Category: Uncategorized

I’m not sure that there is an entry in the Guinness Book of World Records for time spent sitting in a tree, but if there is, Julia Butterfly Hill would hold it.  Hill occupied a redwood tree in California for 738 days before returning to solid ground!

Hill was born on February 18, 1974, in Mount Vernon, Missouri.  She was the daughter of an itinerant minister and spent her youth traveling the country.  Her family lived in a camping trailer, their camping sites providing Hill with the opportunity to enjoy nature as an everyday experience.  A family story says that on a hike when she was a girl, a butterfly landed on her finger and stayed there for the entire hike.  That was the inspiration for Hill incorporating “Butterfly” into her name.

When she was 22, a drunk driver rammed into her car, and her steering wheel penetrated her skull.  After a year of physical therapy, she was able to walk and talk again normally.  But that event changed her:  “The steering wheel in my head, both figuratively and literally, steering me in a new direction in my life….”  (the parallel with John Muir, who was temporarily blinded by an industrial accident and then gave up a traditional life, is uncanny; learn more about him here).

Hill headed west, with no particular destination.  But when she first saw the redwood forest, her fate was sealed (another page right out of John Muir’s life):

“When I entered the majestic cathedral of the redwood forest for the first time, my spirit knew it had found what it was searching for. I dropped to my knees and began to cry because I was so overwhelmed by the wisdom, energy and spirituality housed in this holiest of temples.”

            She learned about a group of tree-sitters that were protesting the harvest of redwood trees by the Pacific Lumber Company in Humboldt County of northern California.  She joined with them and climbed into a 1000-year-old redwood named Luna.  She stayed up for six days, but that was just a prelude for what was to come.

On December 10, 1997, she climbed 150 feet into the canopy of Luna—and she stayed.  She stayed through personal illness, harassment by company helicopters and security guards, and one of the coldest, wettest, windiest winters on record (John Muir also lashed himself to a tree in a violent storm, just to enjoy the experience).  Hill stayed for more than two years, never leaving her six-foot-square platform.  After 738 days in the tree, she descended, when the Pacific Lumber Company agreed to leave Luna standing, preserve a three-acre buffer around the tree and provide a fund for researchers to study old growth forests.

Hill wrote a best-selling book about her ordeal, The Legacy of Luna, which has been translated into eleven languages.  She created the Circle of Life Foundation to “inspire, support and network individuals, organizations, and communities so together we can create environmental and social solutions that are rooted deeply in love and respect for the interconnectedness of all life.”

Luna remains alive and upright today, guarded by the community conservation group Sanctuary Forest.  A chainsaw attack in 2000 cut a three-foot deep gash in Luna that went part way around the trunk.  With extensive interventions to support the mechanical and biological integrity of the tree, however, Luna continues to appear healthy and growing.

References:

Ecotopia.org.  A Brief Biography.  Ecology Hall of Fame.  Available at:  http://ecotopia.org/ecology-hall-of-fame/julia-butterfly-hill/biography/.  Accessed February 12, 2018.

Julia Butterfly Hill.  About Julia.  Available at:  http://www.juliabutterfly.com/-julia.html.  Accessed February 12, 2018.

Lallanilla, Marac.  2017.  The Life of Julia Hill.  The Spruce, April 4, 2017.  Available at:  https://www.thespruce.com/the-life-of-julia-hill-1708797.  Accessed February 12, 2018.

Sanctuary Forest.  Luna Ancient Redwood Tree.  Available at:  http://www.sanctuaryforest.org/programs/land-conservation/luna/.  Accessed February 12, 2018.

We either love it or hate it.  But either way, we have to admit that statistics is one of the most powerful tools for conservation and environmental science.  The foundation of statistics as we know it today comes largely from the incredible brain of Sir Ronald Aylmer Fischer, born on February 17, 1890 (died 1962).

