Sea-level rise talk: Toporagno and the flood

This short story is the first in a collection of three inspired by my master's thesis research on sea level rise narrative futures in the Venice Lagoon: talk, trust, time.

Toporagno went out one day to collect grasses from the high mound of the tidal flat. He plodded up the shallow mucky slope and skirted a pack of friar birds to reach the top where the grasses had remained dry even in the recent stormy days. From this point he could see all the places he had ever known. Across the small channel there was the neighboring salt-flat where his den-brothers lived, and beyond that lay one where the Piovanelli ducks make their nests hidden from the terrifying raptors, and in the far distance he couldn't quite discern some shoreline that he knew was there because of the gulls who come to give news from across the northern lagoon.

To his other side was the humble human city, a busy thing that barely concerned the shrews and their neighbors. Only once in a while would a small rowboat pull onto the lower flats and a tall thin character scrounge about for clams and a bundle of flowers to bring to his home from the barene. Shrews knew how to hide, and anyways the pesky friar birds went flapping off any time a human got near, and this way the most southern residents of the northern reaches were alerted well enough. But today, being a cold and clear November day, Toporagno was unlikely to find any humans on this salt flat. And so it was a day for den maintenance. There was always something to do in the high water season, and Toporagno had been meaning to shore up the paw-paths and the den walls with grasses from the forage grounds.

From the top of the high mound he could also see back to the small place at the edge of the barena, perched just next to a rivulet that supplied them with good water when it rained and the occasional bait fish for a rich meal. Toporagno and his siblings had made a den among the reeds three years back now, and because they had heard good things of the site and of abundant forage around it, others like Garzetta, il Cavaliere, Riccino, Donnola, the Fischioni family, and even a clan of spiders had made neighboring nests in this corner of the lagoon. Naturally, a shared space had emerged out of packed mudbanks and trampled marsh-grass. Toporagno and Donnola had taken the lead in caring for the common bits of the barena, but everyone chipped in when the water trough had to be cleaned, or the old grasses taken down to the waterline so they'd be washed away on the ebb tide, or rebuilding after a flood. The water had never been violent in these reaches, not yet, and with each passing season Toporagno's pride grew in choosing such an auspicious site and knowing his neighbors so well. He cut a few stalks of salicornia and started hauling them back to the dens.

These days they had an existing common square on one side of the main rivulet, connected to the forage grounds with a driftwood-and-grasses bridge. That had been Garzetta's design.  Toporagno admired his friend's work as he crossed over. Visitors always remarked on how sturdy it was, how artfully it wove in with the flowing water, the waving grasses, the coming and going of working residents on the southern flats. Of course everyone knew how to swim and cross the rivulets with the slack tides, Toporagno thought to himself, but it was a well-earned luxury to keep one's paws dry with each crossing. He spent the rest of the day weaving the new salicornia into the den, tossing out the rotted stalks, and sleeping through the cold evening on a feathery nest. 

By the next morning the weather had shifted. No longer a cold still day, a blustery front from the south was warming the air slightly and bringing the perfume of wet woodlands to the lagoon. Toporagno was moving grasses about when the elder Fischioni sister passed by on her way to the back channels, the ghèbi, where the fish hid on turbulent days. "A storm is coming," she remarked with a tone of annoyance in her bill. "As sure as the tides," Toporagno replied with whiskers twitching. He brought the last pieces of new grasses under the overhang of his den, checked that the thatched roof was holding tight, and, as lightning broke on the horizon, laid down the driftwood barrier to shut himself into his home.

What a storm it was! The southern winds brought light rains not much different from any other November squall, but the winds whipped across the long open stretches to the south of the southern flats in ways that no storm had in living memory. As the night came, so did the rising tide, and the residents of this small patch of forage land had never seen it come so high. Garzetta's bridge was washed away by a particularly strong wave. Water leapt up and into almost everyone's den. Garzetta, il Cavaliere, and the Fischioni family flapped over to higher ground. Toporagno's clan, Riccino, Donnola, and the spiders could only wait for the water to recede, which it did after several hours. The fresh-cut grass was soggy and would have to be tossed out at the ebb tide, a day's work wasted. The few stones they kept nearby for cracking seeds all had belts of salt deposits. The seeds themselves were musty, the grass roofs soaked through, and the down nests turned into puddles. A small disaster, thought Toporagno. We'll have to make the whole place right again.

