Early this evening, I went for a short walk in a nature preserve in Bethlehem, New York. As usual, I wasn’t looking for anything in particular. I was just walking and noticing.
The first thing I noticed was something that wasn’t there.
Birdsong.
The preserve was surprisingly quiet. I heard very few birds and saw only a couple of robins. Just a few weeks ago, the woods seemed alive with birds singing, calling, establishing territories, and raising their young.
Now, things are changing.
The spring migrants have long since passed through on their journeys farther north, and many of the birds that nest here are mostly finished with the busiest part of their nesting season. There isn’t as much reason to sing as there was earlier in the year.
The seasons are moving along.
Then I began noticing some of the things that were there.
A few fungi.
Different plants.
And Joe-Pye weed beginning to flower—a plant I associate with mid- to late summer here in upstate New York.
I didn’t need a calendar to tell me that summer is moving along. The preserve told me.
Less birdsong. Joe-Pye weed blooming.
Those were my Notice Moments today.
Sometimes we notice something because it suddenly appears.
And sometimes we notice because something that was once all around us has quietly disappeared.
Either way, nature is always telling us something.
Today I listened to a TED Talk, something I do on a fairly regular basis. I enjoy learning a new thing or two, picking up some little morsel of knowledge that I didn’t have when the day began.
Sometimes those morsels are interesting.
Sometimes they are useful.
And sometimes they stop me in my tracks.
Today was one of those days.
According to the speaker, around 8 billion people in the world now have access to a cell phone. At the same time, around 3.5 billion people do not have access to a toilet. And of those, around 400 million people still practice what is referred to as “open defecation.”
Now, I haven’t dug deeply into those numbers yet. That will come next.
But this isn’t a Stewardship Guide. It’s a Field Note—a Notice Moment—and Notice Moments often begin before we have all the answers.
We notice something.
And then we ponder it.
My immediate reaction was pretty simple:
In 2026, there is something deeply flawed with the overall system.
Think about it.
As a global society, we have developed the technology and infrastructure necessary to put a sophisticated communication device into the hands of billions of people. A person can potentially stand almost anywhere on Earth holding a small computer capable of communicating across continents, accessing vast amounts of human knowledge, taking photographs, watching videos, conducting business, and connecting with people thousands of miles away.
Yet billions of people apparently still lack access to something as basic as a safe and sanitary place to go to the bathroom.
I’m not suggesting that the problem is simple. I’m sure it isn’t.
Nor am I suggesting that cell phones are somehow the problem. They aren’t.
What caught my attention is the contrast.
There is also a certain irony in all of this that is hard for me to ignore.
I suspect that a fair percentage of those billions of people who have both a cell phone and a toilet routinely use the two at the same time. Apparently, sitting on the toilet and scrolling through a cell phone has become something of a modern human pastime.
Which makes me wonder if we’re looking at this problem all wrong.
Maybe the world’s cell phone companies should get into the toilet business.
After all, they have already figured out how to get their products into the hands of billions of people around the world. Perhaps it’s time they started working on creating a few billion more cell phone use stations.
I’m kidding, of course.
Well…mostly.
Because beneath the humor is a serious question about priorities. We humans are remarkably good at creating systems that can manufacture, market, sell and distribute things people want. Yet we seem far less successful at creating systems that ensure everyone has access to some of the most basic things people need.
Why is that?
I don’t know.
At least not yet.
But now I’m curious.
And that is what happens with a Notice Moment.
You are moving along through your day when something catches your attention. Maybe it’s a bird you’ve never noticed before. Maybe it’s something growing alongside the road. Maybe it’s a pile of stuff in your basement that hasn’t been touched in twenty years.
Or maybe it’s a statistic you hear while listening to a TED Talk.
You notice.
You stop.
You ponder.
And sometimes you begin asking questions that you weren’t asking five minutes earlier.
This particular Notice Moment is going into my mental compost pile for a while. I need to learn more about sanitation, infrastructure, poverty, public health and the numbers themselves.
But the question that first popped into my head isn’t going away:
If we can figure out how to put a cell phone within reach of nearly everyone on Earth, why haven’t we figured out how to do the same thing with a toilet?
I don’t know where that question will lead.
But I noticed it.
And now I’m curious.
P.S. If you happen to be reading this while sitting on a toilet and scrolling on your cell phone…well, I rest my case. 😂
Some summer days invite you outside. Others remind you that nature sets the schedule, not us.
Today was one of those latter days.
My backyard weather station recorded a high temperature of 97.5°F, and it felt every bit of it. The air was heavy enough that even standing still left you wishing for a breeze. Like many people across the Northeast, we’ve been looking for air-conditioned places to take our daily walks rather than heading to our favorite nature preserves.
As evening approached, though, the day offered a reward.