Fischer was born in London and educated at Cambridge.  He studied physics and biology, but plagued by terrible eyesight, he decided that mathematics was the way he could serve the biological sciences best.  He was such a brilliant mathematician that he generally just read a problem and produced the right answer, much to the displeasure of his teachers. After graduating, he worked for several years as a school teacher, a job he disliked but paid for his daily needs.  While teaching, he published a paper that unified the ideas of Charles Darwin and Gregor Mendel, showing how genetic variation in populations produced the basis for natural selection (learn more about Mendel here).

He began working at the Rothamsted Experiment Station in 1920, performing statistical analysis of agricultural experiments.  This is where and when his contributions as a statistician took off.  He developed the basics of experimental design, famously saying that “To consult the statistician after an experiment is finished is often merely to ask him to conduct a post mortem examination. He can perhaps say what the experiment died of” (and that is why we always have to consult a statistician before we conduct an experiment today!).

He developed  many of the concepts still used in today’s statistical analyses.  He invented analysis of variance, the tool that lets multiple factors be tested in a single experiment.  He also set the standard probability of error at 0.05, still considered the level of certainty needed to accept the results of an experiment.  He wrote several textbooks that became the foundation of modern statistical theory and practice.  Because of his understanding of the variations in populations, he is acknowledged as one of the pioneers of population genetics.

The importance of Fischer’s approach to statistical analysis is profound for conservation.  While statistics is not really needed in physical sciences (gravity always acts the same way), it is in biological sciences because living organisms and complex environments vary in many dimensions beyond those being tested.  Consequently, in order to judge whether the results we see—the impact of a pollutant, the importance of a habitat feature, whether a set of specimens are one species or two—are real, statistical tests are essential.

So, as much as we hate thinking about statistics, performing the tests and interpreting the results according to rigorous standards, that is what transforms conservation from advocacy to science.  Three cheers for R. A. Fischer and for the statistics he burdened us with!

References:

Encyclopedia Britannica.  Sir Ronald Aylmer Fisher.  Available at:  https://www.britannica.com/biography/Ronald-Aylmer-Fisher.  Accessed February 12, 2018.

Famous Scientists.org.  Ronald fisher.  Available at:  https://www.famousscientists.org/ronald-fisher/.  Accessed February 12, 2018.

The Kyoto Protocol was the first global greenhouse-gas limiting treaty enacted by the world’s nations—most of them, at least.  It was the first step in a journey of a many, many miles.  And although it is often criticized, the momentum it added to combating climate change was truly important.

Worldwide efforts to address climate change really began with the 1994 UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, the fundamental strategy to steer emission controlling efforts.  But it needed more, specifically a protocol for how the strategy would do its work.  That became the Kyoto Protocol, which was adopted in 1997.

However, before the Kyoto Protocol entered into force it needed to be ratified by enough countries that 55% of global greenhouse-gas emissions would be covered.  Although 191 countries and one regional group had signed the agreement, the U.S. backed out in 2001, a big blow because the U.S. was then the largest emitter of greenhouse gases.  Eventually, when Russia ratified, the 55% threshold was passed, and the Kyoto Protocol began, on February 16, 2005.

The Kyoto Protocol was a binding treaty that required developed countries to reduce their emissions by 5% over 1990 levels by 2012.  It left out developing countries, including China and India, asking only that those countries try to reduce their emissions.  The agreement allowed individual countries to devise their own means for achieving reductions, but it also added several incentives to get credit toward their goal by helping developing countries reduce emissions.

The protocol has been praised by some and disdained by others.  Because it divided the world into two groups, only one of which—developed countries—was required to reduce emissions, the protocol lacked a universal approach. Because the U.S., and later Canada and Russia, backed out, control of much of the developed world also fell outside the agreement.

Nonetheless, most of Western Europe performed exceptionally under the Kyoto protocol.  Overall emissions there declined by more than 20%, four times the required reduction.  Of course, the countries of Western Europe were and are the most conscientious about controlling climate change, making huge investments in energy conservation, green energy, forest regeneration and fuel switching.

