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On August 1, 1916, President Woodrow Wilson signed the bill establishing Hawaii National Park as the nation’s 13^th national park.  The original park included three volcanoes—Kilauea and Mauna Loa on the island of Hawaii and Haleakala on the island of Maui.  In 1961, the areas on the two different islands were separated into two parks—Hawaii Volcanoes National Park on Hawaii and Haleakala National Park on Maui.

The park’s features first came to the nation’s attention in the early 1840s, when the U.S. Exploring Expedition landed there as part of a surveying voyage through the South Pacific.  Their report stimulated the beginnings of tourism visits.  Mark Twain experienced Kilauea in 1866, declaring, “Here was room for the imagination to work.”  Although the park was established in 1916, little was done at first to make it accessible or to protect it.  As one congressman quipped, “It should not cost anything to run a volcano.”  Since that time, of course, Hawaii and its parks have become major tourist attractions.  In 2016, nearly 2 million visitors enjoyed Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, making it the 14^th most visited national park in the country.

The volcanoes of Hawaii are extraordinary for several reasons.  First, they are the most active volcanoes in the world, offering a continuous look at the geological forces that created our landscapes.  Second, they are the most gentle volcanoes, spewing lava and ash at a low rate that allows visitors to get close to these processes without endangering their lives (although great caution should be used and all rules and signs should be followed—these volcanoes are dangerous).  The viewing opportunity is spectacular and unique in the world.  The recent eruption of Kilauea is a contemporary example of both of these characteristics.

Third, and most important for ecological reasons, the Hawaiian Islands are the most distant set of islands from a mainland anywhere in the world.  Consequently, the islands have developed a unique biota over 70 million years.  And because the volcanic activity is constantly adding new land and covering over existing lands with new rock surface, the entire area remains in the earliest successional stages, demonstrating nature’s ability to colonize the rawest of the earth’s environment.  Furthermore, Mauna Loa, as the world’s largest volcano, rises to more than 13,000 feet in elevation.  Adding the depth to the bottom of the crater (and additional 18,000 feet) makes this the highest mountain in the world from base to summit—higher by far than Mt. Everest.

The Hawaiian Islands contain 54 federally protected endangered and threatened species.  Among those is the Nene Goose, the state bird of Hawaii and a relative of the common Canada Goose.  But almost everything about the Nene Goose, from reproductive habits to habitat use and distribution, is so different from the Canada Goose that the Nene is critically endangered.  So is the Mauna Loa silversword, a plant that grows on the rocky slopes of the volcano and reproduces just once after decades of growth.  Subject to grazing by feral pigs, the Mauna Loa silversword was at one time down to a few individual plants.  Intense protection inside the park is now bringing the plant back.

Mauna Loa is also remarkable as a site for atmospheric research.  High on the mountain is the federal government’s Mauna Loa Observatory, famous for its continuous monitoring of carbon dioxide levels in the air, a series going back to the 1950s.  It is a perfect site for this work.  Sitting high on the slopes of the volcano, it lies above the inversion layer that can dramatically change surface conditions daily.  Because there is little or no vegetation growing there, the measurements are also unaffected by effects of plant metabolism, either removing or emitting chemicals into the air.  And because it is so far from the mainland, few local pollution sources impact its measurements.

References:

Earth System Research Laboratory.  About Mauna Loa Observatory.  U.S. Department of Commerce, National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration.  Available at:  https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/obop/mlo/aboutus/aboutus.html.  Accessed August 1, 2017.

Hamilton, Dwight.  History of Hawai’i Volcanoes National Park.  National Park Service, Hawai’i Volcanoes National Park.  Available at:  https://www.nps.gov/havo/learn/kidsyouth/park-history.htm.  Accessed August 1, 2017.

HawaiiHistory.org.  Hawai’i National Park established.  Available at:  http://www.hawaiihistory.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=ig.page&pageid=321. Accessed August 1, 2017.

National Park Service.  On the Brink of Extinction:  Paradise in Peril.  Hawai’i Volcanoes National Park.  Available at:  https://www.nps.gov/havo/learn/nature/onthebrink.htm. Accessed August 1, 2017.

National Park Service.  Lieutenant Charles Wilkes.  Hawai’i Volcanoes National Park.  Available at:  https://www.nps.gov/havo/learn/historyculture/lieutenant-charles-wilkes.htm. Accessed August 1, 2017.

In my generation of fisheries biologists, we were all required to read the 1887 paper, The Lake as a Microcosm.  The paper was an early expression of ecological principles—the relationship of organisms to their habitat, the cascading of the food chain, the role of birth rates and death rates in maintaining populations.  The author was Stephen A. Forbes, the father of aquatic ecology.

Stephen Alfred Forbes was born on May 29, 1844, in Silver Creek, a small town in far northwestern Illinois.  He was the son of a farmer, who died when Forbes was just ten years old.  The family was supported thereafter by Forbes’ older brother, who eventually sold the farm to keep the family out of poverty.