Smoke and haze softened the western sky, turning the setting sun into a glowing orange-red disk hanging above the trees. At the same time, the backyard meadow remained surprisingly busy. Bees and other pollinators continued moving from flower to flower through the tall grasses, seemingly unfazed by the heat that had driven most of us indoors.
It reminded me that every species has its own way of dealing with summer. Some seek shade. Some become more active in the cooler hours. Others simply carry on with the work that needs to be done.
The weather forecasters say the humidity will begin dropping tomorrow afternoon. If they’re right, the heat should become a little more bearable, and I’m looking forward to getting back onto one of our local nature preserve trails.
Sometimes stewardship isn’t about doing something extraordinary.
Sometimes it’s simply paying attention, waiting for the right moment, and then stepping back outside.
Most people walking a nature trail probably wouldn’t give a second thought to a hole in an old tree. A few days ago, while hiking through a small nature preserve near my home, I stopped to look more closely at this one.
As a biologist, I immediately recognized it as a cavity likely excavated by a Pileated Woodpecker. These impressive birds, nearly crow-sized, use their powerful bills to carve nesting and roosting cavities into dead or declining trees.
But what caught my attention wasn’t just the woodpecker. It was the reminder that this hole represents something much larger: the importance of leaving some dead and dying trees standing whenever they do not pose a safety risk to people, homes, or other structures.
Wildlife biologists often refer to birds as either primary cavity nesters or secondary cavity nesters.
Primary cavity nesters, such as Pileated Woodpeckers, Downy Woodpeckers, and Hairy Woodpeckers, create their own nesting cavities. Secondary cavity nesters, however, cannot excavate cavities themselves. Species such as Chickadees, Bluebirds, Tree Swallows, some owls, and even certain ducks depend on cavities that have already been created by woodpeckers or formed naturally through decay.
In many ways, woodpeckers serve as nature’s carpenters. Their work provides homes not only for themselves, but for an entire community of wildlife that follows.
And the story doesn’t end with birds.
Tree cavities may also shelter squirrels, bats, flying squirrels, raccoons, insects, salamanders, and countless other creatures. What appears to be a simple hole in a tree is actually a valuable piece of habitat.
As people, we often focus on living trees—and rightly so. But standing dead trees, sometimes called “snags,” play an equally important role in healthy ecosystems. A forest without a few snags is a little like a neighborhood without apartments. There simply aren’t enough places for many residents to live.
The next time you encounter an old tree with a cavity along a trail, pause for a moment. What looks like decay may actually be a sign of life. Someone built that home, someone may be living there now, and many others may depend on it in the years ahead.
Sometimes a hole in a tree tells a much bigger story than we realize.
Yesterday evening, Theresa and I decided to take a short walk through the Van Dyke Spinney Preserve, located less than a mile from our home in the Town of Bethlehem, New York.
This 33-acre preserve was accepted by the Mohawk Hudson Land Conservancy in 2012 as part of the permitting process for a nearby residential development. What might appear to be a small tract of land on a map provides an impressive diversity of habitats, including forests, wetlands, floodplain communities, and stream corridors.
The preserve features a gently rolling one-mile loop trail that winds through mature woodlands and alongside portions of the Phillipinkill, a tributary of the Vlomans Kill, which eventually flows into the Hudson River. Along the trail, visitors encounter small bridges, seasonal wetlands, towering trees, native wildflowers, and quiet views of the stream as it meanders through the floodplain.
One of the things I appreciate most about Van Dyke Spinney Preserve is how accessible it is. Located at 246 Van Dyke Road in Delmar, New York, the preserve includes a convenient parking area and offers an easy opportunity to spend an hour immersed in nature without traveling far from home.
During our walk, the forest was alive with the soft light of early evening filtering through the canopy. Forget-me-nots bloomed along the trail edges, the Phillipinkill reflected the surrounding greenery like a mirror, and the cool, shaded woods provided a welcome escape from the day’s heat. It was a reminder that meaningful encounters with nature do not require a trip to a national park or a remote wilderness area. Sometimes they can be found just down the road.
Places like Van Dyke Spinney Preserve demonstrate the value of local land conservation. They protect water quality, provide wildlife habitat, preserve natural beauty, and offer nearby residents a chance to reconnect with the natural world. For those of us interested in conservation and stewardship, they also serve as living classrooms where we can observe, learn, and simply enjoy the wonders of nature.
As I often remind readers of The Nature of Things, stewardship begins by noticing things. A short walk on a local trail can lead to discoveries, appreciation, and ultimately a deeper connection with the places we call home.
Yesterday morning, I opened my email and found a message warning that the federal government was preparing to offer portions of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge for oil and gas leasing.
The message came from a conservation organization and, like many advocacy messages, it was written to encourage immediate action. My first reaction was not to sign a petition or hit the delete button. Instead, I found myself transported back several decades to a time when I was fortunate enough to play a small role in efforts to protect some of Alaska’s remarkable public lands.