Supporters of the Kyoto Protocol reiterate the idea that every journey starts with the first step and that the protocol was a crucial first step.  It provided motivation for all the actions that individual countries have performed, including the UK Climate Change Act of 2008, and it set a global expectation that responsible governments and industries would work towards emission control.  It also originated many specific ideas for how emissions would be monitored and accounted, including emission trading among nations and regions.

The “son of the Kyoto Protocol” is the Paris Agreement, created in 2015 and entered into force on November 4, 2016.  The Paris Agreement corrects several deficiencies in the Kyoto Protocol, primarily because each of the world’s countries, developed and developing, is now obligated to work toward controlling its greenhouse-gas emissions. And, of course, the world continues to generate new agreements to advance our common ned to battle climate change.

References:

Climate Home News.  2015.  Kyoto Protocol:  10 years of the world’s first climate change treaty.  Available at:  http://www.climatechangenews.com/2015/02/16/kyoto-protocol-10-years-of-the-worlds-first-climate-change-treaty/.  Accessed February 11, 2018.

CNN.  2017.  Kyoto Protocol Fast Facts.  CNN Library, March 24, 2017.  Available at:  https://www.cnn.com/2013/07/26/world/kyoto-protocol-fast-facts/index.html.  Accessed February 11, 2018.

United Nations Climate Change.  A Summary of the Kyoto Protocol.  Available at:  http://unfccc.int/kyoto_protocol/background/items/2879.php.  Accessed February 11, 2018.

United Nations Climate Change.  The Paris Agreement.  Available at:  http://unfccc.int/paris_agreement/items/9485.php.  Accessed February 11, 2018.

On the February 15, 2001, in the science magazine Nature, a group of hundreds of scientists published the complete human genome.  All 14.8 billion base pairs!  This was an enormous undertaking and an enormous success.  And, although this particular feat was about human genetics, the ramifications for conservation are similarly enormous.

The human genome project began in 1990 and ended in 2003, two years ahead of schedule.  We now know the entire sequence of the human genetic code—but as some have said, that was “the end of the beginning.”  Like most major scientific endeavors, the human genome project had many positive outcomes for other parts of science and human endeavor.  The advancement of tools to perform DNA analysis has been a major boon to conservation and environmental sciences.

DNA analysis benefits conservation because finding, capturing, sampling and then releasing organisms unharmed is difficult at best, impossible in many situations.  We know perhaps one-eighth of the world’s species based on traditional means—finding specimens in the wild and bringing them back to the lab.  The pace of finding the rest of those species is excruciatingly slow.

But DNA provides a way to “see” what is living in an environment without actually collecting the specimens themselves.  Because all organisms shed DNA into the environment, through feces, urine, exhalation and decomposition of dead tissue, the soil and water of a place are a treasure store of information.  Called “environmental DNA,” samples of soil or water can be analyzed to profile all the DNA present—and assign it to known standards from specimens previously collected.  If novel DNA is found, that represents species that still need to be identified.

When the totality of environmental DNA in one location is analyzed, it also provides a measure of the amount of biodiversity present.  Therefore, we can determine the location of biodiversity hotspots that need preservation and additional research, without disrupting the habitat or harassing animals that may have complex and sensitive life cycles.

DNA analysis is also making the jump from human crime investigation to wildlife crime.  Poachers often defend themselves by claiming their kills come from other places or other populations where hunting is legal.  But by DNA analysis, the genetics of a poached animal can be compared to a series of standards taken from across the range of a species and the exact source population identified.  This has been used most extensively in Africa, where combating illegal poaching of rhinoceros and elephants is serious business.  Biologists have now taken blood samples from more than 20,000 rhinos, creating a database that law enforcement officials can use to identify the individual rhino from which a confiscated horn or horn product was taken.  Also, the location from where poached African elephant tusks were taken has been mapped using DNA samples to determine where poaching is concentrated and, therefore, where they should focus their enforcement efforts.

