The Changing Lifestyles of the Bedouin Arabs
The Bedouins are ancient clan-centered nomads of the Middle East who have relied on goatherding and camels for millennia. Abraham, for example, was a Bedouin. In modern times, the nomadic way of life, which depended on free movement and embraced a culture of both hospitality and revenge has been threatened due to land enclosures and […]
Grassroots Group Helps Restore New York Estuary
Oysters may seem like humble shellfish, but ecologically, they tower above many other species. They are a tasty food source for a variety of creatures, including humans. But more importantly, oysters help to filter pollutants from coastal estuaries, places where fresh river waters and ocean salt waters co-mingle. Fourteen out of 20 of the world’s […]
Maine Fisherman Plots Endangered Ground Fishing Ecology
Legend has it that cod, haddock, perch and other North Atlantic fish were once so plentiful off the coast of New England that fisherman could almost literally scoop them from the water. Today, that bounty is almost gone, due mainly to many decades of severe-over-fishing. Innovative research into the area fish decline is helping scientists […]
Migratory Songbirds at the Parker River National Wildlife Refuge
The Parker River National Wildlife Refuge in New Hampshire is home to a complex set of delicate interlocking ecosystems that include this barrier beach, salt marsh and wetland, a large marine estuary and a pine and oak forest. The place is especially rich in migratory songbirds. I went there on a blustery New Hampshire day […]
California’s Coastal Redwood Forests
Of all the species of life on earth, none are as grand a symbol of life’s majesty and diversity as the giant redwood trees of Northern California and the coastal ecosystems in which they have grown for tens of millions of years. I visited a small and precious preserve and talked to rangers and an […]
Gary Snyder: Poet and Zen Bio-Regionalist (Earth Day)
For nearly 60 years, Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Gary Snyder has combined an environmental awareness shaped by America’s Far West with a Zen Buddhist perspective that celebrates and reveres the natural world.