For many Americans, Alaska exists only as a distant place on a map. Yet it contains some of the last great expanses of relatively intact wilderness on Earth. Vast mountain ranges, sprawling wetlands, tundra, rivers, forests, and coastlines support wildlife populations that most of us can only imagine. More importantly, many of these lands belong to all Americans.
The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, often called ANWR, is one of those places.
What makes the refuge so important is not simply its size. It is the wildlife. The refuge provides habitat for polar bears, caribou, wolves, musk oxen, and hundreds of species of birds. Many of those birds do not stay in Alaska. They migrate thousands of miles each year, connecting the Arctic to places like New York, Indiana, Florida, and communities all across North America.
A shorebird that nests in the Arctic may stop along the Atlantic Coast. A waterfowl species that breeds in Alaska may spend part of the winter in wetlands near your hometown. In nature, everything is connected.
As I read the email, I decided to look beyond the headline. The message claimed that nearly 700,000 acres could be offered for oil and gas leasing. As it turns out, that statement is generally accurate. However, leasing land is not the same thing as drilling on it. Many additional approvals, studies, and decisions would still be required before any development could occur.
That distinction is important.
But so is the larger question.
How should lands like the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge be managed? Should they remain primarily places for wildlife and wilderness? Should portions be available for energy development? Can both goals coexist? These are not simple questions, and reasonable people can disagree on the answers.
What struck me most this morning was not the politics of the moment. It was the realization that the same fundamental debate has continued for decades. The names of the politicians change. The administrations change. The headlines change. Yet the underlying question remains remarkably constant.
What responsibilities do we have as stewards of the natural resources entrusted to us?
Throughout my life and career, I have believed that conservation is not about choosing between people and nature. It is about finding ways to improve the quality of life and the environment at the same time. Good stewardship requires information, thoughtful discussion, and a willingness to look beyond slogans and headlines.
The email I received this morning reminded me of something else as well.
The conservation decisions we make today will not only affect wildlife in Alaska. They will influence what future generations inherit, whether they live in Anchorage, Albany, Indianapolis, Tampa Bay, or a small rural community somewhere in between.
Sometimes an email is just an email.
And sometimes it serves as a reminder that stewardship is never finished. Each generation must decide what it values, what it is willing to protect, and what kind of legacy it hopes to leave behind.
That may be the most important lesson Alaska has to teach us.
When people hear the words bird observatory, they often picture a large research station with scientists, expensive equipment, and acres of protected land.
The truth is, the Dodson Bird Observatory began in a backyard.
It started with something much simpler: paying attention.
A few years ago, I began keeping track of the birds and wildlife around our home in Albany County, New York. I watched what visited the feeders, what nested in the shrubs, what sang from the trees, and what passed overhead during migration. Over time, I realized that our small property was connected to something much larger.
Birds didn’t recognize property lines.
Neither did butterflies, dragonflies, wildflowers, fungi, or mammals.
What happened in our backyard was influenced by neighboring fields, woodlots, wetlands, roadsides, and residential landscapes. Nature was operating across the entire landscape, regardless of who owned the land.
That realization led me to expand my observations beyond our property and into the surrounding area. Eventually, those efforts evolved into what I recently created on iNaturalist as the Waldenmaier Road Stewardship Corridor Project. (click the link to visit the project.)
Today, the project includes:
546 observations
232 species
275 identifiers
3 active observers
Those numbers represent far more than a collection of records.
They represent a growing understanding of the living community that surrounds us.
The project area follows Waldenmaier Road and adjoining lands, creating a stewardship corridor that includes forests, fields, wetlands, streams, residential landscapes, and agricultural lands. Every observation helps tell the story of the place.
Some observations document common species that most people overlook.
Others reveal surprising discoveries.
Each observation adds another piece to the puzzle.
What excites me most is that this project demonstrates something I have come to believe deeply:
Anyone can become a steward of the place where they live.
You do not need to own hundreds of acres.
You do not need a biology degree.
You do not need special equipment.
You simply need to notice.
Notice the bird singing from a fence post.
Notice the wildflower blooming along a roadside ditch.
Notice the butterfly visiting a patch of clover.
Notice the mushrooms that appear after a summer rain.
Notice the changing seasons.
Stewardship begins with awareness.
Awareness leads to understanding.
Understanding leads to appreciation.
And appreciation often leads to action.
Many people assume conservation starts with large organizations, government agencies, or scientific institutions. While those organizations play important roles, conservation also begins in backyards, neighborhoods, parks, schoolyards, farms, and roadsides.
It begins when ordinary people decide that the places around them matter.
Are home landscape, which I called The Dodson Bird Observatory is proof of that idea.
