Author: todayinconservation

Whoever the Secretary-General of the United Nations might be, he (or she, maybe, someday) is unquestionably a world leader.  But Ban Ki-moon, the UN Secretary-General from 2007 to 2016, deserves our special recognition as an environmental leader who moved climate change to the top of the world’s agenda.

            Ban Ki-moon was born on June 13, 1944, in South Korea when it was still occupied by Japan.  As a boy, he lived through the Korean War.  He said, “I grew up in war and saw the United Nations help my country to recover and rebuild.  That experience was a big part of what led me to pursue a career in public service.” He graduated from Seoul National University and then received an M.A. from the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard.

            Ban immediately entered his nation’s diplomatic service.  Among his many positions, he was the South Korean Ambassador to Austria (1998-2000) and Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade (2004-2006).  On January 1, 2007, he was elected as Secretary-General of the United Nations; he was unanimously re-elected for a second five-year term that ended on December 31, 2016.

            While Secretary-General, Ban focused on climate change as one of his highest priorities.  He led the 2007 Climate Change Summit in Bali, the Rio+20 Conference on Sustainable Development in Rio de Janeiro, and the 2015 Paris meeting that led to the Paris Climate Agreement.  He oversaw the worldwide focus for sustainable development through the Millennium Development Goals and led the formation of the subsequent Sustainable Development Goals that began in 2015 (learn more about the Millennium and Sustainable Development Goals here).

            Since leaving the UN at the end of 2016, Ban has continued his work on climate change and sustainable development.  With Dr. Heinz Fischer, former president of Austria, he founded the Ban Ki-moon Centre for Global Citizens, a non-profit organization that seeks to “use its independence, expertise and network to work for peace, poverty eradication, empowerment of youth and women, justice and human rights worldwide.”  He is President and Chair of the Council of the Global Green Growth Institute, which works through 36 member nations to support and promote “strong, inclusive and sustainable economic growth in developing countries and emerging economies.”

            I will let Mr. Ban’s views on climate change and sustainability speak for themselves.

“Saving our planet, lifting people out of poverty, advancing economic growth … these are one and the same fight.  We must connect the dots between climate change, water scarcity, energy shortages, global health, food security and women’s empowerment.  Solutions to one problem must be solutions for all.”

“Climate change has happened because of human behavior, therefore it’s only natural it should be us, human beings, to address this issue.”

“It is unfair, politically wrong, morally wrong when countries that have not contributed much to the climate phenomena should bear the cost and consequences.  If industrialised countries who have contributed seriously negatively to this climate phenomena are not taking their own responsibility than who can?”

“We have reached 2020 but because of the lack of political will we have not yet been able to mobilise that which is absolutely, urgently necessary for developing countries to mitigate and adapt.”

“We must turn the greatest collective challenge facing humankind today—climate change—into the greatest opportunity for common progress towards a sustainable future.”

References:

AZ Quotes.  Ban Ki-moon Quotes About Climate Change.  Available at:  https://www.azquotes.com/author/21299-Ban_Ki_moon/tag/climate-change. Accessed February 25, 2020.

Ban Ki-moon Centre for Global Citizens.  Mission.  Available at:  https://bankimooncentre.org/mission. Accessed February 25, 2020.

Encyclopedia Britannica.  Ban Ki-Moon.  Available at:  https://www.britannica.com/biography/Ban-Ki-moon. Accessed February 25, 2020.

Global Green Growth Institute.  About GGGI.  Available at:  https://gggi.org/about/. Accessed February 25, 2020.

United Nations.  Former Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.  Available at:  https://www.un.org/sg/en/formersg/ban.shtml, Accessed February 25, 2020.

Zacharias, Anna.  2020.  Industrialised countries must help solve climate change, says Ban Ki-moon.  The National UAE, January 8, 2020.  Available at:  https://bankimooncentre.org/mission.  Accessed February 25, 2020.

            Frank Chapman, the most influential ornithologist of the early 20^th Century, was born on June 12, 1864 (died 1957).  He became known as the “Dean of American Ornithologists” for his leadership of the evolving field of avian biology.  His career marked many outstanding firsts, but his legacy continues today through the annual Audubon Christmas Bird Count, first suggested and implemented by Chapman in 1900.

            Chapman was born in rural New Jersey and grew up in what one biographer described as a “veritable paradise for birds.”  Birds captured his heart and mind from childhood on.  However, the need to help support his family after his father’s premature death led him to a job in banking.  But he also volunteered for studies of bird migration with the American Ornithologists’ Union, feeding his avocation and growing his bird-based network.  When he received an offer to become an assistant to the bird curator at the American Museum of Natural History in New York, he walked away from all other possibilities and obligations.  He started at the museum in 1888 and worked there for the next 54 years!