In the days that followed all the residents came back to pick through the damages. The Fischioni parents gave Toporagno's clan rides across to the forage fields so they could cut down grass and gather new feather down bundles from where the friar birds and gulls gathered. By the time they'd gotten their bundles back to the den and chattered between themselves about how to best repair the damage, the other residents had gathered to clear out the thrown driftwood and muck from the common square. The shrews lent their paws to the effort. It was pleasing work to get their home back in shape, and Toporagno found himself thinking of how they would soon watch the sun pass over the calm lagoon.

After midday Cocai, a gull who roosted far to the north, swooped down and asked about the situation. "Nobody lost, nothing ruined," said Toporagno. "It happens, and we get by. This one was exceptional though."

"Winds from the south and a strong tide. It's only by chance that we haven't seen a flood this big in the last three seasons," Cocai reported.

"We moved here three seasons ago."

"There you have it. Although it might be less chance than we think. There's news out of the northeast that the humans have cut off the river there. Completely blocked it! Now it flows into the sea, not the lagoon. Two days ago they made the change for good."

Toporagno had heard about the river, but never saw such a thing in his life. "Why would it matter what they do?" 

The gull cocked his head sideways to look Toporagno in the eye. "The tidal flats are always shifting. Been that way since my grandfather was flying over this place, he told me. It looks like a nice forage place now, but you get up above it and there's no doubt that it's always an island balancing between the river and sea. Who knows why the humans do what they do, but they're playing with the balance. Taking away the river means the sea comes quicker into the lagoon each day. It doesn't have to mix so much with the fresh water. We've been wondering what this might mean for the southern flats."

The ground beneath his paws didn't feel so steady anymore. "What does it mean?" Toporagno asked. 

"I wouldn't build my nest here. It's nice forage, sure, but no place to live. The waves will come again soon because the tides are getting stronger. The lagoon is changing, and before your kids are grown you'll have to move again." Cocai spread his wings. "Why risk it? There are safer places to make a home." He looked at Toporagno with a puzzled expression. Receiving no answer, he beat the air and took off, wheeling back to the north.

The other residents looked around at each other, and then at Toporagno, who was lost in thought. Garzetta was the first to speak in her thin, steady voice. "We might consider putting all our dens and nests up on stilts or some other structure. They would stay above the water when the next flood comes. That way we can keep ourselves dry." She looked at Cavaliere and added, "we wading birds know how to stand above the water."

"Or we could just float on the tide," said the elder Fischioni sister. Toporagno suspected that she ruffled her feathers at the idea of moving her carefully crafted nest onto stilts. "We can help everyone make your nests into lifeboats. When you float, you have no fear of water."

"Not all of us can swim!" Riccino said, puffing up his spines. "I was scared for my life in the flood, spent a night living out all my terrors..." He trailed off, and his spines went down again. "I'm inclined to agree with the gull. We should move away together, find a better place where we don't have to worry about the floods. I'm not so sure if it's the humans or the world telling us to go, but for me it doesn't matter. I can't stay." 

"It's not so bad as that," Donnola chirped. "Look, it's simple, we get some drift logs together and build a wall at the edge of the flats. Why, if we just reinforce the sides of the main channel and a couple other key points, we wouldn't have to worry about floods. Strong levees could help us sleep soundly in our dry dens, and we wouldn't even have to move them this way or that." This speech cheered Toporagno. Maybe there was a way to keep the home we have, with Donnola's weasel know-how. But then he thought about Cocai's advice and his hope started to wilt again.

Wise Cavaliere spoke up, his long legs picking through the debris. "It's a smart idea, Donnola, but it won't last. If the lagoon is really changing like the gull said, some areas are bound to disappear. Keeping out the water might work now, but the walls will fail sooner or later against the waves."

Toporagno was confused. Everyone seemed to have a strong opinion about what to do. The birds can fly here and there to escape from the storm waters. The spiders cannot. The mammals can't either. He couldn't imagine that anything would want to make Riccino stay except maybe a low tree he could climb. Donnola was canny and would find a way to get by even if it meant building a mud-wall around her own den. His own clan, the shrews, had been here for three seasons now and had never considered moving to other parts. And yet, he wasn't so sure that any of the others' ideas could work, After a few minutes more of Donnola's wild ideas – dig channels to divert the flood, or make underground burrows, she suggested – the residents dropped the subject and continued cleaning up the common square in silence.