When he was 16, Forbes joined the northern army to fight in the Civil War.  Though hardly more than a boy, he rose rapidly to the rank of captain.  He was captured by the confederacy and held as a prisoner of war for six months.  When he was discharged at the end of the war, he attended medical school, but never completed his degree (put off, it is said, by the need to perform surgery without anesthetics).  Instead, he taught school and devoted himself to the study of nature, always his fundamental interest.

In 1872, he took a job as curator of the Illinois Natural History Museum in Bloomington, Illinois.  When the museum was transferred to the state government five years later, he became its director.  During this time, Forbes wrote actively for scientific journals about the natural history of his home state, including some of the earliest descriptions of aquatic invertebrates and an ongoing survey of the biology of the Illinois River.  In all, Forbes published more than 500 articles about natural history.

When the museum was renamed the Illinois Natural History Survey and moved to Champaign-Urbana, Forbes moved with it.  He was also named the state entomologist and became a professor at the University of Illinois—all without any degrees.  That deficiency was corrected in 1884, when the University of Indiana awarded him a doctorate in zoology.  Forbes eventually rose to Director of the Illinois Natural History Survey, from 1917 until his death in 1930.

He was an able administrator, but his great skill was in the field and laboratory.  He reveled in the waters and fields of Illinois and throughout the country.  His capacity for observation led him to understand what few had grasped at the time—nature was a vast complex of relationships among species and their habitats, a “community” and an ecosystem.  The Lake as a Microcosm is a classic because it lays out so many principles of ecology with both scientific accuracy and elegant prose.  Two excerpts demonstrate his understanding.

“If one wishes to become acquainted with the black bass, for example, he will learn but little if he limits himself to that species. He must evidently study also the species upon which it depends for its existence, and the various conditions upon which these depend. He must likewise study the species with which it comes in competition, and the entire system of conditions affecting their prosperity, and by the time he has studied all these sufficiently he will find that he has run through the whole complicated mechanism of the aquatic life of the locality, both animal and vegetable, of which his species forms but a single element.

It is a self-evident proposition that a species cannot maintain itself continuously, year after year, unless its birth-rate at least equals its death-rate. If it is preyed upon by another species, it must produce regularly an excess of individuals for destruction, or else it must certainly dwindle and disappear. On the other hand, the dependent species evidently must not appropriate, on an average, any more than the surplus and excess of individuals upon which it preys, for if it does so, it will regularly diminish its own food supply, and thus indirectly, but surely, exterminate itself.”

Stephen Forbes presided over an era of massive change in the way science considered natural history.  When he began his career, natural history was about collecting artifacts—unusual objects, beautiful specimens of birds, shells and rocks, and exotic species from foreign lands.  Then Forbes and others began seeking to understand the processes that produced such beautiful and wonderful plants and animals.  Then they began using those processes to improve the human condition through agricultural techniques and natural preservation.  And by the time of his death in 1930, natural history had become the science of ecology.

References:

Encyclopedia.com.  Forbes, Stephen Alfred (1844-1930) American Entomologist And Naturalist.  Available at:  https://www.encyclopedia.com/history/historians-and-chronicles/historians-miscellaneous-biographies/stephen-alfred-forbes.  Accessed May 29, 2018.

Forbes, Stephen A.  1887.  The Lake as a Microcosm.  Bulletin of the Scientific Association (Peoria, Illinois) 1887:77-87.  Available at:  http://people.wku.edu/charles.smith/biogeog/FORB1887.htm.  Accessed May 29, 2018.

Howard, L. O.  1931.  Biographical Memoir of Stephen Alfred Forbes, 1844-1930.  National Academy of Sciences, Biographical Memoirs, Volume XV.  Available at:  http://www.nasonline.org/publications/biographical-memoirs/memoir-pdfs/forbes-stephen.pdf.  Accessed May 29, 2018.

John Muir didn’t like organizations of any kind—churches, political parties, clubs, even nations.  Although he lived in the U.S. for most of his life, he never really thought of himself as belonging to the country.  He listed his address as “earth-planet, universe.” He only became a U.S. citizen late in life to obtain a passport needed for international travel (learn more about John Muir here).

He made one exception to his policy of avoiding groups, and he did so in a big way.  On May 28, 1892, Muir joined a small group of fellow Californians to create what is now the largest grassroots environmental organizations in the world—the Sierra Club.

Muir had pondered starting an organization of like-minded wilderness lovers for some time, encouraged by many of his friends.  But he resisted, guided by his firm avoidance of people gathered into groups.  Preserving his beloved Sierra Nevada Mountains, however, proved more powerful than his urge to stay unaligned.  And so, led by J. Henry Senger and a group of students at the University of California-Berkeley, Muir and a few others founded the Sierra Club.

The club’s purpose was “to explore, enjoy, and render accessible the mountain regions of the Pacific Coast; to publish authentic information concerning them; and to enlist the support and cooperation of the people and government in preserving the forests and other natural features of the Sierra Nevada.”  John Muir became the club’s first president, serving until his death in 1914. The club’s charter members numbered 182, many of them scientists.  The club began publishing the Sierra Club Bulletin in 1893, which continues to this day as the magazine Sierra.

