Source of book: Borrowed from the Library
It has been a while since I read a Mary Roach book. Part of the problem here is that I had previously read all of her books. Until this one came out, and then it was popular at the library. Anyway, now I read it, and it is definitely time for her to write a new one.
Here are the others I have blogged about. Bonk is not included, even though that was the first one I read, because back in the day, I was worried about talking about sex on the blog lest I scandalize my Evangelical friends and family. These days, of course, I would write about it anyway - I haven’t participated in church since soon after Trump’s election (and have no interest at this point in going back), and certain Trumpy family members cut us out of their lives when I pushed back on the racism. So whatever. Anyway, here is the blog list:
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In some ways, Fuzz is a bit different than other Mary Roach books. This is because her other books have focused on humans entirely, rather than on animals or other organisms. For this one, she looks at the interaction between human society and animals and plants, and what happens when animals cross the line into what we humans consider criminal behavior.
This ranges from homicide at the beginning of the book to petty theft at the end.
Along the way, she looks at the ways that humans in our modern time seek to limit the unpleasant encounters between us and nature, preferably in ways (these days at least) that do not end in extermination of other organisms.
Hence, we try to prevent bear attacks by not leaving food or garbage around, to give one example. Rather than just exterminate the bears, which is why California no longer has Grizzly Bears.
As Roach notes throughout the book, the issues involved are complicated, and there are rarely great solutions. Bears have a disconcerting ability to return to their old territory - even several states away - or get hit by vehicles while trying. Birds are too smart to stay frightened for long by decoys. Invasive species seem impossible to remove once they get established.
Throughout the book, Roach continues her dedication to find the weirdest, grossest, and craziest stuff - and to participate in as much of it as possible.
Her research takes her all over the globe, from the US to India to New Zealand and more.
The book is best read, and not explained, but I do have to quote the best lines - Roach is wonderfully witty, with a dry sense of humor.
Elephants sometimes kill the way cars kill: by being large and running into - or over - something much smaller.
This is in the section on how India is trying to reduce elephant homicides - the problem exacerbated by habitat loss. The vast majority of the deaths were not intended by the elephant - it just got spooked and ran over a human.
Then there is this one on the problem of ranching on a planet where other animals exist. India seems to have a healthier approach to this than American ranchers, who are the biggest obstacle to reintroduction of wolves to the ecosystem.
Shweta translates for me. “He likes leopards even though they sometimes take his livestock. He says this is its natural prey, and he is acceptable to that. He does not support anyone who does killing.” In the words of an American rancher I met last year who is also, improbably, a mountain lion activist, “When you have livestock, there’s going to be some deadstock.”
From the chapter on monkeys:
The Wildlife Institute of India is a thrown-down cluster of concrete buildings connected by outdoor walkways. Because these corridors have no walls, rhesus monkeys from the neighboring forest can occasionally be seen walking along behind or beside the humans. Neither species pays the other much mind, as if the monkeys, too, have meetings to get to and photocopies to make.
When Roach researches mountain lions, she spends a good bit of time with Justin Dellinger, a tracker and total character. He came from such a small town in South Carolina that any time he wanted to ask a girl out, he first had to check with his parents to find out how closely they were related.
As the first in his family to go to college, he is a source of parental pride, and a little melancholy. He explained to them that he “had to disperse for genetic purposes.”
I thought the chapter on falling trees was fun. I have been too close for comfort to trees that have come down. Not as in, actual danger to me, but close enough to get spooked. It’s a hazard of hiking in the woods. This whole passage is excellent:
What a Douglas fir does, it does very slowly, and that includes dying. Possibly the least attractive feature of a nine-hundred-year life span is the century or two spent dying. Decomposition drags on for another hundred years or so. A tree is the rare organism to which the comparative deader is often and accurately applied. A recently dead, or “dead hard” conifer progresses to “dead spongy,” then “dead soft,” limbs and top rotting and dropping off, until the last piece of standing trunk topples and the tree enters the final classification, “dead fallen.” At some point in its protracted twilight, a tree that stands near a road or path or building may earn a new classification: “danger tree.” Because if it falls, anyone it lands on will spend a very, very short time dying.
