In a world where environmental issues can be brutally divisive, our success at Manomet has come from a unique ability to bring people together around the table to talk.
For the past 35 years, we've used science to diffuse confrontation so that communities, industry, and government can work together to develop practical strategies that improve conditions for wildlife, habitats and people.
Read About Manomet's 2006 Conservation Agenda >>
Healthy Forests, Healthy Water
We are what we drink, yet most of us take pure, clean tap water for granted.
Pause for a moment and consider how many people in developing countries are not able to drink the water coming into their houses – if they even have central plumbing. Despite the proliferation of pricey bottled waters, tap water is as good or better, according to Marion Nestle, a professor of nutrition at New York University and author of the forthcoming "What to Eat" (North Point Press).
How do we assure that the source of our drinking water remains pure and safe? “Water quality is the end result of all activities large and small in the watershed of our drinking water supply,” says Clif Read of the Massachusetts Department of Conservation and Recreation (MDCR) Quabbin Visitor Center in Belchertown.
Rain and snowmelt washing off the landscape and drain into reservoirs, eventually to be drawn into the intakes and transported to our communities. In essence, keeping the landscape clean and free of pollutants is the first line of defense against contamination. Manomet Scientists John Hagan and Ethel Wilkerson have been researching small feeder streams in the western mountains of Maine for the past 5 years, measuring plants, amphibians, and physical characteristics of 15 streams as part of Manomet’s Headwater Stream study. Hagan says the study was designed to detect how much of a forest buffer is needed to protect ecological values from the impacts of timber harvesting. “To maintain unsilted water, a small buffer is needed. For cool unsilted water, you need more, and it ramps up from there,” says Hagan.
Forests stabilize the soil and prevent erosion, and attenuate peak runoff. Water flowing out of New England’s vast forested landscapes often ends up in reservoirs—our drinking water. (Actually, a fair proportion is UNDERGROUND, not on the surface.) Two stand out:
- Quabbin and Wachusett Reservoirs in central Massachussetts are the supply sources to 46 metropolitan Boston, Metro West, and several central Massachusetts communities.
- Sebago Lake in southern Maine is the water source for 200,000 Portland Water District (PWD) customers in 11 Greater Portland communities.
The MDCR manages 56,000 acres of land in the Quabbin watershed, and it is 99% forested. “Forested landscapes provide best land cover for water quality, filtering incoming precipitation through canopy layers and soil,” says Read.
Portland Water District owns 2750 acres of forest near the intakes at the south end of Sebago Lake. Their forester prefers softwood tree cover because the acids in the leaves of deciduous trees react with the water, and a year-round canopy helps reduce erosion during heavy spring and fall rains.
Of all the possible human land uses, forestry is the best for providing clean water. Still, forestry has to be done “right” to keep the water as clean and clear as it would be if no human activity were taking place. Forest buffers provide that huge ecological service to us, for free.
New Conservation Tool for Hemispheric Wetlands & Habitats
A standardized tool to assess conservation priorities on 30 million acres of wetlands in the Western Hemisphere
Shorebird Reserve Network (WHSRN) means the sites will have a better chance of being managed. These 63 sites are key places for shorebirds, and having
their landowners commit to their conservation by using Manomet's new site assessment tool is a great achievement. Despite their protection, virtually
all sites face problems, from tourism pressures to water scarcity, climate change, invasive species, and lack of funds for management and law
enforcement the list is long. Understanding these issues and having a current network-wide picture of the status of the sites is critical for WHSRN to set priorities for conservation action at the hemispheric level, as well as for targeted advocacy and fundraising.
Network-wide assessment demands a systematic approach. In response, WHSRN's site assessment tool is directed at conservation planning at individual sites as well as network-wide. It has the following main goals:
- Review the state of conservation at WHSRN sites.
- Identify the critical threats at the sites and the conservation actions in need.
- Assess the effectiveness of site management and conservation efforts.
- Help sites engage in adaptive management by identifying priorities for action, information gaps, monitoring needs, and successes and failures in management and conservation actions.
- Provide standardized information for a network-wide analysis of the status of sites for use in priority setting, conservation action planning and advocacy.
- Contribute to wider protected area monitoring schemes, especially the Important Bird Area monitoring in the Americas and the assessment of status of Ramsar Sites.
The intention is not to "rank" WHSRN sites; instead, a greater value comes after a second assessment enables comparisons of progress and change. The careful balance between thoroughness and ease of use will enable sites to carry out assessments every three years. "We hope to get 20 sites on board and committed to start assessments by November this year," said WHSRN conservation specialist Iván Darío Valencia. Individual sites will benefit by having an overview of their situation in the context of the network, being able to draw experiences from fellow sites.
WHSRN's Site Assessment Tool contributes to a critical aspect of conservation science: monitoring the state of protected areas around the world. It incorporates methods developed and employed by World Conservation Union (IUCN), BirdLife International, The Nature Conservancy (TNC) and World Wildlife Fund (WWF). Our network and site partners provided feedback. It was field-tested and revised in pilot projects last fall at Copper River Delta, the Upper Bay of Panama, and the Fraser River Estuary. Through partnerships, the assessments will contribute directly to the monitoring of Important Bird Areas (IBAs) in the Americas promoted by BirdLife International and to the evaluation of the status of Ramsar sites, given that many WHSRN sites share these designations as well.
Pesticides & Human Health
Pesticide impacts to both humans and wildlife vary from a minor skin rash to cancer or respiratory illness. Currently,
monitoring of humans is limited to workers who are most at risk of contamination due to exposure to highly toxic compounds in their workplace. But history provides sober guidance when it comes to pesticide exposure: humans are often the unintended targets of chemical contamination. Studies have linked Parkinson’s Disease, for example, with occupational exposure to herbicides and insecticides and to farming.