            He rose through the ranks, until the museum decided to split its mammal and bird department in 1920—and Chapman landed the job as head of the Department of Birds.  His impact on the museum was massive.  Before him, bird displays were generally rows and rows of stuffed specimens lined up on plain shelves, appealing only to the most serious observer.  Chapman reasoned that more visitors would be attracted to a new type of display—the diorama—that displayed birds in natural settings, postures and activities.  He was correct, of course, and the diorama became the standard museum format for generations.

            During his tenure, which ended in 1942, Chapman conducted field work across the Americas, wrote the Handbook of Birds of Eastern North America, promoted Barro Colorado Island as a biodiversity paradise and created and edited the magazine Bird-Lore (which later became Audubon Magazine) for 35 years. 

            But his true legacy is the Christmas Bird Count.  At the end of the 19^th Century, a popular Christmas activity was the “side hunt.”  On Christmas Day, local groups of hunters would divide into two teams and head out to shoot as many animals—birds and mammals—as possible.  The team (i.e., the side) with the highest tally won.  Sporting magazines often carried the results, much like today’s sports pages, praising the prowess and carnage of the winning team.

            Chapman had a better idea.  As he wrote in a 1900 issue of Bird-Lore, he proposed “a new kind of Christmas side hunt, in the form of a Christmas bird-census, and we hope that all our readers who have the opportunity will aid us in making a success by spending a portion of Christmas Day with the birds….”  The idea was to note all birds present and their relative abundance, providing a huge database that could be used to follow population trends into the future.

Twenty-seven bird enthusiasts participated in the first year, counting birds at 25 separate locations.  They counted 90 species.    

Fast-forward 119 years to the 2018-2019 Christmas Bird Count.  More than 79,000 people participated, spread across the Americas and many Pacific islands.  They counted birds in just over 2600 separate locations.  They counted 2638 species, about 25% of all bird species known to exist.  Over 48 million individual birds were counted.

References:

Audubon Society.  History of the Christmas Bird Count.  Available at:  http://www.audubon.org/history-christmas-bird-count. Accessed June 13, 2017.

Chapman, Frank.  1900.  A Christmas Bird-Census.  Bird-Lore Magazine.  Available at:  http://www.audubon.org/sites/default/files/documents/original_cbc_mention_in_bird_lore_1900.pdf. Accessed June 13, 2017.

LeBaron, Geoff.  2019.  The 119^th Christmas Bird Count Summary.  Audubon, December 19, 2019.  Available at:  https://www.audubon.org/news/the-119th-christmas-bird-count-summary.  Accessed February 24, 2020.

Gregory, William King.  1947.  Frank Michler Chapman, 1864-1945.  National Academy of Sciences, Volume XXV, Fifth Memoir.  Available at:  http://www.nasonline.org/publications/biographical-memoirs/memoir-pdfs/chapman-frank-m-1864-1945.pdf. Accessed June 13, 2017.

M. Chapman of the American Museum of Natural History.  The Auk 122(2):389-402.  Available at:  https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/4090434.pdf?refreqid=excelsior%3A205288f5fd80b88c11a38db487af5d9a Vuilleumier, Francois.  2005.  Dean of American Ornithologists:  The Multiple Legacies of Frank. Accessed June 13, 2017.

A favorite trivia question is, what does “scuba” stand for?  The answer, of course, is self-contained underwater breathing apparatus.  A much better question would be who was the famous co-inventor of scuba?  The answer is the same as the answer to the question who’s the most famous ocean explorer?  Right, Jacques Cousteau.

            Jacques-Yves Cousteau was born on June 11, 1910, in a small town near Bordeaux, France (died 1997).  Although he was anemic and sickly as a child, he learned to swim at an early age.  He said, “I loved touching water.  Physically.  Sensually.  Water fascinated me.”  Not surprisingly, he enlisted in the French navy.  His attraction was to the air, however, not the water—he trained to be a navy pilot.  But a traffic accident near the end of his training broke both his arms, ending his dreams to fly.  He swam daily in the Mediterranean as physical therapy for his arms, and when, in 1936,  a friend loaned him a pair of goggles for his swim, he saw his future clearly: ”Rocks covered with green, brown and silver forests of algae and fishes unknown to me, swimming in crystalline water. Sometimes we are lucky enough to know that our lives have been changed, to discard the old, embrace the new, and run headlong down an immutable course. It happened to me on that summer’s day, when my eyes were opened on the sea.”

            World War II delayed his sea adventures for a time.  He was a gunnery officer for the Navy and later served as a spy in Italy for the French Resistance (his heroics earned him the Legion of Honour Award from the French people).  As the war ended, he convinced the navy to let him lead an Undersea Research Group that swept harbors and shipping lanes for mine.