What started as a few observations in our backyard has expanded into a broader effort to document and understand an entire local landscape. The Waldenmaier Road Stewardship Corridor Project is simply the next step in that journey.
Who knows where it might lead next?
Perhaps other residents will begin making observations.
Perhaps new species will be discovered.
Perhaps stewardship projects will emerge that improve habitat for birds, pollinators, and other wildlife.
Every large conservation effort starts with a small first step.
For us, that step was looking out the back window.
For you, it might begin with a walk around your yard, your neighborhood, or your favorite local park.
Because stewardship doesn’t start with grand plans.
It starts by noticing things.
Ron Dodson The Dodson Bird Observatory “Observing nature, one place at a time.”
Every once in a while, I’ll feature an item from my eBay or Etsy stores under the banner of Second-Hand Conservation.
Why?
Because conservation isn’t just about protecting forests, wetlands, wildlife, and natural resources. It is also about how we use the resources we already have. Every item that is reused, repurposed, repaired, gifted, or sold second-hand is one less item headed to a landfill and one less demand for something new to be manufactured.
Today’s featured item is a copy of Of a Feather: A Brief History of American Birding by Scott Weidensaul.
Birdwatching is now one of America’s most popular outdoor activities, enjoyed by millions of people each year. Yet birding wasn’t always the widespread pastime it is today. This book explores how birdwatching evolved from a pursuit practiced by a relatively small group of naturalists into a major recreational activity that has influenced conservation, environmental education, and our understanding of the natural world.
As someone who has spent much of his life working in conservation and environmental education, I find books like this particularly interesting because they help tell the story of how people developed a deeper appreciation for birds and nature. That appreciation has often translated into conservation action.
This particular copy comes from my personal library. Like many of the books I own, it has served its purpose for me and is now ready to continue its journey with someone else.
That’s really what Second-Hand Conservation is all about.
A book is written once, printed once, and then has the potential to educate and inspire many readers over its lifetime. Passing books along rather than allowing them to sit unused on shelves is a simple form of stewardship.
If you’re interested in learning more about the history of birding in America, this book may be worth a look.
This morning I read an article celebrating 130 years of “stewardship” connected to the Dow Jones Industrial Average.
The headline caught my attention because stewardship is a word I use often myself.
The article focused on protecting and maintaining a financial system over time — preserving continuity, trust, and institutional stability. There is certainly value in that.
But as I read it, I found myself pondering a deeper question:
Stewardship of what?
Modern society has become remarkably skilled at measuring financial performance. We track markets constantly. We celebrate growth, efficiency, and economic expansion.
But what about stewardship of:
soil,
water,
wildlife,
local communities,
public trust,
or the long-term health of the natural systems upon which all economies ultimately depend?
A stock index can tell us much about financial conditions. But it cannot fully tell us about the condition of a community, a wetland, a forest, or the emotional well-being of the people who live there.
Perhaps one of the great challenges of our time is not whether we practice stewardship, but what we choose to steward.
This morning I was going through old boxes of photographs that I have taken over the years. As I sorted through them, I found myself traveling back through time — remembering projects, people, ideas, and moments that once seemed ordinary but now feel pretty special.
One group of photographs stopped me in my tracks.
They showed kids outdoors with dirty hands, shovels, buckets, trees, flowers, and smiles. The pictures were from a project I launched years ago in Henderson, Kentucky called Operation Greenup.
At the time, Operation Community Pride had spent nearly a year focused heavily on litter reduction and community cleanup efforts. We had made progress, but I began to realize something important: cleaning up a community is only the first step. If you really want people to care about a place, you also have to help make it beautiful, alive, and worth caring about.
So we shifted gears.
Instead of only picking things up, we started planting things.
Trees. Shrubs. Flowers. Wildlife-friendly vegetation. Anything that could brighten a neighborhood, improve public spaces, and help reconnect people with nature.
And I decided early on that kids needed to be at the center of it.
That turned out to be one of the best decisions we ever made.
The response was incredible. Sometimes we had more children volunteering than we had plants or tools to give them. But somehow we always made it work. Businesses donated supplies. Florists and tree sellers contributed plants. Schools participated. The Chamber of Commerce helped identify locations around the community that needed attention.
Before long, we had built a small army of enthusiastic young people armed with shovels and purpose.
And they put a real shine on Henderson, Kentucky.
Looking back now, I realize the project was never just about planting trees or flowers. It was about planting ownership, pride, stewardship, and possibility in young people. Many of those kids are grandparents themselves today. But I like to think that somewhere deep inside, they still remember that feeling of digging a hole, planting something living, and helping make their community better.
Sometimes the seeds we plant in people matter even more than the seeds we plant in the ground.
If you are interested in reading a full story about this project visit my free online Conservation Chronicles publication at Conservation Chronicles
