Conservation Biology What is Conservation Biology The scientific

Conservation Biology

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

Organizing principles/ethics of Conservation Biology (from Soulé) 1. The diversity of species and ecosystems should be preserved 2. The untimely (human-caused) extinction of populations and species should be prevented 3. Ecological complexity should be maintained 4. Evolution should continue 5. Biological diversity has intrinsic value

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

Conservation – the act of protecting from loss or depletion

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

A (Very) Brief History of Conservation

Live Abalone on California Coast

Red Abalone Shell

Shell midden on California Coast

Close up of Midden

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

Robin Hood

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 …”

Dust Bowl Storm – early 1930’s

After a Dust Storm

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

Endangered Species Act - 1973

Yellowstone National Park – established 1872

Wilderness Act - 1964

Roman sewers and aqueducts

Rachel Carson – Silent Spring - 1962

First Earth Day - 1970

Cuyahoga River, Cleveland, Ohio On fire 1952 Pollution 1969

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

Rio Earth Summit - 1992

Kyoto Protocol - 1997

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

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

Diversity – Aesthetically pleasing

Moral – It is ethically right to act in some ways and ethically wrong to act in other ways

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 that creeps upon the earth. ” – Genesis 1: 26 Revised Standard Version

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 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

St. Francis of Assisi 13 th Century Painting

Ecological

Development of Conservation Ethics in the U. S.

Adam and Eve expelled from the Garden of Eden

The Romantics William Wordsworth 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 steps Towards the distant woods, a Figure quaint, Trick'd out in proud disguise of Beggar's weeds Put on for the occasion, by advice And exhortation of my frugal Dame. Motley accoutrement ! of power to smile At 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 nook Unvisited, where not a broken bough Droop'd with its wither'd leaves, ungracious sign Of devastation, but the hazels rose Tall and erect, with milk-white clusters hung. A virgin scene ! – from ‘Nutting’

The Lake District

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Henry David Thoreau

Knife Edge Trail - Katahdin

John Muir The Romantic-Transcendental Preservation Ethic

John Muir’s House and Ranch

John Muir and Theodore Roosevelt at Yosemite

George Perkins Marsh

Gifford Pinchot The Resource Conservation Ethic

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

Aldo Leopold the Evolutionary -Ecological Land Ethic

Aldo Leopold on horseback in Arizona – rider on left

Aldo And Dog At the Shack

The First Oakies at the Shack