The Red List and the Sixth Extinction

Since 1994, the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) has been compiling a list of endangered species. Today, the IUCN Redlist is the standard for finding out about the status of more than 49,000 endangered species.

Last year, the IUCN began work on a Redlist for ecosystems. Scientists are aware that you can't save species without saving their ecosystems. Further, that it's the wrong type of thinking to ask how many species an ecosystem "needs" to thrive. Last week studies described in the New York Times showed that more species in an arid ecosystem allowed it to function better.

The same article described a major assessment of life's different animal groups and the news is not good. For example, 25% of assessed mammals and 41% of assessed amphibians are threatened. Why it went under the title "Are we in the midst of a sixth extinction?" is a mystery when the answer is obvious.

Facing up to the Extinction Crisis

This is the time of year I start going a little crazy. It has nothing to do with doing my taxes, which I did remarkably early this year, or any crazy weather phenomena. It has everything to do with our upcoming Ecofest (signup starts on Monday) and whether we’re going to finally start taking the crisis in species loss seriously enough to do something about it.

As I research topics to blog about, including news items this week like Whole Foods finally agreeing to stop selling overfished species, pesticides being linked to honeybee decline (bees pollinate one third of the food we eat such as tomatoes, beans, apples and strawberries, so their decline has a huge effect on our food supply), and the Koch brothers, starring in the new documentary, Koch Brothers Exposed (stay tuned for a screening on campus), funding climate change denialism (I’m late to the party here, Greenpeace reported this in 2010), I keep coming back to endangered and extinct species.

It’s a bewildering crisis, with the dubious distinction that many of the species that populated our picture books when we were kids and ultimately fired our imaginations and dreams are suffering enormous declines due to habitat loss, pollution, introduction of invasive species, over-exploitation and climate change. These are all human-induced causes yet we live our lives as if this is someone else’s problem. Ultimately, we are impoverishing not only our wellbeing, because we rely on ecosystem services (with the ecosystem’s resident species) for clean water and filtering the air, we are impoverishing our imaginations and the imaginations of future generations by allowing so many species under our stewardship to go extinct. In addition, apart from whatever benefit we may enjoy from sharing the planet with so many diverse species, each species has its own inherent right to exist.

What drives me crazy is how little attention we’re paying to it. Clean/alternative/green energy has been soaking up more than its fair share of the environmental news pie but the reality is that if we were to develop an eco-friendly fuel to power our homes, cars, businesses and so on today we would still have the problem of over-consumption of natural resources, deforestation and the main drivers of species loss. We need to show more imagination in understanding and solving our environmental problems. 

(I think what also drives me a little crazy is that we don't yet have a proper way to grieve for the species that we know we've lost. Since I heard the story of the golden toad on a trip to Costa Rica, I've been haunted by it: brilliantly colored males seen mating with females in temporary pools in the mountains of Monteverde for a few weeks in the spring... discovered in the 1960's, not seen outside the mating period, hundreds seen in the late 1980's, then only a few, then one year, only one golden toad searching in vain for a mate.)

This week in the New York Times, Thomas Lovejoy reported on the Planet Under Pressure conference in London. The upshot is that we’re failing to act with the scale and urgency needed. We spend our days worrying about the financial system, when really, we should be devoting our energies to understanding the workings of earth’s biological systems and making sure that they remain fully functioning. As Aldo Leopold wrote, “the number one rule of intelligent tinkering is saving all the parts”.

As always, the first step is to educate ourselves. Here at BU, you can check out the screening of the documentary Call of Life, at Rich Hall this Sunday at 7pm or at the Core House on Monday night (also at 7pm). We’ll provide the eco-friendly pizza. 

Green Things I Did in 2011

Here are some daily and special event things I did last year to reduce my ecological footprint and become more aware of other species around. This may give you some ideas or you may have some ideas to share about how we can all be greener in 2012.

1. Switched to essential oils-based dish soap and detergent to reduce input of chemicals into the water stream when washing.

2. Switched to Honey Mango Moisturizing Shave Cream, again to reduce input of chemicals onto my body and into the water stream.

3. Switched to a vegetable oil-based body soap for the same reasons as above.

4. Switched to a green electricity supplier, from a wind farm in upstate New York. You can probably do this too, for about the same rates, if you call your energy company.

5. Ran in the 5K Race Against Extinction on April 17 in Artesani Park in Boston, organized by the polar bear himself, Jeff Neterval, to help raise awareness about the present extinction crisis. Proceeds went to Conservation International and the World Wildlife Fund .

6. Looked for the Asian Longhorn Beetle, an invasive species that is devastating North American forests. This was a chilly April day, but luckily we didn’t find any infestations on the grand trees of Commonwealth Avenue.

7. Chaired the organization of BU’s second annual Ecolympics (http://www.bu.edu/core/ecolympics/), which featured eco-film nights with vegan pizza, a talk on Fair Trade chocolate, a vegetarian cooking class and demo and almost 200 participants taking shorter showers, using re-usable cups, recycling and otherwise reducing their environmental footprints. The US Olympic Committee wrote to me demanding that I change the name under threat of lawsuit, so in 2012 we’ll be known as Eco-Fest.

7. Joined MassAudubon (http://www.massaudubon.org/) and visited four of their nearby wildlife sanctuaries.

8. Got a home energy assessment and found out my insulation was good.

9. Closed my Bank of America account because of their investment in coal mining.

10. Ate vegetarian or vegan more than once a week. This from a lifelong proud meat-eater is something. Check out the book, Comfortably Unaware (http://comfortablyunaware.com/) by Richard Oppenlander, if you want some hard-hitting statistics on how the 70 billion animals raised to feed 7 billion people is affecting our planet.

11. Unfortunately, I also took four trips that required flying more than four hours each way, which nullifies the gains that I made. Anyone know of a reliable carbon offset supplier? According to the New York Times maybe this will soon be added to our tickets?

12. Read or started reading some environmental classics like Henry Beston’s The Outermost House, Edward Abbey’s Desert Solitaire, and Aldo Leopold’s A Sand County Almanac. These are all fine books that will inspire you to be more aware of the impact we have on our surrounding environment.

13. Went on several walks at the Arnold Arboretum in the hopes of being able to understand trees better, even just learning their names.

14. Bought tree-free paper at CVS! 

So far, the shortlist for 2012 includes getting a bird feeder and composting at home and the office.

A Marine Life Encyclopedia

It should be a no-brainer that nature is worth preserving, but given the fact that our minds are more on material goods, we need constant reminders of the beauty of nature. Like this Marine Life Encyclopedia from the New York Times that tells me we live in an amazingly diverse world and we need to tune into it and our effect on it before it all slips right through our fingers.

Scan through the 16 photos in the above slideshow -- how many times did you say "Wow"?