And Other Pleasant Studies of Birds and Beasts

Books on animal telepathy are not my normal fare—and if you follow my site at all, that probably goes without saying. I honestly didn’t know what I was getting into with this book when I first picked it up, though that’s my bad entirely, since right on the cover of my copy, it calls this “The classic book on animal telepathy.” Woops.

It’s actually a fascinating century-old read, this series of essays by liberal-theologian and Teddy Roosevelt nemesis William J. Long. A naturalist to the marrow, Long delivers colorful descriptions of the woods and ponds of his beautiful North America, emphasizing the fauna especially—and yes, even delving a bit into the possibilities of animal telepathy.

What he really describes in his first section “How Animals Talk” is the apparent “sixth sense” that many individual animals possess. It’s not that every dog, for example, can sense when its master is unexpectedly on the road home, but that some individual dogs just seem to know when changes are afoot and then behave abnormally in expectation. It’s akin to the ill feelings a mother might feel when, at the same moment and across the world her son is killed in war—whether you call it telepathy, a sixth sense, or just some odd sensation in our subconscious, it’s certainly a mysterious coincidence worth exploring, which is precisely what Long does in the first part of this book.

Like Long, I too have been curious about some of the strange things that I’ve seen animals do. For example, it’s always fascinated me that birds of so many different species know that the box hanging from my porch contains food today, when for the past week it had hung empty and without a single visitor. They’re not smelling the food, yet when one sparrow begins feasting, then suddenly all the various species from the surrounding hills descend, and my feeder is empty within a day or two. Did all the birds see that first one enjoying his meal? Did that singular sparrow go speak to black-capped chickadees and nuthatches and woodpeckers, telling them that a feast was now available? How could so many birds from so many places suddenly know that food is available? Long suggests that birds of many species can sense from a distance the satisfaction of other birds, a feeling of pleasure that draws them all in. (See his Chapter V: “The Swarm Spirit”)

Or consider the deer in the state forest that borders our land. Ten months of the year, people venture into those woods on hikes or cross-country ski expeditions. All year long, the folks and the deer meander through the woods together, one rarely frightening the other into a frenzy. Come October, however, the deer grow crazy, as if they sense in the air a shift—-that the humans have changed from friendly nature-lovers to venison-hunting monsters. Can it be that all the deer in the woods hear dangerous the “shfffft” sound of arrows as they fly through the air? Or can they smell the blood of their fallen kind somehow on the wind? Long suggests that the deer begin their frantic behavior because they sense a shift in human intent from friendly interest to a more violent blood-hunger. (See his Chapter IX: “At Close Range”)

I’m not saying I agree with him on these opinions—especially since he suggests at one point that human language is just a blip in our evolutionary journey, and that we’ll probably all forgo speech one day in favor of communicating telepathically. Still, I found it intriguing that Long had also wondered about these same natural mysteries and actually came up with one possible solution, albeit an odd one.

Besides telepathic weirdness, this book offers an excellent foray in the natural world of early 20th-century America. I’ve read plenty about the Teddy-Roosevelt-styled naturalists of that time period, bloodthirsty men who shot everything in sight “for study purposes,” so this an intimate look at the flip side of the naturalist coin. I don’t get the sense that this guy worshiped nature, but that instead found within it clues to understanding the human experience (he does appear to be a fervent Darwinian, so that might explain why).

I grabbed these few quotations from that I think are worth preserving:

“The scientist does not study nature because it is useful, he studies it because he delights in it, and he delights in it because it is beautiful. If nature were not beautiful, it would not be worth knowing, and if nature were not worth knowing, life would not be worth living.” (Jules Henri Poincare as quoted by Mark Bekoff in Long, How Animals Talk, xix)

“What is any revelation or discovery but seeing things as they are?” (Long, How Animals Talk, 37)

“The man who has not traveled the wilderness alone at night has a vivid and illuminating experience awaiting him.” (Long, How Animals Talk, 59)

Overall, I enjoyed this book for its delve into the natural world of North America. It’s Waldenesque at times—especially his final section, “My Pond: A Symphony of the Woods”—and it offers a healthy snapshot of our changing wilderness 100 years ago. This would be a good read for any budding nature writer or armchair naturalist, though just be wary of what you’re getting into before you start.

©2022 E.T.