            In 1943, he began working with an engineer, Emile Gagnan, to free divers from heavy, constraining, and surfaced-tethered diving gear.  Compressed air-tanks had been perfected for wartime use, with one-way valves to control air flow.  Cousteau and Gagnan adapted the tanks for underwater use, patenting the “Aqua-lung,” that we now call scuba, in 1946.  They also invented a waterproof case for cameras that could descend hundreds of feet.

            Armed with an Aqua-lung and movie camera, Cousteau began the work for which he became famous.  Although not trained as an oceanographer, he explored the world’s oceans with the eyes of both a scientist and an artist.  He became, as eulogized at his death, “the Rachel Carson of the oceans.”  His first book, The Silent World, published in 1953, sold more than 5 million copies and has been translated into 22 languages.  A movie of the same name expanded his fame—and public appreciation of the oceans—even more.  He renovated a World War 2 minesweeper into an oceanographic research vessel that he named Calypso and sailed to all corners of the world’s oceans.  He made 120 documentaries about the ocean (including 9 seasons of the U.S. based “The Undersea World of Jacque Cousteau”), wrote more than 50 books, received several Oscars and the Palm d’Or.  He was a “popularizer of genius.”

            During his long career, Cousteau’s accomplishments went well beyond producing movies and publishing books.  He headed Monaco’s Oceanographic Institute for more than 30 years.  His early work with scuba demonstrated its utility for salvaging ancient artifacts, establishing the field of underwater archeology.  He invented the aqua-disk, a one-person submarine.  He experimented with long-term underwater habitation, in both shallow and deep water.

            He used his mastery of mass media to spread the need for conservation of the oceans and the earth as a whole.  In 1974, he founded the Cousteau Society, a U.S.-based non-profit group dedicated to “the protection and improvement of the quality of life for present and future generations.”  He considered himself not an “ecologist for the animals,” but “an ecologist for people.”  He was outspoken about what he felt were the fundamental problems facing our future.  “You see a beer can and you pick it up.  You think you’ve done a great thing for the environment….But these are just symptoms of our sickness….It is the economic system that confuses price and value.  This confusion causes us to hurt and deplete our natural resources and damage the environment we are living in.” 

            Cousteau lived by a principle that drove him for all his 87 years on earth.  In English it reads, “We must go and see for ourselves.”  He went everywhere to see for himself, especially to the depths of the oceans.  As John Denver sang in his elegy to Cousteau, Calypso, “Aye Calypso the places you’ve been to; The things that you’ve shown us; The stories you tell; Aye Calypso, I sing to your spirit….”  (learn more about John Denver here). May I suggest that we follow Cousteau’s example—and go see a bit of the outdoors, today!

References:

Cousteau Society.  About the Cousteau Society.  Available at:  https://web.archive.org/web/20090122055053/http://cousteau.org/about.html.  Accessed February 24, 2020.

Encyclopedia Britannica.  Jacques Cousteau, French Ocean Explorer and Engineer.  Available at:  https://www.britannica.com/technology/transportation-technology. Accessed February 24, 2020.

Kraft, Scott.  1995.  Lose Angeles Times Interview:  Jacques Cousteau:  A Lifetime Spent Fighting for the Environment.  Los Angeles Times, Oct. 1, 1995.  Available at:  https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1995-10-01-op-52539-story.html. 

Accessed February 24, 2020.

Jonas, Gerald.  1997.  Jacques Cousteau, Oceans’ Impressario, Dies.  The New York times, June 26, 1997.  Available at:  https://www.nytimes.com/1997/06/26/world/jacques-cousteau-oceans-impresario-dies.html. Accessed February 24, 2020.

Sea and Sky.  Meet the Ocean Explorers – Jacques Cousteau.  Available at:  http://www.seasky.org/ocean-exploration/ocean-explorers-jacques-cousteau.html. Accessed February 24, 2020.

Ant-Man is a popular comic book character and a blockbuster recent movie, with Paul Rudd in the starring role.  But the real ant-man is a scientist who has devoted his life to the study of these humble and ubiquitous six-legged creatures.  E. O. Wilson has used his knowledge of ants to create the ecological ideas that drive biodiversity conservation today.

            Edward Osborne Wilson was born in Birmingham, Alabama, on June 10, 1929.  He and his family moved often, and the young Wilson chose nature as his best friend.  He wanted to study birds, but poor hearing in one ear and blindness in one eye (a fishing accident) meant he didn’t have the acute senses needed for ornithology.  So, he turned to insects, noting that “Most children have a bug period.  I near grew out of mine.”