The process for using a standard length of DNA as a marker for a particular species or individual is called “DNA barcoding.”  It has also been used in combating the illegal harvest of the endangered rosewood tree in Southeast Asia.  Competing claims about the identification of a logged tree or where it was grown can be solved definitively by comparing a small tissue sample with a set of standards.

The future of conservation and the future of DNA technology are closely linked.  While today we associate wildlife biologists with field workers placing tags on fish and radio transmitters on deer, in the future their partners will be geneticists and DNA technicians!

References:

Arif, Ibrahim A. and others.  2011.  DNA market technology for wildlife conservation.  Saudi Journal of Biological Sciences 18(3):219-225.  Available at:  https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3730548/.  Accessed February 8, 2018.

Hartvig, Ida and others.  2015.  The use of DNA Barcoding in Identification and Conservation of Rosewood (Dalbergia spp.).  PLOSone, September 16, 2015.  Available at:  http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0138231.  Accessed February 8, 2018.

International Human Genome Sequencing Consortium.  2001.  Initial sequencing and analysis of the human genome.  Nature 409:860-921.  Available at:  https://www.nature.com/articles/35057062.  Accessed February 8, 2018.

Kolata, Gina.  2018.  In Africa, Geneticists Are Hunting Poachers.  The New York Times, Jan. 8, 2018.  Available at:  https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/08/science/dna-rhinos-ivory-poachers.html.  Accessed February 8, 2018.

Thomsen, Phillip Francis and Eske Willerslev.  2015.  Environmental DNA – An emerging toll in conservation for monitoring past and present biodiversity.  Biological Conservation 183 (March 2015):4-18.  Available at:  https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0006320714004443. Accessed February 8, 2018.

Venter, J. Craig and others.  2001.  The Sequence of the Human Genome.  Science, vol 291, issue 5507.  Available at:  http://science.sciencemag.org/content/291/5507/1304.full.  Accessed February 8, 2018

It is Valentine’s Day, and I couldn’t resist writing about nature’s faithful lovers.  Besides, other than Captain John Fremont “discovering” Lake Tahoe on this date, nothing else really important in conservation happened on February 14.

Being a faithful lover is one way to say it; being monogamous is another.  Monogamy is highly variable in nature.  It is a life-history strategy that has some advantages, including a reliable and desirable mate, ability for parental care of young and maintenance of resources through time.  It also has some downsides, including reduced reproduction after loss of a mate.  So, species and entire groups of animals have chosen one way or another.

It is common among birds, with around 90% of species mating in pairs.  Sometimes just for one year (serial monogamy), but sometimes for life.  Bald Eagles roam around separately for most of the year, but come together for mating, usually with the same mate for decades.  Swans, though, live together continuously, with the male doing a lot of the household work, including incubating eggs.  The Albatross is picky about mating, sometimes delaying decisions for a few years while looking around for Mr. or Mrs. Right; after that, they are a pair forever.

Mammals, however, aren’t quite so faithful.  Only about 5% of mammalian species are monogamous.  Gibbons are famously faithful, pairing off and staying that way for their entire lifespan, 30 or more years.  But, like humans, they sometimes discover irreconcilable differences and find that its better “the second time around.”  Beavers are more faithful, and they have good reason to be—they spend a lot of time and effort building and maintaining a homestead together.  A dam and lodge need lots of “sweat equity” that the pair puts in together.

Among fish, monogamy is pretty rare.  Most fish are promiscuous to the extreme, often just letting the eggs and sperm loose into the water without so much as a first date.  Australia’s thorny seahorse is different, though, pairing off for life.  It seems that they get better at breeding as they get to know each other better, producing more offspring as the years pass.  The French angelfish is faithful, too, swimming together for years in their coral reef neighborhood.