Almost immediately, the club began influencing conservation affairs.  It fought successfully against shrinking the borders of Yosemite National Park and for the protection of other western scenic icons—including the Grand Canyon—as national parks and monuments.  Working alongisde John Muir, it lost the fight to protect the Hetch Hetchy Valley in Yosemite from damming, a heartbreak that is often cited as a prelude to Muir’s death (learn more about Hetch Hetchy here).

A major early feature of the club was a series of annual mountaineering excursions.  Originally, it was an “alpine club,” organized around the interests of those who loved to explore the high mountains.  The founders, including Muir, understood that bringing novices into the mountains, for a gentle but authentic experience, would help build public support for conservation.  For years, Muir himself led the annual outings that became a signature of the club.   The Sierra Club has continued this practice, with the goal of getting people out of the city and into nature.  Today, the club sponsors more than 20,000 outings per year.

Until the 1950s, the Sierra Club remained largely focused on California and adjoining states.  But with growing national environmental interest, the club expanded its programs to cover the entire nation.  In 1951, the club restated its purpose, now with the intent “to explore, enjoy and preserve the Sierra Nevada and other scenic resources of the United States.”  Under the entrepreneurial leadership of David Brower, the club began a long-term relationship with wilderness photographer Ansel Adams, producing books, calendars and other artworks (learn more about Ansel Adams here).  Now, the beauty of nature could travel to the homes of the nation, as well as the nation travelling to them.

The club has since become the largest and most well-known environmental organization in the world.  It counts 3 million members and supports in 64 local chapters located across the U.S. and around the world.  The club’s headquarters remain in San Francisco, but in 1963 it opened an office in Washington, DC, to allow access to federal agencies and lawmakers.  The club has taken on a broader environmental agenda, recognizing that pollution was as big a threat to nature as was direct development.  The club continues to lobby for land protection, but also for clean air, clean water, and reduction of our dependence on fossil fuels.

References:

Cohen, Michael P.  1988.  The History of the Sierra Club:  1892-1970.  Sierra Club Books.  Excerpt available at:  https://vault.sierraclub.org/history/origins/.  Accessed May 28, 2018.

Encyclopedia Britannica.  Sierra Club, American Conservation Group.  Available at:  https://www.britannica.com/topic/Sierra-Club.  Accessed May 28, 2018.

Sierra Club.  About the Sierra Club.  Available at:  https://www.sierraclub.org/about.  Accessed May 28, 2018.

We revel in the glory of the African elephant, giant panda or Galapagos tortoise—the charismatic megafauna that gets most of our attention, whether on television or at the zoo.  But I think the group that deserves the award as the world’s number one animal group—perhaps we should call them the charismatic omnifauna—are the birds.

We all love birds.  According to the 2011 Survey of Fishing, Hunting and Wildlife-Association Recreation, about 50 million Americans feed or observe birds at their homes, spending billions of dollars on bird feeders, sunflower seeds and suet.  USA Today reports that eagles are the most common mascots of high school and college sports teams, virtually lapping the mascot in second place (tigers).  I won’t bore you with more statistics—suffice it to say that only a bird-brain wouldn’t agree that birds are the greatest.

One dedicated bird-lover was Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.  On this day, May 27, in 1784, Mozart went to the contemporary Viennese equivalent of a pet store.  He was amazed by a bird that sang a variation on a work that he had just completed—Piano Concerto in G, K. 453—under the utmost secrecy.   Bird behaviorists Meredith West and Andrew King have suggested that this particular bird probably had heard snatches of the folk tune on which Mozart’s concerto was patterned, but Mozart, known as a skillful and absent-minded whistler, might have stimulated the bird to respond.  He bought the bird, a European Starling, and for the next three years, it was his companion and muse.  When his pet died, Mozart mourned as if for a human—a funeral procession accompanied the grieving composer to the graveyard, sang hymns and listened to an elegy Mozart wrote for the occasion (“He was not naughty, quite, But gay and bright, And under all his brag A foolish wag…”).

This day marks the birthday of another important bird lover—Rachel Carson was born on May 27, 1902.  Carson started watching birds early and continued throughout her life, whether at the bird feeder in her backyard or on a Pennsylvania overlook as the annual hawk migration passed by.

Carson’s love of nature expressed itself in her twin loves of science and writing.  For decades she nurtured the two loves simultaneously, becoming a leading scientific editor for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and a nationally acclaimed nature writer.  But when her third book, The Sea Around Us, hit the New York Times best-seller list and stayed for 86 weeks, her fate was decided—she quit her government job and became a writer, full-time.

Her next book, and her last, is the classic for which we universally praise Carson, Silent Spring.  She began the book with a fable that laments the loss of bird song:

“On the mornings that had once throbbed with the dawn chorus of robins, catbirds, doves, jays, wrens and scores of other bird voices there was now no sound; only silence lay over the fields and woods and marsh.”

