The Age of Innocence: A Gen-Xer Mourns Davy Jones

Beth Pratt February 29, 2012

It would be easy (and perhaps not completely incorrect) to dismiss Davy Jones and the Monkees as a passing pop culture phenomenon, a precursor to the emptiness of reality TV as the band was not accidental, but an assemblage of stereotypes picked from auditions of relatively unknown faces for a TV show. Davy Jones thrived in his role of the cute and endearing heartthrob of the group and became the object of much adoration from female fans—and I was no exception.

Yet if they lacked the weighty aspirations and lofty artistic goals of other bands of their time, they provided a sense of innocence and fun for a whole generation, the boys we could safely dream about (before the advent of online sex tapes and TMZ), a band who had a cuteness factor in the range of puppy dogs and kittens. When Davy Jones showed up at Marsha Brady’s house to ask her to the prom, he caused myself and millions of other young girls to swoon, yes really swoon, and further cemented our enduring crush on this dreamboat. He never aged, not really, not when you could watch the Monkees in eternal reruns and on YouTube, and he forever remained the adorable songster who glided across the rainbow stage while singing Daydream Believer (and on a side note, I am convinced that Axl Rose stole his moves from Davy Jones based on the video for this song).

The Monkees were, at least in my opinion, not without artistic merit—Pleasant Valley Sunday and Last Train to Clarksville are pretty good songs that hold up even today. And any band that dares to star in a film coproduced by Jack Nicholson and with appearances by Frank Zappa and Dennis Hopper deserve some kudos for artistic courage, no matter how disastrous the result.

Critics aside, even if one dismisses the Davy Jones and the Monkees as gimmicky bunch of clowns, is being known for fun a truly bad epitaph? For giving the minds of young girls something innocent to day dream about? It a far better legacy than many can claim.

My mother reminds me that in grade school, I would dash home from my playtime outside in the summer to catch the reruns of the Monkees in the afternoon (for you younger readers—imagine life where the only time you could watch a television show was when it was actually broadcast on TV). I still remember the surge of happiness I got when their catchy theme song started playing and the goofy antics began.

Perhaps Davy Jones inhabited the last generational space of the Tigerbeat variety before the overexposure enabled by 24-hour news and cell phone photos on Facebook could prove the downfall of any celebrity. My later teenage crush on Mel Gibson now seems misguided because of hearing his ugly threats to bury his girlfriend in a garden, and too many of the rock stars of my high school and college years have ended up on bad reality TV shows. But Davy Jones remains eternally the nice boy next door, nary an acne blemish or spousal abuse scandal to tarnish his image. If he had feet of clay or skeletons in his closet, at least he existed in a time when we didn’t have to or even want to know.

So for this aging Generation Xer, I am mourning the loss of Davy Jones however trivial or shallow this might seem to some. As the Kinks say, celluloid heroes never really die. Unlike some of my adult pop culture experiences, I possess no remorse over my admiration. I can remember Davy dancing dreamily across the stage without a hint of irony, or without having to associate him with the ugliness that seems to arise in this age of the personal being public.

Sometimes idolization is a good thing for our psyche. I feel bad for the Bieberites who had to deal with even the unfounded rumor of a paternity suit and I am just glad my childhood pop star phase happened before Twitter and Celebrity Rehab. I’ll keep my unsullied image of Davy Jones asking Marsha Brady for a kiss on the cheek and remember with fondness those fan letters I wrote him, and probably avoid reading too many obituaries in case they dig up a past I really don’t want to discover.

Thanks, Davy, for giving me an age of innocence.

Climate change lessens genetic diversity of Yosemite's alpine chipmunks

Beth Pratt February 26, 2012

An alpine chipmunk (Tamias alpinus) is shown at Yosemite's Ten Lakes Pass at an elevation of 9,631 feet. (Risa Sargent photo)The Sierra Nevada is known for its chipmunk diversity--the central Sierra boasts nine species spanning its various regions--yet a recent study shows that climate change is threatening the genetic makeup of at least one of the animals, the high elevation dwelling alpine chipmunk, (Tamias alpinus).