But my favorite of all is the Black Vulture.  The species is faithfully monogamous, living in pairs throughout the year and for many years; they live up to 25 years in nature.  They have strong families as well, feeding their young for many months and living in communal groups.  If you are related, you are welcome to the roost, but don’t come around if you aren’t part of the clan.  And, of course, Black Vultures, like all their fellow species, are ugly as sin.

Which just proves the old adage:  Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.  Happy Valentines Day!

References:

Cornell Lab of Ornithology.  Black Vulture.  Available at:  https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/black_vulture/lifehistory.  Accessed February 8, 2018.

Frost, Emily.  2013.  Is It Love?  Why Some Ocean Animals (Sort Of) Mate For Life.  Smithsonian, February 13, 2013.  Available at:  https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/is-it-love-why-some-ocean-animals-sort-of-mate-for-life-16907109/?no-ist.  Accessed February 8, 2018.

Green, Amanda.  2016.  10 Monogamous Animals That Just Want To Settle Down.  Mental Floss, February 4, 2016.  Available at:  http://mentalfloss.com/article/55019/10-monogamous-animals-just-want-settle-down.  Accessed February 8, 2018.

Thomas Robert Malthus, a British cleric turned economist, was born on February 13, 1766 (died 1834).  Malthus is famous for a small booklet he published in 1798, entitled An Essay on the Principle of Population as it Affects the Future Improvement of Society, with Remarks on the Speculations of Mr. Godwin, M. Condorcet, and Other Writers.  Originally published anonymously, Malthus later took credit for the work and wrote a continuous string of expansions and updates throughout his life.

In the booklet, Malthus made the fundamental argument that the human species is destined for a recurring series of tragedies—war, famine, disease.  The cause?  Humans (and all species) reproduce so fast that they outstrip the production of resources—chiefly food—to support them.  The consequence of too many people and not enough food is, therefore, tragedy.  This concept—now called Malthusian or Neo-Malthusian—became the centerpiece of environmental thought in the 1960s as ecologists wrestled with worries over a rapidly growing world population.

Malthus grew up in the small market town of Dorking, in southern England.  He was educated at home by his father, until enrolling at Cambridge University’s Jesus College.  He was ordained into the Anglican Church.  He became a professor of “political economy”—the first such post in England—and taught at a college in Hertfordshire, England, for his entire life.  He wrote much about economic theory, most of which was contrary to conventional thought at the time.  For example, while others were suggesting that human life would eventually evolve to a state of perfection, Malthus believed otherwise.  Helping the poor, he thought, would just lead them to have more children, which would produce more poverty.  The obvious endpoint would be famine, disease and strife, leading to a reduction in population through misery—and then the cycle could begin again.

He expressed these ideas in his 1798 booklet, and it found an immediate and sympathetic audience.  However, we remember Malthus today because his message especially resonated when the science of ecology arrived in the 20^th Century.  Ecologists studying populations of animals watched as their numbers grew at exponential rates to high densities, outstripping their food supplies and then ending in massive starvation.  They revived Malthus’ ideas to warn post-World-War-II society that the rapid growth of human populations would end up the same way.  When Paul Ehrlich, the Stanford ecologist, wrote The Population Bomb in 1969, he again popularized Malthus’ view of the human condition.

Fortunately, neither Malthus’ dire view nor Ehrlich’s have come to pass.  With the huge agricultural improvements that we know as the Green Revolution, food supply has grown faster than population (learn more about the green revolution here).  And improvements in standard of living throughout the world have led not to higher population growth rates, but to lower ones.

References:

Encyclopedia Britannica.  Thomas Malthus.  Available at:  https://www.britannica.com/biography/Thomas-Malthus.  Accessed February 12, 2017.

The Victorian Web.  Thomas Robert Malthus.  Available at:  http://www.victorianweb.org/economics/malthus.html.  Accessed February 12, 2017.