The cause of this silence?  The wanton aerial spraying of pesticides, whose impact Carson detailed in the body of the book.  Her perseverance to get to the bottom of this problem and share it with the world, even as she gradually succumbed to breast cancer, has made our world immeasurably healthier and more beautiful.  And through the book, Carson became the acknowledged prophet of the modern environmental movement.

So, as May nears its end and summer is about to begin, let us praise the sounds that fill our lives with beauty and joy, and thank Rachel Carson and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart for bringing them to us.

References:

Nielsen, Larry A.  2017.  Nature’s Allies—Eight Conservationists Who Changed Our World.  Island Press, Washington, DC, 255 pages.

West, Meredith J. And Anddrew P. King.  1990.  Mozart’s Starling.  American Scientist 78(2):106-114.  Available at:  http://www.indiana.edu/~aviary/Research/Mozart%27s%20Starling.pdf.  Accessed May 28, 2018.

In the United States, wildlife belongs to the state in which it lives.  And the individual states have the authority to regulate the management of that wildlife.  Before 1900, unscrupulous hunters took advantage of a legal loophole by poaching animals in one state and then moving them to another state where the harvest and sale of the animals was legal.  States were helpless to control the change in jurisdiction because they could not regulate interstate commerce.

Until 1900, that is, when the Lacey Act became federal law.  John Lacey, an Iowa congressional representative, was concerned about the effect of dwindling wildlife and the importation of exotic species that became agricultural nuisances.  He introduced a bill to control both.  The bill, known as the Lacey Act of 1900, passed congress in late April and President William McKinley signed it into law on May 25, 1900.  The Lacey Act became the first federal wildlife regulation.

And it has remained one of the most effective conservation laws in history.  The law made illegal the interstate commerce of wild animals or their parts if killed in violation of a state law.  No longer could poachers kill protected animals in one state and sneak them into another state where their possession and sale were legal.  Coupled with state laws that made market hunting illegal within an individual state (which most states enacted soon after this), the Lacey Act effectively stopped market hunting in the United States.

The Lacey Act has been amended many times over its century of implementation.  It now covers not only wild birds and mammals, but also fish and other aquatic organisms, plants and any wildlife taken in violation of international laws.   The most pertinent section of the law reads in part as follows:

“It is unlawful for any person – (1) to import, export, transport, sell, receive, acquire, or purchase any fish or wildlife or plant taken, possessed, transported, or sold in violation of any law, treaty, or regulation of the United States or in violation of any Indian tribal law; (2) to import, export, transport, sell, receive, acquire, or purchase in interstate or foreign commerce – (A) any fish or wildlife taken, possessed, transported, or sold in violation of any law or regulation of any State or in violation of any foreign law; (B) any plant taken, possessed, transported, or sold in violation of any law or regulation of any State; or (C) any prohibited wildlife species (subject to subsection (e) of this section);….”

Other parts of the law regulate the marking of wildlife so that the origin can be confirmed; define that guides are subject to the law; regulate importation of various species considered ecologically dangerous; and outlaw “animal terrorism,” meaning attempts to interfere with businesses that use or trade legally in animals.

As the Lacey Act has been enlarged and amended, it has become more controversial, challenged many times in judicial appeals.  While most Americans endorse the protection of wildlife, they are less united on the law’s use for plants, particularly for commercial wood.  Recently, raids on the Gibson Guitar Company for their presumed illegal use of endangered wood raised the specter that the Lacey Act was inappropriately used to attack a long-standing American company and their beloved product—the Gibson guitar.  Similarly, the flooring company Lumber Liquidators recently paid a $13.15 million fine and received a five-year probationary sentence for use and mislabeling of imported endangered woods, believed to be the largest criminal penalty ever levied through the Lacey Act.

Despite legal challenges and regularly required clarification of how and when the law can be used, the Lacey Act has been the salvation for wildlife within the United States.  In his extensive review of the Lacey Act in 1995, legal analyst Robert S. Anderson ended this way:

“Addressing his House colleagues in 1900, Congressman John Lacey said, ‘There is a compensation in the distribution of plants, birds, and animals by the God of nature. Man’s attempt to change and interfere often leads to serious results.’ He acted on these sentiments by introducing a brief statute that created little stir during its initial consideration and remains somewhat obscure, even among environmentalists, almost 100 years later. Though Lacey is rarely ranked with notable conservationists such as John Muir and Aldo Leopold, his legacy remains vibrant and effective today in the form of a law that is arguably our nation’s most effective tool in the fight against an illegal wildlife trade whose size, profitability, and threat to global biodiversity Lacey could probably not have imagined.”

Three cheers for the conservationist of the day, John Lacey!

References:

Anderson, Robert S.  1995.  The Lacey Act:  America’s Premier Weapon in the Fight against Unlawful Wildlife Trafficking.  Public Land and Resources Law Review, 16:29-85.  Available at:  https://scholarship.law.umt.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1199&context=plrlr.  Accessed May 25, 2018.

