Sharing my new Audubon essay on Whip-poor-wills

[Jared Del Rosso]

Hi all --

A few days ago, Audubon published an essay, "As the Whip-poor-will's Chant Wanes, Our Cultural Loss Grows," I've written on Eastern Whip-poor-wills, species decline, and human cultural change. Here's their description from social,

"Portending everything from new life, to death, to love, to even haircuts, Eastern Whip-poor-wills and their nighttime calls have been cultural touchstones in North America for centuries. But as Eastern Whip-poor-will populations wane, Jared Del Rosso fears we may be losing our deep connection with the species. Read his advice on reconnecting with these covert birds and fueling more meaningful connections with the species around us."

I know Whip-poor-wills aren't CO birds, but there are two Colorado connections here. The first is that it's my own experience with CO's Common Nighthawks and Common Poorwills that brought me to this work; I touch on the nighthawks in this essay (and I've posted about them here--probably too often!). The other is that my writing and thinking on this often draws on the work of the lepidopterist Robert Michael Pyle, who grew up along the High Line Canal in Aurora. Pyle's book The Thunder Tree details his youthful discoveries and losses along the Canal, and these figure in my essay. And I guess I'd add that I've heard many of the same things about Common Nighthawks in Colorado as I'm hearing about Whip-poor-wills back east: they once were more common, a sort of annual marker of our springs and summers; now, they're far more difficult to encounter.

https://www.audubon.org/news/whip-poor-wills-chant-wanes-our-cultural-loss-grows

- Jared Del Rosso

Centennial, CO