            Wilson’s specialty was—and is—ants. He is the world’s expert on ants, from taxonomy (he has named hundreds of new species) to behavior.  While in high school in Decatur, Alabama, he studied the ants of Alabama and was the first to report the presence of fire ants in the United States.  He studied at the University of Alabama (B.S. and M.S.) and Harvard, earning his Ph.D. in 1955.  The next year he was appointed to the Harvard faculty, where he remained for his entire career, officially retiring in 1997.  He studied ants across the world, mainly in the South Pacific and the American tropics.

            His decision to study ants was providential.  “Ants are always there,” he said, “and that has given me an edge.  I’ve ridden ants the whole way.”  Ants led him to several important discoveries.  First, he revealed that ants communicated largely through chemicals that he called pheromones; his work launched the field of chemical ecology.  Then, studying ant diversity on islands, he developed the theory of island biogeography (with colleague Robert MacArthur); that theory has become one of the bedrock ideas and strategies of biodiversity conservation.  He then concentrated on ant behavior, recognizing in their complex social organization the similarity to human communities.  From those studies came a series of books exploring social behavior in humans, including his seminal text, Sociobiology.  He introduced the concept of “biophilia,” the need for humans to maintain contact with nature. Many of his ideas on human behavior were initially disparaged, but most have survived decades of scrutiny to become now standard tenets of behavioral biology and psychology. 

            His understanding of the importance of ants in tropical ecosystems led to his fundamental concern for preserving biodiversity.  “Biological diversity—‘biodiversity’ in the new parlance—is the key to the maintenance of the world as we know it,” he wrote.  “Life in a local site struck down by a passing storm springs back quickly because enough diversity still exists.” He has lavished attention recently on the Mozambique island ecosystem of Gorongosa, one of the most biodiverse landscapes on earth and a place where public-private partnerships are protecting and restoring the ecosystem.  He argues today for a concept called “half-earth,” protecting half of the globe in parks and preserves—another new idea for a man and a mind that won’t quit.

            By any standards, E. O. Wilson is among the greatest living scientists and conservationists in the world.  He has written 20 books, received more than 150 major awards (including two Pulitzer Prizes for his books), and been named one of the most influential people of the century.  He remains optimistic that an enlightened human species can and will protect the earth.  His understanding of animal behavior gives him confidence that humans will grow to appreciate what is truly valuable in the world:  “Destroying rainforest for economic gain is like burning a Renaissance painting to cook a meal.” 

References:

E. O. Wilson Biodiversity Foundation.  E. O. Wilson.  Available at:  https://eowilsonfoundation.org/e-o-wilson/.   Accessed February 21, 2020.

French, Howard W.  2011.  E. O. Wilson’s Theory of Everything.  The Atlantic, November 2011.  Available at:  https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2011/11/e-o-wilsons-theory-of-everything/308686/.  Accessed February 21, 2020.

Ruse, Michael.  Edward O. Wilson, American Biologist.  Encyclopedia Britannica.  Available at:  https://www.britannica.com/biography/Edward-O-Wilson. Accessed February 21, 2020.

Wilson, E. O.  1992.  The Diversity of Life.  Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts.  424 pages.

It is an unfamiliar term—the “coral triangle.”  We all know about the Amazon rainforest as the largest and most significant tropical forest in the world.  But what about coral reefs and their seascapes?  Is there an equivalent of the Amazon for coral reefs?

            Indeed there is.  The coral triangle is to coral reefs what the Amazon is to rainforests.  The coral triangle is a huge area—more than a billion acres, about half the size of the continental United States—located at the juncture of the South Pacific and Indian Oceans.  The area includes the waters of six nations—the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands and Timor-Leste.  The marine resources of the coral triangle provide food and jobs of 130 million people.

            The coral triangle contains the richest coral-reef ecosystems in the world.  Roughly three-quarters of the world’s known coral species live there (more than 500 species), along with 6 of the world’s 7 marine turtle species and one-third of the world’s coral-reef fish species.  Scientists believe that coral reefs evolved in the triangle and radiated to other areas across the world’s oceans, including Australia’s Great Barrier Reef (learn more about the Great Barrier Reef here).  The triangle supports other marine life, like blue and sperm whales, dolphins and dugongs, that graze on the abundant flora and fauna of the reefs.

            The nations comprising the coral triangle ratified a treaty in 2009 to sustainably manage the region and its resources.  The “Coral Triangle Initiative on Coral Reefs, Fisheries, and Food Security (CTI-CFF)” works through a permanent staff located in Manado, Indonesia and is partnering with leading conservation groups like Conservation International, The World Wildlife Fund, and The Nature Conservancy.  Primary concerns include unsustainable development and tourism, overfishing, destructive fishing (using explosives or cyanide-based chemicals), coral bleaching and climate change.  The region is of special interest to scientists and conservationists because it appears to be weathering the effects of climate change better than other areas.

