It was a bad afternoon for a river expedition. A light rain had started to fall, pushed by a gusty breeze. But this was about sponges, and it couldn’t wait. By tomorrow morning, the remnants of Hurricane Ida would sweep into Potomac country. Heavy rains would flood the river, producing swift currents that would scour away anything not firmly anchored to the bottom.This would be my last chance this year—perhaps forever—to see my delicate and enigmatic creatures.
The thrill of discovery. I call them “my sponges” because I had found them in 2011, the first sighting of sponges in the main stem of the upper Potomac River. I also call them “creatures,” because a lot of people don’t realize that they are animals, not plants, and are moreover the first animal to emerge on earth, possibly an astonishing 890 million years ago.
I was thrilled by that discovery 10 years ago, and even more so when the sponge expert at the Smithsonian Institution identified the sponge as a species rarely found along the eastern seaboard. Its scientific name was Dosilia radiospiculata for the delicate radial structure of its skeletal parts. I proudly signed a release to donate my specimen to the Smithsonian collection.
I felt a kinship with the legendary naturalist explorers of former times, whose exploits I so admired. Now I had exploits of my own. But I quickly I learned that not all scientific discoveries are equal. A person can live their entire life without thinking even once about a freshwater sponge. When I told one person about my sponges, her response was, “Let’s go see what’s on the buffet table.”
Then the sponges disappeared, also after a flood, like the one that was threatening to hit now. In the following years I searched for them, all up and down the river, but found no trace.
But even though my discovery was perhaps not very interesting, it was significant. Look at Darwin and his earthworms! As it turned out, my discovery and the events that followed would transcend the subject of sponges, and help me to better understand the world and our place in it.
Here my guide would be Potowmack the Trickster, the spirit of the river, who excelled in exposing our foibles and puncturing our pride, particularly as regards our place in the natural world.
Sponges redux. And now, after 10 years of absence, the sponges reappeared. I had taken my son Matt and his young family out for a Potomac afternoon of getting wet and muddy. As we were preparing to leave, Matt casually remarked, “Hey Dad, isn’t that one of those sponges you told me about”? I was astounded.
We were in a little cove, its water murky from the silt we kicked up boarding the canoe. But we could still make out the bottom and its tufts of algae, dead leaves, and smoothed river stones. And the sponges, a whole colony of them.
By now everyone was settled in the canoe and clearly anxious to be on their way. I snapped off a couple of more photos, and off we went. I would return as soon as I could to spend some quality time with these long lost creatures.
One last encounter. Now here I was by myself, paddling hard through the rain and the weeds and around the rock ledges. I heard some distant rumbling to the west, imagining that Hurricane Ida was already arriving. It turned out to be aircraft making their approach to Dulles Airport, some of them probably carrying Afgan refugees. Most of the world was focused on the Afgan evacuations, or the hurricane, or covid-19. My mind was on sponges.
I angled across the river heading for a gravel bar, a spot where you can still find remnants of the canal that George Washington built to skirt the rapids. I wondered if Washington also saw the sponges. Would he have cared?
The gravel bar was already occupied by an increasingly agitated flock of Canada geese. They bobbed their heads and honked and cackled and pooped and then took to the air, flying low over the water, still honking and pooping.
I pulled my kayak up on the shore, picking my way around the piles of goose droppings. The water was a little discolored, but clear enough to see.
The trickster returns. But there was nothing to see. The sponges had vanished, once again gone without a trace.
I was disappointed, but at the same time intrigued. No doubt about it. Here was Patowmack the Trickster at work once more.
What happened? I had read somewhere that ducks will eat sponges. I’d guess that geese eat a lot of the same things as ducks. I imagined a flock of geese coming upon a colony of sponges, and in no time devouring them all—but with an exception. For along with the sponges the geese also pick up the sponges’ gemmules, those tiny spherical reproductive bodies. The geese fly off and land somewhere else, always honking and pooping, and depositing the gemmules. If the current is swift, the gemmules just become part of the organic soup that washes downstream to who knows where. But if the geese land in some protected cove or back water, the gemmules could produce a new colony of sponges come next season.
I later asked my son Matt what he thought of my scenario. After all, he was the one who found the sponges. He also has a doctorate in ecology, so he should know about such things.
Matt listened politely to me, and then came up with a more prosaic explanation. The sponges looked pretty shopworn, he remembered, and they smelled bad. Later he had to wash his hands over and over to get out the stink. Probably the sponges were just dying, he said. Their season had come to an end, like the leaves starting to fall from the trees or mushrooms turning black and slimy. The bits and pieces of their bodies—including the gemmules—those tiny time capsules—probably lay among the algae and dead leaves in that same little cove. With any luck, the gemmules could produce another colony when the conditions are right. I later learned that scientists describe this stage in the sponge’s life cycle as “gemmulation and degeneration.”
River keeps its secret. I like both explanations. I like mine because it illustrates the lengths the human imagination will go in finding a cause for anything and everything, even in the absence of any real evidence. The more complex the cause, even if it enters the realm of the conspiratorial, the greater its allure. Taken to the extreme, a search for causes could inspire elaborate myths and liturgies and the creation of priestly hierarchies. (If it seems like I’m straying a little far from a pooping goose, blame Potowmack the Trickster.)
In contrast, Matt’s explanation looked at the disappearance of the sponge from the standpoint of the sponge. The life cycles of natural creatures operate independently of our assumptions and expectations. It’s the creatures that are calling the shots, whether we like it or not.
Whatever actually happened in that little cove is the river’s secret, at least for now. I don’t have the persistence to figure it out, and Matt is mainly focused on getting tenure.
Let’s just call it a thought experiment. We can name it Schrödinger’s Sponges. It’s as if the sponges were locked away in a box, just like the famous physicist’s imaginary cat. Is the cat dead or alive? Unless we open the box to see, it occupies both states at the same time. The same goes for the fate of the sponges. Until we have data based on observation, all explanations are valid.
I think this would be good problem to leave to some graduate student with a lot of time for research and little interest in public recognition.
Patowmack the trickster 