In the weeks that followed there were major changes on the flat. Garzetta and il Cavaliere re-built their nests on a tall driftwood platform that afforded excellent views of the southern reaches. Everyone agreed it was an elegant structure. The Fischioni family refashioned their nests near the waterline to be buoyant and made a tether to the rivulet bank so that it wouldn't float out into open water. Donnola started to build a low mud wall on one side of the common square, but the shrew and duck kids kept knocking it down by accident when they scrambled down to the water to gather seagrasses and play in the flats. It would be a long project, if it could ever be completed. And a few of the more observant residents whispered their suspicions to each other that the tides were indeed stronger, the ebb taking more of the tidal flat away each day.

Toporagno and his clan didn't do a thing except reassure Riccino that everything would be all right. The hedgehog wanted to call for the gulls to fly him back to his former nest in the northern flats, but no one, himself included, took his idea very seriously. There was talk among the relatives about what to do. Leave it or live with it? they asked in every conversation. The residents liked the place so much, and the younger ones had never known another home. Besides, maybe the flood was an exceptional event. Once every few seasons, even once a season? Not a big deal. Surviving it once means surviving it again.

After each of these intense conversations with his family, rattled by their strong opinions, Toporagno would cross over Garzetta's bridge and go to the high foraging grounds. He harbored a secret desire that maybe all his family could simply move to the small hillock area to avoid the floods. But he also knew that the clan was safer in community with the other residents than they would ever be on their own in these parts. Besides, it was customary that the forage grounds were owned by no one, used by all. Toporagno even wondered if the higher ground would protect them, since the high parts were only slightly elevated above the rest and had almost been swamped by the recent floods, too.

From the high forage grounds Toporagno could see the human settlements on the water stretching off to the north and west. He was jealous of their ability to build such dry dens on the water. They probably don't have to worry every day about the winds and tides wiping out their homes, he thought, and if they do worry it's over what? their paws getting wet. They could learn a thing from the Garzetta and the Fischioni family and their creative adaptations, or maybe they could be as imaginative as Donnola and her designs. Then he remembered what they might have done with the river and convinced himself that maybe they have enough imagination already. He looked back at his own community's grass and wood infrastructure compared to the fortified walls of the human settlement. After thinking for a while, he found one happy thought. If the waves and floods do come back, we can always rebuild in a day or two... We don't have quite as much to lose as those powerful humans, and somehow we're richer for it.

Feeling satisfied in what he thought was a very wise thing to think, Toporagno went home with more dry grasses and down, and made a fresh bed for the shrew kids to nestle into as the sun went down.

That very night, the winds shifted to the south again and the full moon came over the horizon. A clear sky with a few wispy clouds whipped by the wind in long reaches across the long night. From his nest Toporagno heard one of the ducks cry to get out, get out. When he came to the driftwood-blocked entrance he saw the same flood as a moon ago, the same disaster on repeat. The whole clan hurried to the rivulet and jumped into the nest with the Fischioni family, already floating at the same level as the common square, covered paw-deep in water.

Toporagno went on his own to find Donnola and Riccino, who were together trying to bail out water from Riccino's den by the pawful. He called to them, "come now, the water's still rising!" Slowly, with regret, they abandoned their homes and followed Toporagno to the platform that Garzetta and il Cavaliere had made. The stilts were holding well against the choppy water. The birds and their small mammal neighbors huddled together to ride out the storm.

Toporagno, neither dry nor completely drenched, saw the kids tucked in with the Fischioni family below in their floating nests. He thought about the spider clan and hope that that they had found shelter, too. The gull had been right to warn the residents of the southern flats that it would happen again. He looked over at the human settlements that in this weather appeared like low grass dens on mudflats, the rain making them seem more ephemeral than he knew they were.

He looked down and gasped. Down in the rivulet, and now floating over the flooded common square and the forage grounds too, Toporagno saw hundreds of jellyfish pulsing with their own light, a faint twilight glow. Like a blessing, he thought, they come from afar and glide over our underwater home.