Larkin, Paul.  2012.  The Lacey Act:  From Conservation to Criminalization.  The Heritage Foundation.  Available at:  https://www.heritage.org/report/the-lacey-act-conservation-criminalization.  Accessed May 25, 2018.

U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.  Lacey Act.  Available at:  https://www.fws.gov/le/pdffiles/Lacey.pdf.  Accessed May 25, 2018.

Wisch, Rebecca F.  2003.  Overview of the Lacey Act (16 U.S.C. SS3371-3378).  Animal Legal & Historical Center, Michigan State University.  Available at:  https://www.animallaw.info/article/overview-lacey-act-16-usc-ss-3371-3378.  Accessed May 25, 2018.

The story of bison (Bison bison) conservation is usually told from the United States perspective, but a Canadian version closely parallels the U.S. experience.

The bison was once the most abundant large herbivore of the North American continent, with vast herds of 30-60 million animals living from the Gulf of Mexico to northern Canada.  As humans settled the lands, converting forests and prairies to farmlands and towns, they exterminated bison populations.  The grasslands of the Great Plains, in the U.S. and Canada, remained the last available habitat for bison.

Bison played an important ecological role in those grasslands.  They grazed the vegetation as they roamed over large areas.  Dispersing seeds as they went, bison continually renewed the floral community.  A diverse faunal community thrived in the grasslands, with hundreds of bird species and dozens of small mammals.

But the Great Plains proved no impediment to the onslaught of human settlement.  Enabled by a growing network of railroads, cattle ranchers drove out bison herds and farming uprooted the sod.  Ruthless hunters shot every animal they could, shipping enormous quantities of hides and bones to booming east-coast markets.  Soon, bison were nearly gone, reduced to a few hundred individuals in isolated herds.  By 1881, Canada considered bison extirpated.

The folly of bison mis-management, however, was soon replaced by efforts at restoration.  In 1907, Canada established a pure bison herd of about 700 animamls at Elk Island National Park, near Edmonton, Alberta.  That herd has been the source for bison reintroduction since then, not only in Canada, but also around the world.

Grasslands National Park was a “natural” for bison reintroduction.  The park is in southern Saskatchewan, just north of the international border with Montana.  The park ecosystem is a short-grass prairie, subject to strong winds, harsh and variable climate, and long periods of drought, and with vegetation historically maintained by large herbivores—namely prairie bison.

The reintroduction project began in December, 2005, when 71 animals were translocated from Elk Island to Grasslands.  They were kept in a 40-acre enclosure for the winter, to allow the animals to acclimate to their new home.  On May 24, 2006, the bison were released to roam freely in the park’s 70-square-mile West Block.  For the first time in 120 years, bison had rejoined the natural ecosystem.

The herd has thrived.  In 2015, it was thinned and now numbers over 300 adult animals.  Parks Canada has followed the successful Grasslands reintroduction with a similar project in Banff National Park.  Sixteen bison were translocated to Banff from Elk Island in 1917, where they are being held for release into the wild during later 2018.  Bison populations now exist at seven Canadian national parks, including both subspecies of plains and wood bison.

The IUCN classifies the bison as a “near-threatened” species, as populations are still low, many are hybrids with cattle, and many carry chronic diseases.  Wild, disease-free populations exist only in a few protected conservation areas and number fewer than 5,000 individuals.  Despite these ongoing worries, however, like so many wildlife species that had been nearly gone a century ago, the bison is on the way back—in the U.S. and Canada.

References:

Defenders of Wildlife.  Basic Facts About Bison.  Available at:  https://defenders.org/bison/basic-facts.  Accessed May 23, 2018.

Parks Canada.  2017.  Bison Reintroduction.  Available at:  https://www.canada.ca/en/parks-canada/news/2017/02/bison_reintroduction.html.  Accessed May 23, 2018.

Parks Canada.  Grasslands National Park Bison update.  Available at:  https://www.pc.gc.ca/en/pn-np/sk/grasslands/visit/visit7.  Accessed May 23, 2018.

The United Nations has designated May 22 annually as the International Day for Biological Diversity.  The day commemorates the day on which the UN Convention on Biological Diversity was adopted in 1992 in Nairobi, Kenya.

Biological diversity, as we all know, is of tremendous importance.  Our lives depend on it in dozens of ways, from providing our food to cleaning our air and water and providing us recreation and inspiration.  However, as we all also know, biodiversity is generally sacrificed to the more direct and immediate demands of the economic system.

The creation of the Convention on Biological Diversity was a giant step forward in recognizing and valuing those aspects of nature’s bounty that typically lie outside the economic system.  The Convention actually entered into force on December 29, 1993, after it had been ratified by at least 30 nations.  Today, 196 countries are parties to the convention, including the European Union (adding 28 countries to the list).  The U.S. is one of only a handful of countries that has not joined the convention, despite being a leader in its origin and content.  The U.S. acts in accordance with the convention, but the Senate has never taken up the necessary action to ratify U.S. commitment.

The convention proclaims that “conservation of biological diversity is a common concern of humankind,” and it lists three specific objectives as “the conservation of biological diversity, the sustainable use of its components and the fair and equitable sharing of the benefits arising out of the utilization of genetic resources….”

