Blue Ridge Country March/April 2021 - 19

COUNTRY ROADS

NEW BEE IN
THE SMOKIES

The insect becomes the 21,081st species discovered in one of the most
bio-rich places on Earth.

he latest buzz from the Great Smoky Mountains National Park is the discovery of a new bee never before reported in the 522,527-acre expanse
of forest that straddles the North Carolina-Tennessee line. This summer,
scientists researching the effects of the 2016 Chimney Tops II fire discovered the
bee, Epeolus inornatus, a variety of cellophane-cuckoo bee. It was the 21,081st
species tallied so far in the All Taxa Biodiversity Inventory, an unprecedented
effort begun some 23 years ago to catalog every living species in the park.
After the fires had burned across forested slopes, new flowering plants
emerged that apparently attracted the bee to the Baskins Creek watershed area
in Sevier County, Tennessee, says Will Kuhn, director of science and research.
All told, the inventory has revealed 10,412 species new to the park, and 1,028
species new to science.
" Major events like the Chimney Tops II fires have cascading effects, and we
don't always know which way
things will turn out, " says
Kuhn. " This is a testament to
the importance of the All Taxa
Biodiversity Inventory. We
need to learn how the park's
n the warmer early evenings of
ecosystems bounce back from
March and April, look to the south
previous natural disasters so
for the three bright stars known as
that we can predict the effects
the Winter Triangle. Its southernmost
of future disturbances, like cliluminary is Sirius, the brightest star in
mate change. "
the night sky. It and two other bright
Learn more at Discover
stars form an equilateral triangle
Life In America, which mandangling off the eastern side of the
ages the biological inventory:
constellation Orion. In fact, the Winter
dlia.org.
Triangle's northwestern star, Betel-CAT MCCUE
geuse, sits at the northeastern corner
of the constellation. The third stellar
component, Procyon, shines east of
WILL KUHN - DISCOVER LIFE IN AMERICA
Betelgeuse.
Either with your unaided eyes or
through binoculars, gaze towards the
famous star forming region, M42, the
Orion Nebula glowing in the southern
half of Orion. Amazing!
Next, from Orion's equally bright
three Belt stars, head northwest
towards two attractive star clusters,
first the Hyades, then the Pleiades. In
A variety of the cuckoo bee was
March, the red planet Mars can be
apparently attracted by new
found marching between them, then
flowers appearing after fires in the
continuing eastward across the sky in
Smokies.
April.
-JOHN GOSS

Skywatch: March-April

Book Notes
Donald McCaig. Jacob's Ladder. (W.W. Norton &
Company, 1998; Penguin Books, 1999) 525 pp.

aving grown up in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, I've read a lot of Civil War books.
" Gone with the Wind, " of course. But also
most of Bruce Catton, and Michael Shaara's
" The Killer Angels, " and later, Kent Gramm's
" Gettysburg: A Meditation on War and Values, " Tony Horowitz's " Confederates in the
Attic " and Charles Frazier's " Cold Mountain. "
But the late Donald McCaig's " Jacob's Ladder " is hands-down my favorite.
As the 160th anniversary of the firing on Fort
Sumter approaches, now
is a fine time to discover/
re-discover this novel.
Based on a sliver of
history from McCaig's
western Virginia farm,
" Jacob's Ladder " follows
the fates of the Gatewood
family and their slaves as the Civil War looms
and then expands up and down the Shenandoah Valley and east to Richmond and the coast.
What's striking about McCaig's handling of
the war is that it is both tactically precise and
character-driven. You'll learn as much about
the minds of Black Union soldiers and plantation wives, sons and daughters as you will
about troop movement and munitions.
I'd be hard-pressed to choose a favorite
passage in this book. But the scene in which
a few Black Union troops consider the recently
delivered Gettysburg Address is more than
memorable-it's timely. Having listened to
the final phrase of Lincoln's speech- " '...and
that government of the people, by the people
and for the people shall not perish from the
earth' " -one soldier asks, " Jesse, are we 'the
people?' "
" 'Not yet,' " he said.
So read " Jacob's Ladder " for its detailed
history and sympathetic characters, both Black
and white. For its take on love and hate, war
and peace. And know that McCaig was ahead
of his time with the questions asked and the
answers given.
-JOAN VANNORSDALL

MARCH/APRIL 2021

http://www.dlia.org

Blue Ridge Country March/April 2021

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Blue Ridge Country March/April 2021