The alpine chipmunk is a species endemic to California's Sierra Nevada and historically was sighted at elevations as low as 7,800 feet. New research led by Emily Rubidge, while a Ph.D. student at UC Berkeley's Museum of Vertebrate Zoology and the Department of Environmental Science, Policy and Management, shows that the animals are moving over 1,500 feet upslope. This loss of geographic range was accompanied by a decrease in genetic diversity--which has serious implications for the future of the alpine chipmunk.

"Climate change is implicated as the cause of geographic shifts observed among birds, small mammals and plants, but this new work shows that, particularly for mountain species like the alpine chipmunk, such shifts can result in increasingly fragmented and genetically impoverished populations," said Rubidge, "Under continued warming, the alpine chipmunk could be on the trajectory towards becoming threatened or even extinct."

Almost a hundred years ago, Joseph Grinnell led a series of comprehensive biological surveys for Yosemite National Park, providing historical data which has been valuable for scientists today in studying the impacts of climate change on flora and fauna in the park. The Grinnell Resurvey Project, led by Craig Moritz, professor of integrative biology and director of the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, found that many small mammals in Yosemite moved or retracted their ranges to higher, cooler elevations over the past century, a period when the average temperature in the park increased by 3 degrees Celsius, or about 5.4 degrees Fahrenheit.

“At the heart of this whole enterprise is the incredibly dense historic record and specimens we have at UC Berkeley from 100 years ago,” said Moritz. “These collections allow us to conduct sophisticated analyses to better understand how ecosystems are reacting to environmental changes, and to create more detailed models of future changes.”

A Spring Wildflower Walk (in Winter) in the Merced River Canyon

Beth Pratt February 10, 2012

Poppy in the Merced River Canyon today (photo by Beth Pratt)During my almost daily walks or runs in the Merced River Canyon near Yosemite, I enjoying witnessing the changing seasons and especially look forward to the annual wildflower bloom. Usually I have to wait until March, although sometimes if I am really lucky some blossoms appear by late February. Yet last week the fiery orange faces of the California poppy appeared on the landscape, and on my walk this afternoon I noticed a few other wildflower species, not to be outdone by the poppies, making an early appearance as well. I observed a solitary hummingbird resting on a burnt out tree and thought he might be pondering the same thing--the strangeness of this year without a winter.

Indian paintbrush blooming in February (photo by Beth Pratt)Where's winter? Hummingbird in tree (photo by Beth Pratt)Fiddleneck? (photo by Beth Pratt)

Popcornflower(?) blooming in February (photo by Beth Pratt)

It’s Not Easy Being Green, or Yellow, or Red: The Plight of California’s Frogs

Beth Pratt February 10, 2012

During my first thru hike on the John Muir Trail fifteen years ago, on the ascent up to Seldon Pass I encountered a young man energetically trotting down the trail without a backpack. Before even saying hello he asked excitedly, “have you seen any frogs?” The question was a strange greeting, but this researcher had luckily encountered a fellow frog enthusiast. Subsequently he revealed that he was studying frog populations in the Sierra Nevada. I wish I could recall his name, but his passion for frogs I remember well.

California red-legged frog (Courtesy of Save the Frogs)During that hike, I encountered hundreds of the mountain yellow-legged frog, a cool little critter that has a raspy croak and loves to swim in alpine waters. When Joseph Grinnell conducted his famous biological inventories in Yosemite and the Sierra in the early 1900s, he remarked that his survey team could hardly move without stepping on these frogs. Today, less than 200 populations of Rana muscosa exist in the Sierra Nevada with an estimated 5,000 adults–they have disappeared from over 90% of their historic range. Sadly, these frogs are headed for extinction soon.So it seems appropriate that on February 2, the California Fish and Game Commission voted unanimously to grant this frog protection under the California Endangered Species Act.

