Conservation Biology

1. Conservation Biology

2. What is Conservation Biology? • The scientific study of the scarcity and diversity of organisms. • - The applied science of maintaining the earth’s diversity.

3. Organizing principles/ethics of Conservation Biology (from Soulé) • The diversity of species and ecosystems should be preserved • The untimely (human-caused) extinction of populations and species should be prevented • Ecological complexity should be maintained • Evolution should continue • Biological diversity has intrinsic value

4. Conservation Biology is a Crisis Discipline • We often must make decisions and/or recommendations without the luxury of perfect data and absolute certainty about outcomes

6. Conservation – the act of protecting from loss or depletion

7. Flavors of Conservation • Conservationist – a person who advocates or practices the sensible and careful use of natural resources – resources maintained in healthy condition • Preservationist – a person who advocates allowing some ecosystems and creatures to exist without significant human interference • Environmentalist – a person who is concerned about the impact of people on environmental quality • Ecologist – a scientist who studies the relationships between organisms and their surrounding environment

8. A (Very) Brief History of Conservation

9. Live Abalone on California Coast

10. Red Abalone Shell

11. Shell midden on California Coast

12. Close up of Midden

13. Early Conservation Efforts • 3000 YA – Ikhnaton sets aside land for game preserve • Deuteronomy – do not kill mother bird on nest • Asoka – 272-232 BCE declared some animals can’t be killed, forests not burned

14. 1639 Rhode Island hunting regulations • “from the first of May till the first of November; and if any shall shoot a deere within that time he shall forfeit five pounds …”

15. Dust Bowl Storm – early 1930’s

16. After a Dust Storm

17. NRCS – originally founded as Soil Erosion Service in 1935, later renamed Soil Conservation Service and finally NRCS

18. Endangered Species Act - 1973

19. Yellowstone National Park – established 1872

20. Wilderness Act - 1964

21. Roman sewers and aqueducts

22. Rachel Carson – Silent Spring - 1962

23. First Earth Day - 1970

24. Cuyahoga River, Cleveland, Ohio On fire 1952 Pollution 1969

25. Major US Environmental Policies • 1963 - Clean Air Act • 1970 – Clean Air Act Extension • 1970 - Environmental Protection Agency formed • 1974 – Safe Drinking Water Act • 1977 – Clean Water Act • 1976 – Resource Conservation and Recovery Act

26. Rio Earth Summit - 1992

27. Kyoto Protocol - 1997

30. Basic Conservation Ethics • Utilitarian – When a species goes extinct or an ecosystem disappears we lose something useful • Aesthetic – Species, ecosystems are beautiful, pleasing – worth preserving • Moral – All species and ecosystems have a right to exist and humans have no right to destroy them • Ecological – Species, ecosystems must be conserved because their loss leads to further losses and repercussions we can’t predict

31. Utilitarian Ethic - Pacific Yew Tree - Bark is source of Taxol – anti-cancer drug

32. Diversity – Aesthetically pleasing

33. Moral - Judeo-Christian ethics of relationship to nature “Then God said, ‘Let us make man in our image, after our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.” – Genesis 1:26 Revised Standard Version

34. Moral - Judeo-Christian ethics of relationship to nature “Then God said, ‘Let us make man in our image, after our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth.” – Genesis 1:26 “The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to till it and keep it.” – Genesis 2:15 Revised Standard Version

35. St. Francis of Assisi13th Century Painting

36. Ecological

37. Development of Conservation Ethics in the U.S.

38. Adam and Eve expelled from the Garden of Eden

39. The Romantics                              It seems a day,(I speak of one from many singled out)One of those heavenly days which cannot die,When forth I sallied from our cottage-door,And with a wallet o'er my shoulder slung,A nutting crook in hand, I turn'd my stepsTowards the distant woods, a Figure quaint,Trick'd out in proud disguise of Beggar's weedsPut on for the occasion, by adviceAnd exhortation of my frugal Dame.Motley accoutrement ! of power to smileAt thorns, and brakes, and brambles, and, in truth,More ragged than need was. Among the woods,And o'er the pathless rocks, I forc'd my way Until, at length, I came to one dear nookUnvisited, where not a broken boughDroop'd with its wither'd leaves, ungracious signOf devastation, but the hazels roseTall and erect, with milk-white clusters hung.A virgin scene ! – from ‘Nutting’ William Wordsworth

40. The Lake District

41. Ralph Waldo Emerson

42. Henry David Thoreau

43. Knife Edge Trail - Katahdin

44. John MuirThe Romantic-Transcendental Preservation Ethic

45. John Muir’s House and Ranch

46. John Muir and Theodore Roosevelt at Yosemite

47. George Perkins Marsh

48. Gifford PinchotThe Resource Conservation Ethic

50. Possible Values of Nature • Instrumental value – a thing is valuable because it is useful to humans • Intrinsic value – a thing is valuable in and of itself – valuable because it exists