The value of biodiversity is enormous.  At least 40% of the world’s economic productivity relies directly on biological resources; in developing countries, that percentage is much higher.  Estimating the economic value of biodiversity as a proxy for its total value has been covered in thousands of analyses.  A 2012 paper lists 1350 individual valuations, covering 22 different ecosystem services across 10 biomes.  Total average economic value, in international-dollars/hectare/year, ranges from a high of $352,000 for coral reefs to a low of $491 for the open ocean.  The second highest value exists in coastal wetlands, at just under $194,000.

A worthwhile side note:  The UN celebrates the International Day for Cultural Diversity on May 21, the day before their biodiversity day.  The juxtaposing of these days may be a coincidence, but their relationship is real.  As Gro Harlem Brundtland so famously noted, environmental sustainability is one leg of the three legged stool of global success, along with freedom from want and quality public health.

Despite its increased profile, biodiversity remains under great stress.  In its latest global report, the Convention on Biological Diversity notes the status of 55 target elements from the 2011-2020 strategic plan.  Of those 55, only 5 are on track for reaching their targets by 2020.  Among those five, the only substantive goal is protecting 17% of the earth’s land and freshwater ecosystems.

So, biodiversity conservation has a long journey ahead of it.  The International Day for Biological Diversity is one way to keep the importance of this work in the public eye.  A new theme is selected each year.  In 2018, the theme is “Celebrating 25 Years of Action for Biodiversity.”  Let’s hope that in 25 more years, there will be much more to celebrate.

References:

Convention on Biological Diversity.  1992.  Convention on Biological Diversity.  Available at:  https://www.cbd.int/doc/legal/cbd-en.pdf.  Accessed May 22, 2018.

Convention on Biological Diversity.  Global Biodiversity Outlook 4.  Available at:  https://www.cbd.int/gbo/gbo4/publication/gbo4-en.pdf.  Accessed May 22, 2018.

Convention on Biological Diversity.  International Day for Biological Diversity 2018.  Available at:  https://www.cbd.int/idb/2018/.  Accessed May 22, 2018.

de Groot, Rudolf et al.  2012.  Global estimates of the value of ecosystems and their services in monetary units.  Ecosystem Services 1(1):50-61.  Available at:  https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2212041612000101.  Accessed May 22, 2018.

The Rio Grande is one of North America’s great rivers, travelling 1885 miles from headwaters in Colorado, through New Mexico and forming the border between the U.S. and Mexico for more than 1200 miles in Texas.  Yet, because of extensive water withdrawals, in many years, the Rio Grande dries up before it reaches the sea.

To bring order to water withdrawals between Mexico and the U.S., the two countries have entered into water-sharing agreements.  The first was signed on May 21, 1906.  It requires the U.S. to provide Mexico with 60,000 acre-feet of water annually from the upper region of the watershed. That water generally comes from Elephant Butte Reservoir, in central New Mexico, which is a major water-storage impoundment providing water for irrigation and municipal use in New Mexico and the El Paso-Juarez region.  The river often stops flowing south of Elephant Butte because the water is all allocated and withdrawn, leaving none for the channel itself.

The second agreement was signed in 1944.  It allocates water from the lower region of the river, downstream of El Paso.  This treaty requires Mexico to provide 350,000 acre-feet of water to the U.S. from its tributaries annually; the U.S. does not have to provide any water from its tributaries to Mexico.  The river often also dries up in this region because of water withdrawals, and often is empty when it reaches the ocean.  Because of the use of water, the Rio Grande is often considered two rivers, upstream and downstream, rather than one.

The Rio Grande is a good example of a reality that is common around the world.  Rivers often form the borders between nations, and, therefore, their watersheds and water flows are shared among nations.  According to the UN, nearly half of the earth’s surface is in watersheds shared by two or more countries, through a total of 263 rivers and lakes that serve as national borders.  Transboundary waters, as they are called, involved 145 nations.

Often, rivers connect many more than two nations.  Nineteen water basins are shared by more than five countries, including the Congo, Nile, Rhine and Zambezi.  The Danube, which runs through central Europe, flows through 18 countries!

As Mark Twain famously said, “Whiskey is for drinking, water is for fighting.”  To avoid fighting, more than 3600 treaties, conventions and other agreements have been negotiated to allocate the water in shared watersheds.  Today, most countries deal peacefully with their neighbors about water, even when they may engage in violent and long-running contests over other issues, such as religion, immigration or borders.  The UN cites that the last half-century has seen only 37 aggressive disputes over water, while 150 treaties have been signed.  Consequently, an entire discipline has developed in international affairs to address water-sharing concerns—water diplomacy.

Water, as we know, is the most valuable resource.  And nations, even warring nations, understand that their short-term and long-term existence depends on the orderly and rational allocation of the water that nature makes them share.