Understanding Evolution.  The Ecology of Human Populations:  Thomas Malthus.  University of California, Berkeley, Understanding Evolution website.  Available at:  http://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/article/history_07.  Accessed February 12, 2017

The world of fisheries changed forever on February 12, 1974.  On that day, federal judge George Hugo Boldt issued his decision that Native Americans in the Pacific Northwest owned half the salmon in the rivers.  But that was only half the story.

Native Americans have fished for salmon species in the Pacific Northwest throughout their existence.  The runs of salmon from the ocean up the streams and rivers  provided the sustenance that kept Native Americans well fed year round and later provided a crop that could be sold.  Sites and methods for fishing and traditions surrounding the fishing were handed down from generation to generation.

When the United States began to colonize the region, the government decided that treaties were needed that made the theft of Indian lands legal.  On Christmas Day, 1853, the new governor of the Washington Territory, Isaac Stevens, signed his first treaty with three Indian groups.  The Indians ceded most of their land, but they retained one very important right:  “The right of taking fish, at all usual and accustomed grounds and stations….”

For the next century, that treaty right was not a problem.  Indians fished where, when and how they wished; the rest of the community, both commercial and recreational fishermen, did the same.  But after WW2, salmon stocks began to suffer.  With large dams that blocked spawning grounds, heavy logging that warmed the water and clogged streams with sediment, and greatly expanded recreational and commercial fishing, the entire fishery was in trouble.  Someone needed to be blamed—and Native American fishing became the target.

The State of Washington began harassing Indian fishermen, under the premise that they had to follow the state’s fishing regulations, just like everyone else.  Native American fishermen began to protest, including Billy Frank Jr.  He became a central figure in the fight to assert the Indian treaty rights.  He was arrested first when he was 14 and then more than 50 times for doing what he claimed was his legal right.

Clashes between conservation officers and Indians grew, increasingly attracting outside attention in the civil disobedience era of the late 1960s.  At one encounter in September, 1970, violence erupted, shots were fired, and a bridge was burned.  A federal attorney witnessed the event and decided he had seen enough.  He sued the state of Washington for abridging the rights of the Native Americans.

Judge George Hugo Boldt was assigned the case.  The deliberations lasted until February 12, 1974, when Boldt issued his ruling.  Yes, he said, the Native Americans had a right to fish where, when and how they wished.  No, they didn’t own the 5% of the total catch that they were taking at the time; they owned 50% of the catch.  And—most importantly for the future of fisheries management—they shared co-equal responsibility and authority for managing the anadromous fish populations of the Pacific Northwest.

The State of Washington and its supporters went ballistic.  They burned Judge Boldt in effigy.  They refused to back off their enforcement.  They counter-sued, raising the issue to the U.S. Supreme Court.  The Supreme Court affirmed Boldt’s decision in its entirety, and the state finally accepted that this was their new reality.

The affirmation of fishing rights and the assignment of half the catch to Native Americans are both important, but the other part of the decision—that Native Americans and the states had co-management responsibility—is what changed fisheries management.  Now, the two groups needed to decide together, transparently, how to manage the fish populations.  To do that, they needed to know a lot more about the fish—how many were present, how abundance varied annually, how many could be harvested sustainably.  The age of intensive study of population dynamics began.  Today, because of the Boldt Decision, the Pacific Northwest salmon fisheries are the most studied and monitored in the world.  What they have learned is the basis for most fisheries management theory and practice since.

As a consequence, salmon stocks are recovering and the fisheries continue to serve the needs of Native American fishermen and communities, commercial fisheries and recreational angler.  They even leave a few for the bears!

References:

Crowley, Wald and David Wilma.  2003.  Federal Judge George Boldt issues historic ruling affirming Native American treaty fishing rights on February 12, 1974.  HistoryLink.org Essay 5282.  Available at:  http://www.historylink.org/File/5282.  Accessed February 7, 2018.

