Feeling down? Touch some grass.
By: Sahara Ahmed
The first time Amara Cordero truly felt at peace was when she walked through Brooklyn’s Prospect Park on a snowy night in December 2019. She spotted the iced-over Lullwater pond near Quaker Hill, shut off her phone, and stepped toward the frozen Fallkill waterfall.
“Earth in its natural state is what we are, and we’re a part of it,” said Cordero. “Just leaving footsteps in the snow will make you feel more connected to the world than checking social media.”
Ironically, it was the digital world that sparked Cordero’s latest interest: insect documenting. During the COVID-19 lockdown in early 2020, she spent ten months collecting 5-star digital butterflies, moths, and beetles on Animal Crossing. Back then, her proudest find was the Golden Stag, but now it is the Convoluted Gall Wasp she noticed on CSI in 2023 and logged onto the Seek app.
Seek by iNaturalist uses image recognition technology to identify plants and animals from user-uploaded photos. The nonprofit organization’s mission is to sustain biodiversity by motivating people to learn about the nature that surrounds them. The website shares users’ findings with scientific databases including the Global Biodiversity Information Facility.
Cordero discovered the app after moving from Brooklyn to Staten Island for high school. She was used to barely seeing nature unless she visited Prospect Park, but while exploring her gated community, she found a dead bee on the sidewalk that was completely intact.
It was not a rare bug like the ones she had spent hours searching for on Animal Crossing, but a Bruner’s Sweat Bee. Cordero has since logged 126 species on iNaturalist and believes the recent online insult of “go touch grass” holds more truth than people realize. She found that taking a moment to step outside and actively reconnect with the real world makes daily worries less overwhelming.
“Nature is something that came before us and will exist after us,” said Cordero. “You’ll always find comfort in interacting with something outside of yourself.”
Staten Islanders had little choice but to experience the overwhelming power of nature firsthand during the spotted lanternfly infestation of summer 2020. While many were frustrated by the invasive species, Staten Island is home to over 2,655 insect species, many of which Cordero believes people would appreciate if they took a moment to see the beauty in.
For Cordero, nature exists in two states: transformation and imitation. She visited Willowbrook and Clove Lakes Park monthly to observe subtle changes, like caterpillars becoming monarch butterflies and lime-green Luna Moths hatching from cocoons. But she is equally interested in how nature imitates itself, like the Catacanthus stink bug, which appears to have a human face, or the Orchid Mantis, which disguises itself as a flower to attract pollinators as prey.
“It’s the same difference as watching a mukbang video at home or going out to attend a cooking class,” said Cordero. “Viewing the world online may give you information, but seeing living things in their natural habitat is an experience you can feel, touch, hear, and remember.”