            As part of their work, the CTI-CFF created Coral Triangle Day, celebrated annually on June 9.  The date was chosen to piggy-back on World Oceans Day, which occurs annually on June 8. The first celebration was held in 2012.  The organizers state that the goal “is to position the Coral Triangle as a globally-significant ecoregion—a modern day icon of the natural world so that millions of people learn more about its significance to their everyday lives and are empowered to take specific actions to help conserve and protect this natural treasure.”  Although the focus of the day is on the nations in and around the triangle, celebrations are welcomed around the world.

            So, if you are looking for an excuse for a beach party on June 9, now you’ve got the reason!  Let’s hear it for the Coral Triangle!

References:

Conservation International.  The Coral Triangle Initiative.  Available at:  https://www.conservation.org/projects/coral-triangle-initiative.  Accessed February 20, 2020.

Coral Guardian.  The Coral Triangle.  Available at:  https://www.coralguardian.org/en/coral-triangle/. Accessed February 20, 2020.

Coral Triangle Initiative.  History of CTI-CFF.  Available at:  http://www.coraltriangleinitiative.org/about.  Accessed February 20, 2020.

Coraltriangleday.org.  Welcome to Coral Triangl Accessed February 20, 2020e Day 2019.  Available at:  http://coraltriangleday.org/. Accessed February 20, 2020.

Eschner, Kat.  2017.  Three Things to Know About the Coral Triangle, the Ocean’s Biodiversity Hot Spot.  Smithsonian Magazine, June 8, 2017.  Available at:  https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/three-things-know-about-coral-triangle-180963561/. Accessed February 20, 2020.

Thomas Malthus published “An Essay on the Principle of Population” on June 7, 1798.  The essay and the name of Malthus have become synonymous with the idea that humans, because of the growth of their population, will eventually run out of resources, leading to conflict and famine.  In other words, human existence is fundamentally unsustainable.

            Thomas Robert Malthus was an English academic and cleric who lived from 1766 to 1834.  He was educated at Cambridge University and eventually became a professor of history and political economy.  He was deeply interested in the statistics of populations, from birth to death and everything in between—co-founding the Statistical Society of London in 1834.  His work was sufficiently regarded to earn him membership in the Royal Society and the Political Economy Club.  Despite his high ranking in society, it seems he was a pretty regular guy—he always just called himself “Bob.”

            While Malthus’ other works may have been important during his life, it is his essay about population that has maintained his prominence today.  In the essay, he relates that the human population grows exponentially—that is, very rapidly—while the ability of humans to raise food and other necessary resources grows arithmetically—that is, rather slowly.  Malthus reasoned that the size of the human population would eventually outgrow available resources and a state of misery and vice would take over, effectively but painfully keeping the human population in check.  In other words, human life as we know it is not sustainable.

            Malthus’ idea is generally cited as the argument for pessimism in the future by environmentalists who view humankind through dim eyes.  For example, the idea is basically the same as that advanced by Paul Ehrlich in his 1969 book, The Population Bomb, which predicted that global famine would prevail as early as the 1970s.   Malthusian ideas (now often referred to as Neo-Malthusian) remain popular.

            Malthus also believed that because misery was the tool that nature used to check the size of the human population, attempts to improve the conditions of the poor were misguided.  Helping the poor, he reasoned, reduced misery, leading to higher birth rates and population growth—which would eventually lead to more misery.  We know today that reality shows the exact opposite.  Improved quality of life, through better nutrition, health care, education and the like, does lead to a higher population growth rate for a time, but then the growth rate slows and then stabilizes.  Prosperity, not poverty, checks population growth.

References:

BBC History.  Thomas Malthus (1766-1834).  Available at:  http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/malthus_thomas.shtml.  Accessed June 8, 2017.

Encyclopedia Britannica.  Thomas Malthus.  Available at:  https://www.britannica.com/biography/Thomas-Malthus. Accessed June 8, 2017.

Library of Economics and Liberty.  An Essay on the Principle of Population.  Available at:  http://www.econlib.org/library/Malthus/malPopCover.html. Accessed June 8, 2017.

Library of Economics and Liberty.  Thomas Robert Malthus.  Available at http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/bios/Malthus.html. Accessed June 8, 2017.

In truth, Bryce National Park wasn’t created on this date—but that is just a technicality.  The protection of Bryce Canyon became law on June 8, 1923, when President Warren G. Harding proclaimed the area as Bryce Canyon National Monument.  A year later, Congress passed a law to change its status to a park, changing the name to Utah National Park.  Four years later, in 1928, when the land had been acquired and other administrative targets met, the area settled into its now familiar name of Bryce Canyon National Park. 