Nielsen, Larry A.  2017.  Nature’s Allies—8 Conservationists Who Changed Our World.  Island Press, Washington, DC.  252 pages.

Tizon, Alex.  1999.  The Boldt Decision at 25 – The Fish Tale That Changed History.  The Seattle Times, February 7, 1999.  Available at:  http://community.seattletimes.nwsource.com/archive/?date=19990207&slug=2943039.

We work incessantly to make the world a better place through conservation and environmental sustainability.  We preserve habitat, save individual animals and plants, and put up nesting structures for birds and bats.  We fight against pollution.  We help the underrepresented throughout the world get to a better life.

And we all know that the number one, absolute best strategy for effecting long-term change in the way the world works is a simple, fundamental idea:  Create equity and parity for girls and women in all parts of society.  Today’s message, therefore, addresses that simple, fundamental idea on the International Day of Women and Girls in Science, declared as February 11 by the United Nations.

In 2015, the United Nations created the International Day of Women and Girls in Science, asserting, among others, that the following are true:

• “representing half of the world’s population, [women] continue to be excluded from participating fully in the economy…”
• “women have a vital role to play in achieving sustainable development…”
• “gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls will make a crucial contribution to progress across all the Goals and targets of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development…”
• “women and girls play a critical role in science and technology communities and that their participation should be strengthened…”

Some may argue that we are finished with this concern, that women and girls have achieved equality and parity in all aspects of society.  And certainly, the world has made great progress.  Under the Millennium Development goals that ran from 2000-2015, the proportion of girls in school in developing countries has nearly reached parity, and a higher percentage of children are attending school every year (learn more about these goals here).

But this is a journey, not a destination.  The sciences—including conservation and environmental sciences—continue to lag behind.  The UN cites a study of women in science in 14 countries.  It shows that the probability of women graduating with a Bachelor’s, Master’s or doctoral degree in a science field are 18%, 8% and 2%, respectively.  The percentages for men are 37%, 18% and 6%.

Please support efforts to engage girls and women in the fields of conservation and environmental sciences and studies of all kinds.

References:

United Nations.  International Day of Women and Girls in Science.  Available at:  http://www.un.org/en/events/women-and-girls-in-science-day/.  Accessed February 7, 2018.

United Nations.  2015.  Resolution adopted by the General Assembly on 22 December 2015.  Available at:  http://www.un.org/en/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbol=A/RES/70/212.  Accessed February 7, 2018.

Francis Moore Lappe was born on February 10, 1944.  She is most well known for her 1971 book, Diet for a Small Planet, that has sold more than three million copies.  The book argues that malnutrition is not a problem of food scarcity, but of bad food policy.  She contends that a meat diet is bad for people and for the planet—arguing instead for “environmental vegetarianism” that lowers the impact of agriculture on the earth’s soil and water resources and provides more food for more people.

Lappe describes herself as a child of the 1960s social justice advocacy.  She initially worked as a housing inspector in Philadelphia.  The problems she saw there led her to form an organization that worked for fair practices for poor individuals and communities.  Later, as a graduate student at the University of California, Berkeley, she hit on the idea that by addressing the realities of food—a fundamental problem that always attracted attention—she could get at the underlying issues preventing a fair and prosperous world for all.

The success of Diet for a Small Planet astounded her.  “I had never published anything,” she said, “not even a letter to the editor.  I made a D on my first English paper in college, so I did not think I was material for a major publisher in New York.”  The book’s combination of addressing big-picture policy issues and recipes that any person could make to improve their health and reduce their ecological footprint embodied the idea of “think globally, act locally,” and resonated with a broad population.

From there, Lappe went on to publish several other books focused on food, but gradually expanding in scope to address ever larger issues of sustainability and democracy.  She founded several organizations aimed at getting more information to the public about food, nutrition, environment and democracy.  A popular catch-phrase has become:  “Hunger is not caused by scarcity of food but scarcity of democracy.”

