- ANNOUNCER: The Texas Parks and Wildlife Television Series is supported in part by Texas Parks and Wildlife Foundation -- conserving the wild things and wild places of Texas, thanks to members across the state.

Additional funding is provided by Toyota.

Your local Toyota dealers are proud to support outdoor recreation and conservation in Texas.

Toyota -- Let's Go Places.

- NARRATOR: Coming up on Texas Parks & Wildlife... - We're trying really hard to protect the skies and keep the skies dark.

- We have changed tremendously some of this habitat with fire.

- For me, nature is it.

We have disconnected ourselves from nature, and we need to connect ourselves back.

[theme music] ♪ ♪ - NARRATOR: Texas Parks and Wildlife, a television series for all outdoors.

- TARA POLOSKEY: There's something magical about this place.

It's like nothing else.

- BILL WREN: We're trying really hard to protect the skies -- keep the skies dark.

- LARRY FRANCELL: Without the dark skies here, we- we'd be in a world of hurt.

It's beginning to encroach on us.

[soft wind blows] - BILL: The dark skies, the remote locations, the high elevation, the dry climate, and the southerly location all combine to make this an ideal spot for an observatory.

McDonald historically and certainly ongoing today has had a very active public outreach/education program.

Astronomy is an excellent vehicle for science education in the country.

I don't have the technical inclination to be an astrophysicist, the math and the physics stuff escapes me.

The biggest part of my job responsibilities are maintaining the dark skies, keeping the skies dark for the observatory.

[cars passing] "Dark sky" just means the lack of any artificial light sources, anthropogenic light, man-made, human-origin light sources.

It's a relatively recent phenomenon, I mean "light pollution" wasn't a term anybody would have understood a hundred years ago.

And astronomers are kind of like the canaries in the coal mine, we're the first ones to say, "Hey, wait a second.

The skies aren't as dark here as they used to be."

Tens of billions of dollars a year worldwide is just wasted up into the night sky, light that's doing nobody any good whatsoever and is blocking our view of the stars.

[ominous music] One of my earliest memories is watching the moon rise through a pair of binoculars leaned up against a window.

Ever since then I've been fascinated by the night sky and looking through telescopes.

It's going to look like a garage sale in here.

The new upgraded parts are still being attached to the telescope.

There we go.

Yeah, I mean it doesn't even look like a, I mean, I've had people come in here and say, "So where's the telescope?"

You know?

The amount of data collected by the telescope is about to dramatically increase, gathering light from galaxies that are 10, 12 billion light years distant, very faint objects.

We're talking about maybe a dozen or so photons per hour will be collected by the telescope, so if the background sky gets brighter than the faint objects that we're trying to observe, then we lose them, they're lost for observation.

So it's critical that we maintain the dark skies here at McDonald Observatory and West Texas.

It's an amazing project.

It's really remarkable.

Can't wait to get on a star.

- When you say pollution, you don't think of light as being in that category of pollution.

So it's not something you think you're doing wrong.

And when I talk about the dark skies, I try to help people understand how easy it is to preserve them.

All it is is a choice you make at Home Depot... to buy the light that points down instead of points up.

[soft music] [soft music] And doing it here, I think, is important because people can see the dark sky and once people kind of get an idea of what they could have in their backyard, they're more motivated to go and make those right decisions.

- You can come into this community at night and you'll think, "Where'd the power go?"

Because we, as a group, keep our night lights either directed downward or don't use them.

But it's encroaching from other areas, particularly the oil patch in the Permian Basin.

The only way to keep McDonald Observatory working and safe and viable is for dark skies.

- BILL: We've seen the glow along the horizon to our northeast steadily increase.

We are not against outdoor lighting at night, this is not an anti-light campaign.

We're trying to promote good lighting.

First off there are ordinances in place- outdoor lighting ordinances in place in the seven counties that surround the McDonald Observatory that ask, basically, that light be kept on the ground and out of the sky.

