What is an animal that I am grateful for? Why?

Black Skimmers! Today I choose these magnificent seabirds to be grateful for. Their long wings, buoyant flight, how they skim over the water, their long lower beak slicing the surface. Here is a haiku I wrote about a “peak experience” during the beautiful offering (Exploring Haiku as a Gratefulness Practice) on this site last April.

Sailing solo.
Two Black Skimmers
and I
FLY
just above the waves.

I was 19 years old and sailing a little rented Laser out of the marina at Norfolk Naval Air Station at the mouth of the Chesapeake Bay and I’ll never forget skimming along, speeding downwind with these two birds. We were so close, we could almost have touched finger-tip to wing-tip. But we didn’t need to touch. We were flowing as one being. Free.

Why am I remembering this today? Because today I learned that the Virginia Department of Transportation has recently PAVED OVER the largest seabird nesting site in the state — a small island where 20,000 Black Skimmers, Royal Terns, and other seabirds breed. Right. There. Where I had my peak experience 33 years ago.

These are migratory birds that spend the winter further south, so when they return to the island as they do every April (they nest in colonies on the ground in shallow sand scrapes), they will find nowhere to settle. No sand to make a nest scrape in. Only asphalt and construction machinery for the traffic tunnel expansion. And no suitable replacement habitat anywhere nearby due to the inexorable march of coastal development and the apathy of state officials who were fully aware of the effect of the project but declined to commit to a solution proposed by wildlife researchers. Where will they go, these 20,000 birds? This breaks my heart.