Insight and inspiration in turbulent times.
Ukrainian conservation organizations have largely shifted their efforts to support refugees and other citizens in need, even as the environmental toll from the Russian invasion continues to loom over the country’s future.
I have come to believe that Udall was actually in many ways, a conservative whose creative ideas may help point America’s way forward in a turbulent, polarized, and destructive time. Above all, Udall was devoted to conserving the land and the beauty of the American landscape.
It’s not just to hide clutter anymore – add “saving the planet” to the reasons you leave the camera off during your next virtual meeting.
Access to the benefits nature provides — such as clean water, cool air and protection from flooding — should not be a luxury available to those who can afford it. It’s a right that goes to the core of human health and well-being.
Because most political, social and working life is enclosed, people falsely conclude that our struggle must be to improve those enclosures – not to step gently into the wood. That choice, to weave improvements into the wires, is the course taken by most of the liberal left. It endorses enclosure.
Why does nature need half the planet? To maintain a highly functional system of plants, animals, and their habitats. And we need such a functional ecosystem to support our own species. Nature is ourhabitat. No nature means no economy, no national security, and no international stability.
For public land managers, policy-makers, natural resource specialists, farmers, ranchers and others in the business of protecting and renewing the world’s diverse ecosystems, it’s easy to get lost in a sea of studies and strategies. How does a person determine which solutions will yield the best results in any given situation?
By any measure, Haig-Brown was a unique and visionary voice in a nation that has never been terribly impressed with the idea of conservation. As rural dweller and social critic, he listened to what the rivers and forests had to say and was never afraid to write about the wonder of existence.
I’ve never been enthusiastic about reducing my carbon footprint or energy consumption. It would have real effects, I know, and you can make extreme reductions, as the Riot 4 Austerity folks and others have demonstrated. But I can’t help saying to myself, “Unless everybody does it, the effects are marginal.”
Fungi and other soil microbes are critical to the health of soil and our food systems yet ‘conservation biodiversity’ often overlooks them for more charismatic wildlife.
Cowboys and Indians are at it again.
As economic growth threatens climate stability, biodiversity, planetary geochemical flows, and ecosystem health, humanity is creating a bottleneck for itself.