Within the seven counties, the Texas Railroad Commission has let right at 5,000 permits in five years to drill for oil and gas, and that's just the drilling, that doesn't take into account all the facilities that go along with oil and gas production, so there are literally thousands of installations within the region that's protected by law to keep the skies dark.

I don't think a single oil and gas operator even knew that there was a lighting ordinance in place.

- LARRY: Our ability to enforce a dark skies-type ordinance thing sort of ends at the county line for us.

There's just so many things we can't do.

We're not talking about enforcement, we're talking about education.

- I've been to probably a dozen major conventions over the past year and a half.

- LARRY: Bill's a great guy.

I mean, he can sell this.

And he does sell this.

And he goes around, and that's what we have to do is to educate.

- BILL: I don't think there's anybody that's insensitive or doesn't care, it's just not a blip on their radar screen.

A lot of them will say, "Well I've never really thought about it before," but once they do it's like, "Well sure, this is a problem that we don't need to have."

If we can just keep the light on their work and out of the sky, problem solved.

- CHRIS HOLMES: Going to a state park in a place away from the city, it's a really majestic feeling.

We're really using state parks as demonstration sites.

We'll just do a tour of the constellations and people can learn a little bit, and then we'll start talking to people about light pollution and how they themselves can help reduce some of the light pollution, because we you do go and see the Milky Way, it's a really inspiring sight.

- Today, Enchanted Rock joins an elite group of park preserves and other conservation areas worldwide as an IDA - International Dark Sky Park.

We look forward to a long and enduring relationship with Enchanted Rock and Texas Parks and Wildlife that will help us keep the stars at night truly "big and bright."

Please accept this award with our compliments.

Congratulations Doug.

- DOUG: Thank you!

- Yeah!

You've done so much.

You've done so much.

[applause] Do people living in urban areas notice that they're missing anything?

Some don't.

But if they've never really seen it, then it's hard to convey the meaning or the value that it might have.

There's nothing quite light getting out under a starry sky and actually seeing it for yourself.

[soothing music] [turkey gobbles] - When I see or hear turkeys, that makes me feel real good.

[turkey gobbles] I love it.

I am Gary Costlow, the chairperson for the Brushy Creek Wildlife Management Association.

This co-op consists of approximately 11,000 acres with around 15 members.

And all this land is tied together, whether it is a small tract or a large tract, everything in this co-op is a piece of what we are trying to do.

[gentle music] - So we will sit here for two minutes.

See if he calls.

If he does not, move on, record different observations.

[turkey gobbles] There is one right there.

- GARY: Yep.

[gobbles] - JASON: There he goes.

[gobbles] There he goes.

That is fun!

As our landscape in East Texas becomes more fragmented, large ranches becoming smaller ranches, it is harder for one individual to provide enough habitat to support a population of wild turkeys.

So that cooperative approach, neighbors working with neighbors, creates a larger landscape.

- And out of the 10,000 acres do you have any clue how much we have actually burned?

- Probably about 2,500 or so.

- So about 25% of it?

Well that is good!

- GARY: We have got people who have been involved in wildlife for years, we have got people who have not been in wildlife, who are greenhorns at it, and sometimes that is the best people to have.

- We have had several of friends come out and help us with burns which is kind of like training them how to do it so yeah, we try to spread it around a little bit and teach people how to do it.

- GARY: Before we started this project, most of the woodlands were so thick, that had to change.

- JASON: One thing that turkeys rely on more than anything else is their eyesight.

They have to be able to see through an area to use it.

So our goal is to get fire on the ground.

[fire crackling] - GARY: We have changed tremendously some of this habitat with fire.

- JASON: Going out on a piece of property, one of the first things I am looking for, if I do not see an area that is been fresh burned like this, I am looking for the sides of those trees.

That black on the tree up three, four, five feet and I think that is a beautiful thing.

