December 26, 2008
Bob and Thea Pyle with dwarf Agraulis vanillae at Koko Crater, Oahu. Photo by Jim Snyder.
Bob Pyle stalking Zizina otis on Waikiki, Oahu. Photo by Jim Snyder.
Dorsal view of male Chinese Swallowtail (Papilio xuthus) at Kailua-Kona, photo by Jim Snyder.
Hawaiian Blue (Vaga blackburni) at Mana Place on Honolulu, Oahu, photo by Jim Snyder.
Dorsal view of male Lesser Grass-Blue (Zizina otis) at Waikiki, Hawaii. Photo by Jim Snyder.
Larval tents of banana skipper (Erionota thrax) in Kauai. Photo by Thea Linnaea Pyle.
Koke'e naturalist Laura Arnold shows RMP a native Hawai'ian mint. Photo by Thea Linnaea Pyle.
View of Napali Coast from Kalalau Lookout, with Kalalau Valley (rich in native plants) and beach in background; in foreground, red-flowered ohia trees, on which Blackburn's blues (=Hawaiian) were nectaring. Photo by Thea Linnaea Pyle.
Falls at the head of Manoa Valley, Lyon Arboretum, where we encountered the Greater Lantana Butterfly. Photo by Thea Linnaea Pyle.
Butterflies in the Mist, Halelau, Koke'e, Kau'ai. Photo by Thea Linnaea Pyle.
Butterflies in the Mist, Halelau, Koke’e, Kau’ai. Photo by Thea Linnaea Pyle.
Bob writing up notes at night with help from Laura's assistant. Photo by Thea Linnaea Pyle.
Tiki Torch butterfly net, net furled; perhaps the only tiki torch ever to make it through airport security. Photo by Thea Linnaea Pyle.
Welcome Back Snowman. Photo by Thea Linnaea Pyle.
Christmas with Grandson Francis. Photo by Thea Linnaea Pyle.
TLP & RMP, back from Hawaii. Photo by Dorothea Hellyer.
January 7th, 2009 at 4:33 pm
Bob - this poem, recenting appearing in Nature I am told, made me think of you…Enjoy, as the rains pound us in Western Washington.
The Very Small Baseline Group Convenes at The Cat and Fiddle
A groaning table of empties makes up
our Very Small Array — a barley-scented
interferometer. Here we can study the cosmos
and drink. We tune into the microwave sky:
to the froth at the edge of the universe.
We sup in the dusk, everything glows
with its own light: the hedgerow, lawn,
the atoms inside the glass. The Milky Way
sings in a half-inch of Guiness
a song of distant path when the world
was a moment old. We gather it all in our mugs,
in a pub garden on the edge of the moors,
looking down on Jodrell Bank: Queen
of the red-light district, cocking her huge lug
to the mayhem beyond our patch.
The bats are in on it, hunting in ultrasound,
catching moths in their fangs, while frogs
bark in the meadows, one to the other,
a vast unfathomable love-song. I finish my pint
and add my glass to the phalanx: the more
we drink
the clearer we see, as any old soak will tell you.
I tip back my head to look at the Pleiades
and tumble, arse over tit, into the damp grass.
I lie in my cups under the bling of the
northern sky.
I can hear it now, I can see it all clearly,
all and nothing, just the whole sky blazing.
Neil Rollinson