Artist and illustrator, Adelaide Tyrol, hesitated for a moment when I asked her about her time in Grand Teton National Park with a group of biologists from the Biodiversity Research Institute (BRI), then she says smiling, “Well, I didn’t know exactly what they expected of me.”
In fact, they didn’t know what to expect of her. Vin Spagnuolo, a wildlife research biologist and head of the Wyoming loon project, recalls Dave Evers, BRI’s chief scientist and executive director, on phone saying that an artist was going to join them. Vin thought, “Oh sure Dave, you’re the boss. If you say jump, we say how high.’” Vin remembering thinking, “Oh boy, I have no idea who this person is, whether she’s had any wilderness experience, how old she is, whether she can handle the grueling hikes into the backcountry. But, hey, we’ll give it a go.”
Adelaide’s connection to BRI and the biologists began when she worked on illustrations for Conserve the Call, a publication focused on Common Loon research and conservation. Dave Evers and Wildlife Outreach Specialist, Kate Taylor, were impressed with Adelaide’s work and thought a trip into field would be worthwhile for her and the work the Institute was doing. “I was just amazed that they wanted me,” Adelaide commented.
Vin called her before she left Vermont to talk about what she might expect and to get a feel for what she was looking for and what she was comfortable doing. He reassured her that they would carry all her gear. She told him that while she was pushing 60, she was active outdoors, took hikes, and was in relatively good shape.
That turned out to be a good thing because there were 5 to 8-mile hikes into the backcountry to secluded lakes. And Adelaide, according to Vin, “did perfectly.” One measure of how someone does in the field, Vin says, “is if he or she complains. Adelaide never once complained. She just kept exclaiming at how amazing everything was. She was a bit taken aback by what we do, ‘You mean you’re going to go here and jump into that water!’”
Not sure if the biologists expected her to actually paint in the field, Adelaide did bring paints and sketch books. But once actually on a lake in a canoe, sitting under camouflage netting in the hot sun, and needing to be perfectly still so the biologists could capture the loons, she realized that painting was definitely out.
In an interesting twist, she realized that there were many gorgeous images of loons, but you don’t often get an opportunity to see biologists in the field at work. “So, it was the people and the camaraderie that really moved me and the chance to look closely at nature, at say lodge wood pin and other plants that I was going to have to illustrate.”
Adelaide remembered one very special night. “The night they brought me out to the lake, I didn’t know who I was with. It was pitch black, and the biologists wore head lamps so you couldn’t see their faces. I just wanted to be well behaved and quiet.”
When the team was in position on the water, one set of biologists swept the lake with a red light that the loons, who had just had their chicks, attacked. This gave other members of the team a chance to get a loon and then go get the chicks. “I could hear they had caught a bird,” Adelaide explained, “and were coming back to us.
They had set up a fold out chair for her to sit in and then they put a loon in her lap. The bird was furious. She was big, weighing about 10 pounds, with a beak and feet like weapons. After they put a towel over her head, she quieted down. The biologists took blood samples and measurements very quickly. The goal was to hold the bird for as short a time as possible and then release it. Before releasing the chicks, one of the biologists handed Adelaide a small, black chick ¾ a life so vulnerable, she thought.
Adelaide knows she’ll never have these experiences again. “I learned a great deal not just about the loons, but about what these young scientists are doing and how respectful they are of nature and her creatures.”
As for the biologists, Vin says “We’re so focused on data and capturing the birds to study them, we sometimes don’t see another side of our work. Adelaide got us to step back and really look at the amazing place we work in. But perhaps even more important, we can only tell part of the story, as an artist she’ll be able to reach the public in a way we never can.”