Human exposure in home and recreational environments, and occupational exposure to compounds of low and moderate toxicity are not monitored; very little wildlife and environmental monitoring occurs. “What makes it difficult for society is that response to chemicals is not black and white. Response is very individual; each person or animal has a different ability to detoxify, depending on their genetics, nourishment, even personal habits,” says Manomet senior scientist Kathy Parsons.
Like the proverbial canary in the coal mine, wildlife responses to pesticides signal potential problems to human health before the connection is clinically made. “Case histories offer real life examples of situations where wildlife has clearly been the sentinel for those effects,” says Parsons, pointing out how the extreme impacts of DDT on wildlife were well documented in Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring. DDT falls into an early class of pesticides called organochlorines (OCs) that persist in the environment for long periods – even decades. Use of DDT in the US was banned January 1, 1973, but it has a half life of 65 years. That means that in 2038 half the DDT would be degraded.
Subsequent generations of pesticides provide little relief. The current suite of chemicals containing endocrine disruptors are found not only in pesticides, but plastics, detergents – things we are exposed to in daily life. “In my mind DDT is one of the best examples. Since Silent Spring heralded serious wildlife impacts, we have found organochlorines and endocrine disruptors are having human impacts,” says Parsons. “The studies are compelling; there is a huge weight of evidence making the case.”
Manomet sponsored a workshop that brought together wildlife, toxicology, and human health professionals to share information and plan strategies for better collaboration. “I feel we can partner with public health officials now that we did that project,” says Parsons. “We can help the people studying human health associations bring more attention to public health issues, and they can help us to bring attention to wildlife issues.”
No Pleasure Cruise
This summer Manomet senior Scientist Stephen Brown will join Arctic National Wildlife Refuge bird biologist Steve Kendall on an
exploratory survey of the Arctic coastal plain. Their goal is to witness the extent to which adult and young-of-the-year shorebirds such as
Semipalmated Sandpiper and Red-necked Phalarope use coastal waters, mudflats and river deltas as staging areas prior to southward migration. Over six
weeks, the team aims to survey 100 miles of coastline and traverse several major rivers, navigating around icebergs and polar bears in a rigid-hull
inflatable outboard. The team is not sure what to expect, as they are the first team to attempt such a study. Read more about the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge with our current timeline.
Editorial: Re-stating the Case of a Strong Land Ethic
Public debate over the future of North Woods timberlands – a future that will directly or indirectly affect the entire region's long-term economy and character – has been muted. Why hasn't this grabbed the attention of people? One theory is that the strong land ethic that was sown and watered by the likes of Teddy Roosevelt, Aldo Leopold, and John Muir has been superceded by an even more pressing issue: global warming.
Last fall Manomet issued a report documenting wholesale land ownership change in the Northern Forest region: 252 land transactions since 1980 amounting to approximately 24 million acres of timberland sales in the Northern Forest region of New York, Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine. That acreage represents an area almost the size of the entire Northern Forest region, although in some cases the same land may have changed hands more than once. The only large industrial landowner left in Maine is Irving Corporation, a privately held New Brunswick family company. The mill owners - names we have equated with the North Woods for decades like Great Northern, International Paper, Boise Cascade – have divested of their land base.
In doing so, most required wood supply contracts of the new owners ranging anywhere from 20 to 40 years. What happens after these contracts expire is anyone's guess. Plum Creek Timber Company provides one clue. The company name belies its real business: Plum Creek is actually a real estate investment trust that wants to convert between 10,000 and 11,000 acres of working timberland into resorts, houselots, and RV parks around Maine's Moosehead Lake – the largest development project the state has ever seen. Real estate values are superceding timber values as the “management” strategy.
It's not that people don't care about land stewardship. Recent furor over hunting rights on the proposed addition of the Katahdin Lake tract to Baxter State Park shows people have strong opinions. Polls show that when asked, people express concern - if not outrage - at the way the North Woods are being put up for sale to the highest bidder.
Perhaps individuals feel powerless to confront questions as broad as the future of 26 million forested acres in northern New England. Have we become numb in the face of global warming, something seemingly too big for individual action to have an effect?
Global warming transcends not only the land stewardship debate, but all others. It steamrolls questions of forests, biodiversity, wildlife, oceans, and air quality with the simple pronouncement: if earth's temperature rises five degrees, nothing else will matter. Forests will die, as will wildlife, fish, and inhabitants of every ecosystem altered by warming. Climate change is, in author Bill McKibben's words, “the one overarching global civilizational challenge that humans have ever faced.”
Global warming is tied to emissions of CO2 and other greenhouse gasses, so it is usually discussed in the same breath as Energy. How we heat, light, and drive our civilization has become our central environmental concern. Today, Kilowatts have become what whales were in the 70's, the icon of responsible living and environmental motivation. It's not because the cost of oil hovers at $60 a barrel. Now, we hear about “peak oil” – the theoretical point when world oil production peaks and then gradually declines as oil reserves are gradually depleted. Siting wind farms, LNG terminals, and government rebates for solar power projects dominate the discussion.
Global warming is real. City, state, and local governments are catching up to the science and heeding the warnings. But this is no time to ignore the other environmental issues that are just as pressing, if not “overarching.” People can still have an impact in shaping their communities for a more livable future with less sprawl and vibrant natural features. Our forests, rivers, and bays need their Keepers and advocates as much as ever. To ignore them is to give up hope. And hope is nature's strongest tonic. We can't give up on that.
The opinions expressed in this editorial are those of the writer and do not necessarily reflect the views of Manomet Center for Conservation Science management or staff.
