The private eye

de Mary Burns

In The Private Eye we learn about snow geese through the eyes of Native people, scientists, artists, hunters, and farmers. Yup'ik Eskimo Charles Hunt harvests snow geese along the Yukon River delta each fall, continuing a subsistence way of life that has existed for millennia. Russian, Canadian, and US scientists track the movements of the geese each spring and fall, banding, sexing, counting, and precisely monitoring the activities of these beautiful birds. Robert Bateman provides an artist's view of nature and relates how his curiosity led him to join a camp set up at a remote nesting site. Mary Burns also talks to hunters, joining a party of them as they wait for their snow geese decoys to lure the real thing into a Westham Island field in the Fraser delta. To complete the experience she prepares snow geese for supper. As well, Burns travels around the Skagit River delta during a population survey and meets a dairy farmer who describes both the wild flocks that converge on his fields each spring and the snow geese he raises in pens. The Private Eye suggests that by acknowledging our many and varied connections with the natural world, we will have a better understanding of the human place in it.