There is an entire chapter on toxic plants, which is also fascinating. It starts with the Rosary Pea, which contains abrin, arguably the most potent phytotoxin in existence. Although, like the Castor Bean, it is somewhat difficult to digest, so it’s theoretical deadliness exists mostly in the possibility of purifying the toxin. Humans would then do the murder, not the plant. Anyway, Roach’s brain goes to a certain place regarding this plant.
Possession of anything over a gram of abrin is a federal crime. Possession of rosary peas, however, is legal. The internet has thousands of rosary pea necklaces and bracelets on offer, as well as crafting websites selling the beans in bulk to people who make these items. But oddly, no rosary-pea rosaries.
Something I did not know is that the common beans we eat for food are also toxic. At least if eaten raw. They cause gastrointestinal distress. Which does make one wonder who is actually eating raw beans, and why? Perhaps the same sorts Roach mentions who shove beans up their urethra for “sexual gratification.” In one case, the beans made it all the way into the bladder, where they, predictably, swelled up. Roach describes the case report, which includes the softened beans in a surgical basin after the extraction.
[M]ore appetizing than most things removed by forceps in a surgery suite, but probably not, owing to the urine presoak, more delicious.
There is another chapter on the problem of birds. Specifically, birds eating crops, or just sitting around in large numbers and crapping. I had no idea that people used to blow flocks up using dynamite. This turned out to be ineffective, actually. The problem with birds - and indeed most pest animals - is that reproduction increases when you kill them. Nature finds its balance pretty rapidly. It was this musing that caught my eye, though.
Were Meanley and Neff, like Joe Browder, simply men with a hatred of crop-raiding birds? And/or a love of setting off bombs? Bird-bombing seemed to peak after World War II. I began to wonder if it was the product of some lingering zest for combat, some wartime hangover of misplaced patriotic zeal.
Actually, there are multiple chapters on birds. Because birds can definitely be pests. There is a whole section on gulls, which apparently will destroy stuff for the hell of it - a lot like humans.
Why would a gull do this? Was there a biological motive? Are some species just dicks?
In the case of gulls, I am inclined to say that they are just dicks. In an unexpected twist, part of the gull research involved the Vatican, which has both a problem with gulls at events and a policy regarding humane treatment of animals. So yes, Roach interviewed multiple people at the Vatican for the book.
I follow Tornini’s gaze to the massive wall that surrounds the Holy See. A gull glides over. There’s your symbol of peace, I think to myself. A bird, any bird, soaring over walls, ignoring borders! Peace, freedom, unity! It’s possible I’ve had too many espressos.
And then, there is the attempt to use lasers to scare birds. Roach’s quip is hilarious.
Could keeping birds away be as cheap and easy as pointing to graphs on PowerPoint slides that no one understands?
Roach also discusses the use of poison and baits to kill pests - particularly invasive species. The key is to make the poison specific to the species you want to kill, or to make the bait unattractive to every other species. It’s a tough challenge. And then there is Roach, who does crazy stuff.
So far the challenge seems to be the bait. In a lush tropical environment, a bait has to be extremely tempting to compete with the natural food sources. Aaron hands me a bottle of Goodnature bait, a chocolatey-coconutty goo that smells, but does not taste, delicious. It’s like eating suntan lotion, I tell Aaron.
“You tried it?” His look combines horror, confusion, and pity. “You want some gum?”
Related and also pretty funny is the bait used for the invasive Brown Tree Snakes on Guam. The winning bait turned out to be:
Eventually a winner emerged: “mouse butter” on a core of potted meat product. “We reverse-engineered Spam,” Kimball told me with understandable pride. Spam is cheap, keeps for at least a week, and doesn’t attract ants - and the snakes, like the humans of Guam, are inexplicably fond of it.
Well, there you go. Classic Mary Roach. I recommend all of her books.
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