            Southern Utah in 1900 was pretty far away from anywhere.  But as roads, for cars and trains, started to penetrate the area, more folks wandered upon an interesting canyon with some spectacular scenery.  In 1915, the new supervisor of what is now Dixie National Forest, J. W. Humphrey, visited a spot we now call Sunset Point; his reaction mirrored that of visitors ever since:  “You can perhaps imagine my surprise at the indescribable beauty that greeted us, and it was sundown before I could be dragged from the canyon view.  You may be sure that I went back the next morning to see the canyon once more, and to plan in my mind how this attraction could be made accessible to the public.”

            Humphrey took up the challenge to popularize Bryce Canyon, with great success.  In the next few years, the Union Pacific Railroad began bringing visitors to the area, and a still-operating motel, Ruby’s Inn, provided lodging and tourist services.  The park has become a central feature of southern Utah’s five national parks, and serves as a midway point between Zion and Grand Canyon (AZ) National Parks (learn more about Grand Canyon National Park here).  From about 20,000 annual visitors when it opened, Bryce Canyon now welcomes more than 2.6 million visitors each year, all as awestruck as Humphrey a century before.

            Those visitors come primarily to view Bryce Canyon’s “hoodoos.”  Hoodoos are tall, thin, colorful towers of rock, eroded into delicate shapes.  Hoodoos occur elsewhere, but Bryce has more of them in a concentrated area than anywhere on earth.  All those hoodoos formed—and continue to form and dissolve—because of a unique sequence of geological and meteorological occurrences.  First, the entire region was once the bottom of a huge lake that accumulated sediment whose chemical composition varied through time; the sediment compressed into alternating layers of limestone, sandstone, dolostone, mudstone and siltstone.  Next, the crashing of tectonic plates raised the lake bottom to its current election of over 7,000 feet. 

            Then, and now, weather took over.  Bryce Canyon has about 200 days per year when the air temperature varies from below freezing to above freezing in the same day.  So, rain falls during the warm day, gets into cracks in the rocks, freezes over night, and cracks the rocks further apart.  In the morning, the ice thaws, seeps farther into the rock, and repeats the procedure. Then, and now, the wind eroded the rock layers, which have different levels of hardness, into pillars that look like the handiwork of a deranged lathe operator.  Nature’s sculpture garden is truly breathtaking.

            Bryce Canyon is quite small as national parks go, just under 36,000 acres (only 11 of 61 national parks are smaller).  But Bryce lies within a larger geological landscape that stretches from the Grand Canyon on the south to Capitol Reef National Park on the north.  The area is known collectively as “The Grand Staircase” because the geologic history of the earth is displayed here as a series of steps—exposed layers that have been little disturbed by earthquakes, volcanoes and other geological events.  Several other national parks, national monuments (including the controversial Grand Staircase Escalante) and national forests protect this landscape, together comprising a huge area some 200 miles long and 100 miles wide.

References:

National Park Service.  Bryce Canyon National Park.  Available at:  https://www.nps.gov/brca/learn/historyculture/park_history.htm.  Accessed February 20, 2020.

Scrattish, Nicholas.  1985.  Historic Resource Study—Bryce Canyon National Park.  September, 1985.  National Park Service.  Available at:  https://www.nps.gov/parkhistory/online_books/brca/hrs.htm.  Accessed February 20, 2020.

The United Nations now has many days devoted to the environment—days for water, biodiversity, forests, wildlife, fisheries, and more (many are described in this calendar).  But the granddaddy of them all was established on June 5 – World Environment Day.

            The United Nations began to take environmental matters seriously in the late 1960s and early 1970s.  Their concern culminated in the first major conference sponsored by the UN that addressed the condition of the environment.  The “Conference on the Human Environment” was held in Stockholm, Sweden, during June 5-16, 1972.  Now generally referred to as the “Stockholm Conference,” the gathering included representatives from 113 nations, featured 86 national reports, made 109 recommendations for global action, and unanimously passed the Declaration on the Human Environment.  Among the 26 principles in the declaration, the second sums up the essence of the need:  “The natural resources of the earth, including the air, water, land, flora and fauna and especially representative samples of natural ecosystems, must be safeguarded for the benefit of present and future generations through careful planning or management, as appropriate.”

            Later in 1972, the UN chose June 5, the starting date of the Stockholm Conference, as the permanent date for World Environment Day.  The day is designed for the world’s nations to “undertake … activities reaffirming their determination expressed at the Conference.”  Even more importantly, the results of the Stockholm Conference led to the establishment of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), the major UN body focused on a sustainable global environment.