References:

Carter, Nicole T. et al.  2017.  U.S.-Mexican Water Sharing :  Background and Recent Deveopoments.  Congressional Research Service.  Available at:  https://fas.org/sgp/crs/row/R43312.pdf.  Accessed May 21, 2018.

International Boundary & Water Commission.  Treaties Between the U.S. and Mexico, Convention of May 21, 1906.  Available at:  https://www.ibwc.gov/Treaties_Minutes/treaties.html.  Accessed May 21, 2018.

Rister, M. Edward  et al.  2001.  Challenge and Opportunities for Water of the Rio Grande.  Journal of Agricultural and Applied Economics 43(3):367-378.  Available at:  https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/bitstream/113529/2/jaae433ip6.pdf.  Accessed May 21, 2018.

United Nations.  International Decade for Act ‘Water For Life’ 2005-2015.  Available at:  http://www.un.org/waterforlifedecade/transboundary_waters.shtml.  Accessed May 21, 2018.

The European Community chose, in 2008, to designate May 20 each year as a day to celebrate the importance of seas and oceans to the European people.  By that action, the combined nations of Europe recognized that Europe is as much a maritime continent as a land continent.

Consider these facts about the relationship of Europe to its coasts and marine environments.  23 of the EU’s 28 nations have a coastline.  Europe has 70,000 km of coastline in all, bordering the Mediterranean, North, Baltic, Norwegian and Black Seas.  That coastline is seven times as long at the U.S. coastline and 4 times as long as Russia’s.  Almost half of Europe’s population lives in maritime regions, and 40% of the GDP comes from there.  Europe’s maritime region is the largest of any nation in the world.  In fact, Europe controls more marine territory than terrestrial territory!

However, that marine territory, although still highly productive, is not in good shape environmentally.  About two-thirds of marine habitats and one-quarter of species conditions were deemed “unfavorable” by the EU in its latest report on ocean conditions.  Invasive species are on the rise, with 320 new non-native species observed since 2000.  Half of commercial fish stocks in European waters are fully or over-exploited, and fish catches have been declining over the past decade.  Marine pollution continues to grow, with increasing worries about noise from shipping, renewable energy development and oil drilling.  Plastic litter is also being recognized as an emerging issue, with most litter originating from land-based activities.

As a consequence, the EU has enacted an Integrated Marine Policy, or IMP, to govern uses and conservation of marine areas.  The first objective of the IMP is “maximizing the sustainable use of the oceans and seas….”  The objective includes efforts to reduce and adapt to climate change and reduce all forms of pollution.  For fisheries, the objective includes eliminating discards of unwanted catches; outlawing harmful fishing practices; reducing illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing; and developing aquaculture that does not threaten wild fish stocks or create localized pollution.

The EU has also increased the pace of creating marine protected areas.  Nearly 8000 protected sites exist, covering almost 6% of the total marine area.  More than half of that area is in the Baltic and Mediterranean Seas.

European Maritime Day is one effort to raise the profile of marine conservation and to focus leaders annually on marine issues.  Each year, a new theme is covered during a major conference held at rotating sites around Europe.  The theme for the 2021 virtual meeting is “A green recovery for the blue economy.”

References:

European Commission.  European Maritime Day.  Available at:  https://ec.europa.eu/maritimeaffairs/maritimeday/en/about-emd.  Accessed May 18, 2018.

European Commission.  Maritime Affairs—Facts and figures.  Available at:  https://ec.europa.eu/maritimeaffairs/documentation/facts_and_figures_en.  Accessed May 18, 2018.

European Environment Agency.  2015.  Europe’s seas:  productive, but not healthy or clean.  Available at:  https://www.eea.europa.eu/media/newsreleases/europe2019s-seas-productive-but-not.  Accessed May 18, 2018.

European Environment Agency.  2015.  Marine protected areas in Europe’s seas.  Available at:  https://www.eea.europa.eu/publications/marine-protected-areas-in-europes.  Accessed May 18, 2018.

European Parliament.  The Integrated Maritime Policy.  Available at:  http://www.europarl.europa.eu/atyourservice/en/displayFtu.html?ftuId=FTU_3.3.8.html.  Accessed May 18, 2018.

European Union.  2008.  Joint Tripartite Declaration Establishing a “European Maritime Day.”  Available at:  https://ec.europa.eu/maritimeaffairs/maritimeday/sites/mare-emd/files/20080520_signed_declaration_en.pdf.  Accessed May 18, 2018.

When you walk into Chicago’s Field Museum of Natural History, you are met by two gigantic African elephants, locked in battle.  When you walk around the mammal hall at the American Museum of Natural History in New York, you see a series of magnificent displays of African wildlife in natural settings.  Whenever you observe a diorama of a natural history scene anywhere, you are witnessing the legacy of Carl Akeley.

Carl Ethan Akeley was born on May 19, 1864, in Clarendon, New York (died in 1926).  He cared little for the work of the family farm, but fell in love with animals and was intrigued by the possibility of preserving them after they died.  At 12, he stuffed his first specimen, a friend’s canary—he wanted to bring her comfort by preserving the animal so it could continue to be with her.  He never was far from taxidermy for the remainder of his life.

