by Ron Joseph
Island Press, 2023
Avid readers, including me, always are on the hunt for a can’t-put-it-down, read-in-one-sitting book. Bald Eagles, Bear Cubs and Hermit Bill: Memories of a Maine Wildlife Biologist by Ron Joseph is such a book. For decades, Joseph has written columns and articles for newspapers and magazines. This is his first book, but it’s clear he’s no stranger to writing for publication.
Joseph generously shares stories about himself – from a young boy working on his grandparents’ dairy farm to a seasoned wildlife biologist who spent most of his career in Maine. His parents understood the value of hard work and instilled that in their children. His dad, the son of immigrants, worked as a welder in the mills. His mom grew up on a dairy farm, and her father – Joseph’s grandfather – continued to use draft horses to cut and haul hay, spread manure, and other farm work, until his death in 1972.
Joseph and his sister and brothers worked and played at the farm, which was located about 20 miles from his family’s house in Oakland, Maine. Visits included chores, as well as time to roam the fields, forests, and wetlands. “There is no question that my love of nature and wildlife was born on the farm,” Joseph writes in the prologue.
The book is organized into three groups of essays: “At The Farm,” “In The Field,” and “On The Trail.” These tales are entertaining – I laughed out loud at some and cried through others. Reminiscent of essays by Hal Borland, Ted Levin, and Bernd Heinrich, Joseph laces his work with delicious morsels of information about his childhood experiences and his encounters with the natural world. He also offers insight into state efforts to protect endangered species and their habitats and shares fascinating natural history information.
For example, in “Small Bird, Big Journey,” Joseph reveals that blackpoll warblers bulk up with steroids – naturally generated prior to their migration – before flying 80 to 90 hours nonstop from Maine to Venezuela. For the birds that make it to South America, “Their three-day journey will have averaged 650 miles per day at speeds of 20 to 30 mph,” Joseph writes. An analysis of the birds’ efficiency revealed that their achievement is equivalent of an automobile averaging 750 miles per gallon.
I laughed out loud at Joseph’s story about the rooster that became drunk after eating very ripe grapes. On the other end of the spectrum, I was saddened by his account of the role he played in the harvest of 300-year-old eastern white cedars. Because white-tailed deer had not used the grove for shelter that winter, it no longer met the criteria as a state-designated deer wintering area. This opened the way for the landowner to cut the trees.
“I was a young, inexperienced biologist at the time and did not know how or if I could have persuaded the owner to sell to a conservation buyer,” Joseph said. “Not preserving the stand is my single greatest sorrow and failing as a wildlife biologist.”
Joseph is a keen observer of nature, including humans (the “Hermit Bill” of the title is Bill Hall, a Maine character whose diary Joseph discovered at a camp). This collection of stories is a gift to any reader who enjoys a well-told tale and wants to learn along the way. We can only hope that Joseph is trolling his files for apt tales for a second collection.