Another of the Golden State’s frogs, the California red-legged, is struggling as well. This species was once considered one of the most abundant amphibians in California (and gained famed as being the frog featured in Mark Twain’s “The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County”), but now they are listed as federally threatened. The National Wildlife Federation and Save the Frogs named the California red-legged—the largest native frog in the western states—one of America’s top ten most threatened frogs. Save the Frogs is currently trying to convince Mayor Ed Lee of San Francisco to turn over Sharp Park Wetlands—home to red-legged frogs and other creatures—to the National Park Service to ensure protection. The wetland site is currently a golf course. Show your support for California’s red-legged frog by sending Mayor Lee an email today.

California frogs are not alone in their plight. Over a third of all amphibian species are on the verge of extinction, the result of ongoing habitat destruction, infectious disease, pollution and pesticides, climate change, invasive species and other factors. The National Wildlife Federation and Save the Frogs are partnering with the National Park Service and other Yosemite organizations to host a Save the Frogs Day event on April 28 in Yosemite National Park to celebrate and help protect these remarkable creatures. Stay tuned for details!

Winter is coming (we hope): my last excursion to Tioga Pass?

Beth Pratt January 17, 2012

Walking on a frozen Gaylor Lake, January 16, 2012As my dad and I drove through the Arch Rock entrance station in Yosemite yesterday, we viewed something that had become so unusual recently that it took us a moment to identify it. “Is that snow?” I asked the ranger at the gate. Granted it was a pretty weak snowfall, as if someone was occasionally sprinkling confectionary sugar, but we can’t be too picky in the Sierra these days. The clouds followed us to Crane Flat and beyond, and some of the trees and granite peaks glowed with a light dusting of snow against the gray clouds. At Olmsted point, the blue skies emerged, but Tenaya Peak boasted some white highlights on his granite face.

Gaylor Lake (photo by Beth Pratt)“Winter is coming,” is a catch phrase on one of my favorite shows, Game of Thrones. It’s a mantra we have been uttering here in the Sierra Nevada, yet less emphatically than Ned Stark. The California version: “Winter is coming? Isn’t it?”

The record-breaking delay in closing Tioga Pass and the access to Tuolumne and Yosemite’s high country in winter has been marvelous. Being on the Dana Plateau in January or walking across a frozen Tenaya Lake is not an experience usually attainable for those of us who are not good backcountry skiers. Yet these rare opportunities come with a price tag—a disruption of the water cycle so central to California that the decreased snowpack reverberates with implications for all life in the state. We’ll hope skating on frozen Tenaya Lake (or taking beautiful wedding photos on the ice—check out this photo by Patrick Pike Studios) remains an once-in-a-lifetime experience that we tell our grandchildren about.

With one of the ghost trees in the middle of Tenaya LakeSo the dusting of snow made me hopeful. And the forecast for more snow and rain later in the week may put an end to my winter wanderings at 12,000 feet (it’s just unreal that I have been hiking—yes—hiking at this elevation in winter), yet the Sierra needs a long, sustained drink of water. As I hike around the Gaylor Lake basin yesterday, I found the the lack of snow and the parched landscape unnerving. In my twenty years of exploring Yosemite, I had never seen this area look so, well, just plain thirsty. The white gleam of ice from frozen Gaylor Lake contrasted sharply, like a mismatched outfit, against the adjacent brown, bare landscape.

(On a related note, the other glaring absence from the Tioga landscape has been the Mobil Station being closed. Do you know how hard it is to drive over the pass without being able to stop for a fish taco at the Whoa Nellie Deli or talk baseball with Chef Toomey?)

Tuolumne River and Lembert Dome (photo by Beth Pratt)Even the lakes seemed to be lamenting against the current lack of snow—in song. One of the most wonderful discoveries of this late access to the high country has been the music of the lakes. On my first visit to frozen Tenaya Lake when the road reopened in December, I stood on the west shore and listened in amazement to the voice of the lake—it resembled the mysterious moanings of whale song. Gaylor Lake sang a melancholy song as well, with Cathedral Peak listening sympathetically in the distance.