Today, Lappe has moved away from her direct efforts to reduce hunger and enhance sustainability to focus her attention completely on advancing democracy.  She takes her 18 honorary doctorates and long list of awards—including the 2013 “Feisty Woman Award” of the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom—into that endeavor.

References:

Kelly, Kathy.  2016.  Interview transcript:  France Moore Lappe on why she’s Reinventing Herself.  Bill Moyers & Company, November 11, 2016.  Available at:  http://billmoyers.com/story/diet-democracy-frances-moore-lappe-re-inventing/.  Accessed February 9, 2017.

Small Planet Institute.  Frances Moore Lappe.  Available at:  http://smallplanet.org/about/frances/bio.  Accessed February 9, 2017.

Commercial fishermen first raised the alarm:  The oceans were being overfished.  They knew it long before anyone else, because they were experiencing smaller catches from each haul of their nets, needed to travel to deeper and more dangerous waters to fill their holds, and caught smaller fish every year.

It took many years and much debate for science and government to agree with the fishermen.  Around 1850, government commissions began to look into the claims of fishermen. Some of the most learned men of the time, including Thomas Huxley, insisted the oceans were inexhaustible, based merely on their great size.  Others, using data, concluded the opposite.

The U.S. government decided to do something about it in 1871.  Congress passed and President Grant signed, on February 9 of that year, a law which created the U.S. Office of the Commissioner of Fish and Fisheries.  Its role was to “prosecute investigations on the subject (of the diminution of valuable fishes) with the view to ascertaining whether any and what diminution in the number of the food-fishes of the coast and the lakes of the United States had taken place.”  The Fish Commission, as it became known, was also to make recommendations for repairing the fisheries.

President Grant appointed Spencer Fullerton Baird as Commissioner.  At the time, Baird’s full-time job was as the original curator of the Smithsonian Institution, which had been established in 1850 (in 1878, Baird became the second Secretary of the Smithsonian) .  A well regarded naturalist, Baird took a broad approach to understanding and improving the country’s fisheries. He established headquarters at Woods Hole, Massachusetts (now one of the world’s leading centers for marine science) .  He began studies of major fisheries, including striped bass, cod and bluefish.  He invested in aquaculture, which was considered a promising method for growing marine fisheries populations (it later proved not to be particularly useful).  Baird directed the agency until his death in 1887, but by then the Fish Commission and its purpose were well established.

Over the past century, the U.S. Fish Commission has seen many re-organizations.  It began as an independent agency, then became part of the new Department of Commerce and Labor in 1903, switched to the Department of Interior in 1939 and returned to Commerce in 1970.  In that year it was placed inside the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA, where it remains today) and named the National Marine Fisheries Service.

Today, NOAA Fisheries has enormous responsibilities.  It oversees regulations governing the catches of all marine fisheries, a $200 billion industry supplying 1.6 million jobs.  It implements the Endangered Species Act for 157 marine and anadromous species.  It conducts research on fisheries and marine biology through a network of 6 science centers and 20 laboratories.  Most importantly, it tracks the status of 474 stocks of fisheries organisms with the goal of assuring the sustainable yield from those stocks.

References:

Guinan, John A. and Ralph E. Curtis.  1971.  A Century of Conservation.  NOAA(12):40-44.  Available at:  https://www.nefsc.noaa.gov/history/stories/century.html.  Accessed February 6, 2018.

Nielsen, Larry A.  1976.  The Evolution of Fisheries Management Philosophy.  Marine Fisheries Review December 1976:15-23.  Available at:  http://spo.nmfs.noaa.gov/mfr3812/mfr38122.pdf.  Accessed February 6, 2018.

NOAA Fisheries.  About Us.  Available at:  https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/about-us.  Accessed February 6, 2018.

Smithsonian Institution Archives.  Spencer Fullerton Baird, 1823-1887.  Available at:  https://siarchives.si.edu/history/spencer-fullerton-baird.