Reestablishing Kinship with All Life in a Time of Chaos

Written for Kosmos Journal, Vol. 24, Issue 4

A few kilometers off the east coast of Newfoundland’s Avalon Peninsula lie four small islands that teem with life throughout the summer. The Witless Bay Ecological Reserve is the nesting and breeding home for over two million seabirds. It includes the largest North American colony of Atlantic puffins and the Leach’s storm-petrel colony of 620,000 pairs.12

​As our pilgrim group travels via catamaran to a close but respectful distance from the nesting areas, we are greeted by wave after wave of bouncing puffins, glancing off the water in what seems to be sheer joy. So fast and ecstatic are these horn-beaked “sea clowns,” I fear they will collide with our boat. Sometimes referred to as “little brothers of the north” for their black and white, monk-like plumage, they appear nothing like reverent clerics as they frolic in their summer home. Read the full article here.