What this is going to do with this fire is it's going to create that little low growing woody cover, turkey will get right underneath that, and that is where she is going to lay her nest.

- GARY: They seem to like it here.

There will still be smoke coming up and you will see these turkeys coming into these burns.

I love seeing the turkeys when I am out on the ranch.

It makes me feel like we are accomplishing something when we see it going the way it is supposed to go.

- JASON: This landscape is a place where these landowners have worked together to do something positive for wild turkeys.

- What I have heard my neighbors say is what can I do?

When you hear your neighbor say what can I do, you know you are making progress.

[dramatic music] - NARRATOR: Ralph Waldo Emerson once said, "Every man has his own vocation, talent is the call."

And Clemente Guzman has a talent, a gift.

[dramatic music] His calling is found on canvas... - The sun, the way it penetrate the leaves is just amazing.

For me nature, nature is it!

We have disconnected ourselves from nature, and we need to connect ourselves back to take care of it.

[kids playing] - NARRATOR: One of nine children, Clemente grew up in Doss, Texas.

His granddad, his father, even Clemente and his siblings, they all worked the fields and farmlands of the U.S. as migrant workers.

- CLEMENTE: To be a migrant worker, at first I was ashamed of that, ya know cause man people see you kind of down.

But actually it has made me stronger.

Being able to appreciate, to appreciate life.

[dramatic music] - NARRATOR: Clemente is the artist for Texas Parks and Wildlife.

For 25 years now, he's been working on everything from license plates, to posters, to hunting stamps.

- I need to be looking at it so I'm going to put it right here like this.

- NARRATOR: Today he's just starting on a new project.

[brush strokes on canvas] [tink tink] - Usually what I'll do first, I'll throw some paint in there but it's light, I don't go intense with it.

And kinda sketching it in a way, but with paint.

But I want the gray color to be in kinda like a fuzzy, have like a fuzzy look to it.

That'll make it look like it's far away.

- NARRATOR: He discovered his talent for painting wildlife at an early age.

- My first painting was a sparrow, a painting of a sparrow on a twig.

After that I just, I don't know, I just fell in love with that.

[dramatic music] ♪ ♪ - NARRATOR: This painting of bison will be a cover for an issue of Texas Parks and Wildlife Magazine.

- See right now I'm using a medium sized brush and I'm applying the dark color on there.

I'm about 40% done, I still need to paint the buffalo, the foreground, the painting is still in the loose form.

I'm not into the detail yet.

I can see all the colors working together.

The blues and the oranges, the highlight on the wool of the buffalo.

I think it's going to be a powerful piece.

[red shouldered Hawk calls] When they see my painting and the see the hawk, or they see a raccoon, a fish.

[bird chirps] You know try and show it to you in a way that I saw it.

I hope I can translate the energy that nature has.

Ya know that's just life and life at its best.

- NARRATOR: To keep his creative spirit alive, Clemente takes a break from his work... - CLEMENTE: Ah it's beautiful!

- NARRATOR: ...to get outside.

- CLEMENTE: Ya know we come to work every day, we don't even see this we just go get up, go straight to work and start working and we forget all about this.

And you got to come out here to experience it.

[dramatic music] [water flowing] This little spot is very spiritual to me, it's very full of energy.

Through the little pebbles, the noise of the water, it's just peaceful and relaxing.

And I get all kinds of ideas running through my head, I get a lot of inspiration and I use that inspiration on my art work.

[dramatic music] You always think where does this come from your inspiration for wildlife.

My dad um, I remember my dad telling me a story about he went to work, he's a laborer.

They encountered this possum.

All the workers were like kill it and we can keep on working.

My dad grabbed it by the tail, and released it where the pecan trees are.

And all the workers were like, "Why didn't you kill it."

And he said, "Why?

Its life, animals have a right to live."

[cries] That to me was powerful when he did that.

[dramatic music] It's going really well, I like the colors so far.

