alarmed that the numbers of Piñon Jays have dropped an incredible 80% over the past decade and show little indication that they are recovering. They were recently listed as a species for consideration to add to the increasing list of endangered species. It is shocking and eye-opening to me that just a few years ago, there were large rowdy hordes of these birds squawking through the trees the last time I was collecting Piñons and now it is silent… Reasons for this population drop include massive losses (40-80%) of Piñon forest stands to bark beetles in the early 2000s, deforestation of Piñon stands for development, clearing by the Forest Service for fuel reduction and fire safety, elimination of Jays because of annoyance to humans (when I looked up “Piñon Jay” online, the first many entries were about how to kill or remove Jays!), and because of the continued drought causing longer periods between Piñon mast crop drops. Historically, Piñons had mast drops every 3-5 years; the spacing now nearly double that and is exacerbated by a fertile seed production drop of nearly 40%. I found that although there are countless piñons on the ground, many are empty and infertile, worthless for tree reproduction or for nutrition for Jays (or humans). All of these things are affecting Jay reproduction and the result is…silence. 

Why does all of this matter? Historically, humans, Piñons, and Jays are linked. Piñons produce carbohydrate-rich nuts to reproduce but nuts laying on the ground cannot germinate. Jays, as living things, need carbohydrates so that they can reproduce. In the process of storing the nuts, they plant them in the ground where they will sprout in the spring. Piñons without Jays cannot effectively reproduce and without the ability to reproduce, are doomed; Jays without Piñons cannot reproduce and without the ability to reproduce, are doomed. Native humans who relied on hunting and gathering would be hugely affected by this loss of a calorie-rich resource and would have to leave the area and find other ways to gather carbohydrates. In the era of Walmarts and Safeways, it is easy to forget how precarious the balance of life is, but sitting under a tree, I am grateful that nature is forging ahead on this beautiful day and I make a decision to replant nuts, at least on this one hill, that over time has supported so many living things from Piñons to squirrels, jays to elk, coyotes to mountain lions, Pines to butterflies, and humans to hawks, all of which are entangled in a complex web of interdependence.

 

I am grateful to feel part of this web on this one day in the amazing White Mountains. I am grateful that my ears can pick up the sounds of elk competing to reproduce. I am grateful that my skin can feel the movement and temperature of the air moving past as if moves with the thermal changes caused by the rising sun. I am grateful that my muscles can carry me out into the forest for some time away from the worries of life and I am grateful to have the time on Earth to be grateful for it all! Take the time to appreciate the colors of the leaves, the sounds of the elk, the taste of the Piñons, and the feel of the cool air. Take the time to appreciate the small things around you this fall, life is amazing and beautiful. Happy Thanksgiving everyone.