            The first World Environment Day was celebrated on June 5, 1972, as part of Expo ’74, a world’s fair held in Spokane, Washington.  World fairs were popular in the years after World War II, as people looked forward to the benefits of modern technology—electronics, chemicals, air travel, nuclear energy, and many others.  So, world fairs generally worshipped a rosy human-dominated civilization, with little concern for the natural environment.  Expo ’74 took a different approach, however, recognizing the emerging environmental movement.  This world fair emphasized caring for the environment—the theme was “Celebrating Tomorrow’s Fresh New Environment.”

            World Environment Day has been celebrated annually since then, with the 47^th iteration scheduled for June 5, 2020.  The core site is Colombia, in partnership with Germany.  The theme for 2020 focuses on biodiversity, making biodiversity-rich Colombia an ideal site for the topic.  Nearly 150 countries participate annually in World Environment Day; in 2019, more than 200 events occurred across the globe as part of the focused on air pollution.

            So, on this day, why not spend a little time thinking about the environment, both near and far—and most importantly, why not do something that reduces our environmental footprint—both near and far?

References: 

Center for the Study of the Pacific Northwest.  Lesson Twenty-six:  Spokane’s Expo ’74; A World’s Fair for the Environment.  Available at:  http://www.washington.edu/uwired/outreach/cspn/Website/Classroom%20Materials/Pacific%20Northwest%20History/Lessons/Lesson%2026/26.html.  Accessed February 18, 2020.

Library of Congress.  Declaration of the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment.  Available at:  http://webarchive.loc.gov/all/20150314024203/http%3A//www.unep.org/Documents.Multilingual/Default.asp?documentid%3D97%26articleid%3D1503. Accessed February 18, 2020.

UNEP.  World Environment Day:  driving five decades of environmental action.  Available at:  https://www.worldenvironmentday.global/about/world-environment-day-driving-five-decades-environmental-action. Accessed February 18, 2020.

United Nations.  World Environment Day, June 5.  Available at:  https://www.un.org/en/events/environmentday/background.shtml. Accessed February 18, 2020.

Earth Day has become an annual event for remembering and enhancing the plight of our environment.  The man who started Earth Day, however, both for that accomplishment as well as many others, deserves separate recognition on this, his birthday.

            Gaylord Anton Nelson was born in the northern Wisconsin village of Clear Lake, on June 4, 1916 (died 2005).  From the beginning, he admired two things about Wisconsin.  First, he loved the beauty of the north woods, a forested landscape sequined with the reflective waters of innumerable lakes, ponds and streams.  Second, he believed in Wisconsin’s “progressive movement,” in which the government used its power and resources to tackle the most pressing issues of the day.

            Nelson received his law degree from the University of Wisconsin.  After returning from his tour of duty in the Navy during World War II, he worked to build a coalition of Wisconsin’s leaders from both political parties in support of progressive ideals.  He became a state senator and then served as Wisconsin’s governor for two terms during the late1950s-early 1960s.  As governor, he championed an improved environment, fighting against pollution and habitat destruction.  He re-organized the state’s many environmental and natural resource agencies into a single department that remains one of the finest in the country.  He convinced the state to dedicate $50 million to acquire parks (using a one-cent tax on cigarettes), in remote as well as populated areas.  For his efforts, he became known as the nation’s “conservation governor.”

            Wisconsin elected him one of their two senators in 1962, a position he held for 18 years.  He took his conservation-governor moniker to Washington and became the de facto conservation senator.  He fought for both environmental improvements and for social welfare, acknowledging that the two are really one aspiration, not two.  He said, “Environment is all of America and its problems.  It is rats in the ghetto.  It’s a hungry child in a land of affluence.  It is housing not worthy of the name, neighborhoods not fit to inhabit.”

            Nelson’s positive influence, reaching across political divides to unite a congress in support of a healthier environment, is reflected in a range of laws he sponsored or nurtured.  He led efforts that passed, nearly unanimously, the Wilderness Act, the National Trails Act, the National Wild and Scenic Rivers Act, the National Environmental Education Act, and the National Environmental Policy Act.  He also was the force behind strip-mining reform, the banning of phosphates in detergents, and vehicle fuel-efficiency standards. 

            But Nelson will always be remembered most for his idea to grow conservation from the grass roots.  He wanted the leadership in Washington to understand that the people of the United States wanted a sustainable environment.  So, working with college students, he and a small staff organized the first Earth Day in April, 1970.  He only planned for one Earth Day, but, as we know, the idea caught hold and continues to grow as a global phenomenon (learn more about Earth Day here) .

            For Earth Day and all his other actions on behalf of our environment, Gaylord Nelson is considered one of the most influential persons of the 20^th Century.  President Clinton bestowed the Presidential Medal of Freedom on Nelson in 1995, noting that “His work has inspired all Americans to take responsibility for the planet’s well-being and for our children’s future.”