Right now I'm working on the final touches.

- NARRATOR: When all was finished, Clemente spent a month on the painting.

- I had a lot of fun working on the fur on the buffalo, the nice warm colors, and the steam coming out of the nostrils.

Also like the transition from the mountains to the buffalo.

- NARRATOR: So in the end, thanks to family, his challenges overcome, his discovered inspiration- Now that talent, his calling, continues.

- I found what I want to do.

I'm happy and everybody needs to search for that.

And I don't know if it's in nature, being a doctor, uh, helping people.

But you need to find what moves you what grabs you, once you find that, there's nothing that can stop you.

- NARRATOR: If you head down a dirt road near Sweeny, Texas, keep your eyes peeled.

Because underneath these towering oaks, slithering below the Spanish moss... are plenty of these guys.

[bongo music] This is Copperhead Country.

- I've dealt with more copperheads than most professionals have, and I'm just a guy that lives in Sweeny, Texas.

[footsteps] - NARRATOR: Lee Hubbard's property is overrun with copperheads.

Common throughout much of the state, these small venomous pit vipers seem to really like Lee's place.

At first he killed the snakes, and after a while, it became too much.

- ANDY: Yep, let's find some!

- NARRATOR: So he called in some help.

- Well, I've received a number of calls over the years, where people had two, three, four, up to 20 copperheads in their yard.

I've never had anybody report 150 copperheads in a season, and it turns out that uh, that's really pretty average around here.

- KRIS: There's one right there.

- ANDY: Hey Kris, first one of the night!

Is this how you normally find them, just here at the base of the tree?

- KRIS: Yep, they sit by the base of the trees waiting for the Cicada's.

- ANDY: There's that classic pit viper head shape, it's not unusual to find copperheads throughout most of Texas, if you look very closely between the eye and the nostril on the upper lip, you'll see some small pits in the scales above the lip, and those are the heat sensing organs.

- NARRATOR: Snake specialist Kristofer Swanson is collecting these copperheads for science.

- ANDY: That's two.

- KRIS: We don't want to hurt these animals.

We're trying to collect them as gently as possible, but because they are in a feeding scenario at this time of night, this time of year, we actually have to chase after 'em.

- ANDY: Oh here we go!

You see one?

- KRIS: Where?

- ANDY: Oh yeah, uh yeah, that's a good size one!

Cool!

And there's that cicada molt, the copperheads here this is what they're eating, they're eating the insects when they come out of the ground and they molt, the snakes feed on them.

- They actually come up and they'll work their jaws all the way over them without an envenomating bite.

They have no purpose to do that, which is why we found their venom very, very interesting, - ANDY: There you go!

- NARRATOR: Scientists believe that a protein found in the venom of copperheads inhibits the growth of cancerous tumors.

For Lee this hit's home, his aunt died of cancer, and the next day, a team started collecting copperheads to help with the research.

- LEE: To find out that day, after burying my aunt the day before, that we could do something and possibly help.

I have two daughters, I have a beautiful wife, so it's personal.

I mean, copperhead venom could save one of my family members.

That's why I do it!

- ANDY: It's just fantastic and here you know we've turned from a landowner who perceived the copperheads on his property as a nuisance or a potential threat.

And now he recognizes them as a potential medical miracle.

It's just great, I couldn't be happier!

[crickets chirp, owl hoots] [crickets chirp] [crickets chirp] [crickets chirp] [crickets chirp] [crickets chirp, frogs croak] [crickets chirp, frogs croak] [crickets chirp, frogs croak] [leaves rustle] [leaves rustle] [leaves rustle] This series is supported in part by Texas Parks and Wildlife Foundation -- conserving the wild things and wild places of Texas, thanks to members across the state.

Additional funding is provided by Toyota.

Your local Toyota dealers are proud to support outdoor recreation and conservation in Texas.

Toyota -- Let's Go Places.