After leaving high school, he moved to Rochester and began work for Ward’s Natural Science Establishment, which collected and prepared specimens for museums.  Akeley quickly learned the trade, but disparaged it, calling the current practice as the “upholsterer’s method of mounting animals.”  Skins were stuffed with sawdust, cotton and straw into the vague shape of an animal, sewn together and dropped on their straightened legs.

His big break came when P.T. Barnum asked Ward’s to preserve the memory of the famous elephant, Jumbo, which had been killed in a railroad accident.  Akeley and a colleague, J. William Critchley, worked for five months on the project, creating a new style of taxidermy.  They built up the body from bones or wooden and steel elements, sculpted the elephant’s body in clay, sprayed it with wet cement, and stretched the skin over it, making a realistic and gigantic mount.  A new, naturalistic era of taxidermy began.

Two years later, Akeley moved to the Milwaukee Public Museum and began making realistic dioramas of animals in their natural habitats.  His success there led to his employment by the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago in 1896.  While there, he made several trips to Africa to collect specimens.  During a trip in 1905, he and his wife, Delia, shot the two elephants that still stand in the central hall of the museum.

But it was his first trip to Africa, in 1896, that made Akeley a bit of a legend.  While shooting what he thought was a warthog, he wounded a leopard.  The leopard charged Akeley, biting him in the hand.  Rather than trying to escape the jaws, Akeley jammed his fist down the leopard’s throat and used his other arm to attempt strangling the animal.  They wrestled to exhaustion, with Akeley finally outlasting the leopard.

In 1909, Akeley moved to the American Museum of Natural History, where he worked for the rest of his life (taken ill on an African expedition in 1926, he died and was buried in Africa).  His approach to taxonomy reached its zenith at the New York museum, now permanently displayed in a series of 28 dioramas in the Akeley Hall of African Mammals.

The secret to his mastery of taxidermy lay beneath the skin.  He was actually a sculptor. He studied animals alive in the field and took careful measurements of the animal carcasses.  He also was a sculptor, creating life-sized pieces in bronze (a pair still stand in the central hall of the American Museum of Natural History).  He was an inventor, also, with dozens of patents.  One was for an improved motion-picture camera that replaced the bulky machines he had to take to Africa on early trips.  Another was a cement sprayer to cover his clay sculptures that is still used in commercial applications.

Today, killing animals to display them seems barbaric, but when Akeley began working, it was considered an act of conservation.  Africa was being rapidly developed by colonial nations, and African wildlife was disappearing at astonishing rates.  Neither zoos nor photography were considered adequate to educate the public about wildlife, but museum dioramas could serve that purpose. Fearing the extinction of African species before the developed world could see or study them, museums took the desperate step of hunting them.  So, like Audubon a century before, Akeley and his colleagues shot rare and precious animals and brought their remains back to the great museums of the world.

But Akeley realized that more was needed than simply showing people dead animals in artificial settings.  One of his most important taxidermy projects created a display of mountain gorillas, using specimens he shot in the Belgian Congo.  His motives were pure:  “I have been constantly aware of the rapid and disconcerting disappearance of African wildlife. [This] gave rise to the vision of the culmination of my work in a great museum exhibit, artistically conceived, which should perpetuate the animal life, the native customs, and the scenic beauties of Africa.”  But it was also one of his most heart-rending projects.  After wounding an immature gorilla, he said, “I came up before he was dead.  There was a heartbreaking expression of piteous pleading on his face.  He would have come to my arms for comfort.”   Over time, Akeley was haunted by the feeling that he was a murderer.

Observing mountain gorillas in the Belgian Congo, Akeley realized that conserving the habitat of the animals was more important than collecting them.  He worked tirelessly to convince King Albert of Belgium that this portion of the Congo should be preserved for mountain gorillas.  In 1925, the government established a 200-square-mile gorilla sanctuary.  That sanctuary has grown into the 3,000-square-mile Virunga National Park, home to a majority of the world’s remaining mountain gorillas.  Without Akeley’s persistence, most experts believe the mountain gorilla would now be extinct.

References:

American Museum of Natural History.  2016.  The Man Who Made Habitat Dioramas.  Available at:  https://www.amnh.org/explore/news-blogs/news-posts/the-man-who-made-habitat-dioramas/.  Accessed May 17, 2018.

Barclay, Bridgitte.  2015.  Through the Plexiglass:  A History of Museum Dioramas.  The Atlantic, Oct 14, 2015.  Available at:  https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2015/10/taxidermy-animal-habitat-dioramas/410401/.  Accessed May 17, 2018.

NPR.  2010.  Wrestling Leopards, Felling Apes:  A Life in Taxidermy.  Available at:  https://www.npr.org/2010/12/04/131107085/wrestling-leopards-felling-apes-a-life-in-taxidermy.  Accessed May 17, 2018.

The Field Museum.  Carl Akeley.  Available at:  https://www.fieldmuseum.org/about/history/carl-akeley.  Accessed May 17, 2018