            Let’s heed his example.

References: 

Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies.  The Nelson Legacy.  Available at:  https://nelson.wisc.edu/about/nelson-legacy.php. Accessed February 15, 2020

Nelsonearthday.net.  Meet Gaylord Nelson, founder of Earth Day.  Available at:  http://www.nelsonearthday.net/nelson/. Accessed February 15, 2020

The Wilderness Society.  Gaylord Nelson.  Available at:  https://www.wilderness.org/articles/article/gaylord-nelson.  Accessed February 15, 2020.

The Wilderness Society.  Earth Day Founder Gaylord Nelson to Receive Medal of Freedom.  Available at: http://www.nelsonearthday.net/docs/nelson_231-4_medal_of_freedom_press_release.pdfAccessed February 15, 2020.

On the afternoon of June 6, 1912, a massive volcanic eruption occurred on the Alaskan Peninsula, across from Kodiak Island.  The Novarupta eruption was the largest in volume in the 20^th Century, and surpassed in history only by the eruption of Mount Tambora about 100 years earlier.  The volume of materials expelled was 30 times greater than that of the Mount Saint Helens eruption in 1980.

            This area of Alaska was sparsely populated in the early years of the 20^th Century, so no one was close enough to actually see the eruption itself.  It was first observed by the crew of a mail boat, the Dora, who heard an explosion and then observed a smoke plume rising in the sky behind Mount Katmai, about 55 miles away.  Residents of Juneau, 750 miles away, heard the explosion—about one hour after it occurred.  Everyone assumed that Mount Katmai, a known site of volcanic activity, had erupted. 

            The ash plume rose rapidly to a height of 20 miles, spreading eastward on prevailing winds.  Within 2 hours, the ash cloud had enveloped the Dora.   Subsequent explosions and venting continued for three days.  Settlements on Kodiak Island, 100 miles away, were blanketed in a foot of ash.  Local residents huddled indoors to escape the choking atmosphere.  Wildlife died by the millions, as did fish swimming in sediment-filled rivers and lakes.  In subsequent days, the ash cloud spread across North America and the world, purportedly reaching Algeria by June 17.  Ice cores from Greenland contain ash from Novarupta.

            A team of National Geographic Society explorers, led by Robert Griggs, thoroughly investigated the site in 1916. The eruption had spewed 30 million cubic meters of material out of the earth, covering the adjacent valley in rock and ash, in some places up to 700 feet deep.  The former v-shaped valley surrounding the eruption site had become a flat, barren plain.  Because of innumerable steam plumes escaping from vents across the area, Griggs called the site the “Valley of Ten Thousand Smokes.”  Discovering a new lava dome located near Mount Katmai, Griggs named it Novarupta—further expeditions in the 1950s later confirmed that Novarupta, not Mount Katmai, was the source of the eruption.

            Griggs and others  considered the area of great scientific value.  They began a lobbying effort that soon convinced President Woodrow Wilson to create the Katmai National Monument on September 24, 1918.  For decades after that, Katmai got little attention—by tourists or by the government—because of its remoteness.  It took until the 1950s before Katmai had its first permanent ranger and first facility, at the now famous Brooks Camp.

            Grizzly bears, not volcanoes, have become the starring attraction at Katmai.  The area holds one of the densest grizzly populations in the country, well fed by the abundant salmon in the region’s rivers.  Because of this, the protected area has been expanded and, on May 18, 1980, became Katmai National Park and Preserve, now covering slightly more than 4 million acres (by coincidence, this was the same day that Mount Saint Helens erupted; learn more about that eruption here).  From fewer than 20 visitors per year in the 1920s, more than 30,000 now visit annually.  And live “bear cams” are available so millions can watch bears fishing at Brooks Falls. 

References:

Alaska Volcano Observatory.  Novarupta reported activity.  Available at https://www.avo.alaska.edu/volcanoes/activity.php?volcname=Novarupta&eruptionid=456.  Accessed June 6, 2017.

Geology.com.  Novarupta, the most powerful volcanic eruption of the 20^th Century.  Available at http://geology.com/novarupta/. Accessed June 6, 2017.

Hildreth, W., and Fierstein, J., 2012, The Novarupta-Katmai eruption of 1912—largest eruption of the twentieth century; centennial perspectives: U.S. Geological Survey Professional Paper 1791, 259 p. Available at https://pubs.usgs.gov/pp/1791/. Accessed June 6, 2017.

National Park Service.  Katmai National Park and Preserve History.  Available at https://www.nps.gov/katm/learn/historyculture/history.htm. Accessed June 6, 2017.