A conservation goal: Keeping the land ‘whole’

My latest newspaper column:

In fish and wildlife conservation lingo, the concept of “wholeness” is everything.

Wholeness means a whole habitat, one whose ecological values are intact, not chopped up (what conservationists refer to as “fragmented”) into smaller chunks.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, in a fact sheet for the 2002 observance of International Migratory Bird Day, states: “Habitat is defined as an area that provides the food, water, cover and space

that a living thing needs to survive and reproduce. The quality and quantity of a particular type of habitat determines the

number and variety of its inhabitants.

 

“Unfortunately, in altering or creating habitat for human uses, people often cause the loss or damage of habitat needed by birds and other wildlife. This loss and degradation of habitat has resulted in widespread declines and extinctions of many species.

 

“It is not possible for people to live and prosper without affecting their surroundings. However, people do have the ability to consider the needs of other species and can choose to modify their activities to decrease the negative effects they have on wildlife habitat.”

 

This means that the little five-acre woodlot down the street (the one with the real estate agency’s sign on it, declaring the land as “available”) has much less ecological value to native flora and fauna than the 5,000-acre (or larger) forest that grows on yonder ridge.

 

Conservationists, whether toiling in Utah or New England or Pennsylvania (or any other place) know this to be the case. That’s why proposals to build mammoth land-devouring things like airports and highways and such generate lots of opposition. People who value, cherish and fight to protect Pennsylvania’s natural heritage really should be (excuse the cliché) “up in arms” over the still-alive chance that a cargo airport (isn’t “freight” airport a more accurate term?) will be constructed on terrain near Hazleton.

 

Before “authorities” allow bulldozers to be cranked to life and their land-eating blades lowered, let’s take a gander at the fate today of closed, former Air Force bases. I served at two such places that are within a one-day drive of Hazleton.

Both Griffiss AFB, near Utica, N.Y., and Plattsburgh AFB (four hours due north of Albany, N.Y.) were Strategic Air Command bomber bases. Aircrews at these, and many other SAC installations pulled what everyone referred to as “alert duty,” living together in secure dorm-style buildings referred to (no joke) as “alert facilities.” The base at Plattsburgh, not too long after the Air Force pulled out) became Plattsburgh International Airport. (In this case, unlike the Avoca airfield which still bills itself as an “international” port, the label is true as suburban Montreal, Quebec, is only an hour due north). Plattsburgh already had a 13,000-foot runway, loads of adjacent tarmac, and office space and aircraft hangars. Learn more at http://www.flyplattsburgh.com/opportunities/facilities.asp

 

Griffiss was home to a B-52 bomb wing (Plattsburgh had a fleet of the smaller FB-111 bomber). Visit http://ocgov.net/airport/tenants to learn about the civilian tenants that now operate at Griffiss International Airport. And by visiting http://ocgov.net/airport you get to see a nice aerial photograph of Griffiss. A brief look is all that’s needed to realize just how much land the place covers. Then, consider how a “cargo” airport in northern Schuylkill County would look from the air.

 

People who know the real “value” of Pennsylvania’s natural heritage (a value that covers a lot more territory than just dollars) ought to be nice, yet vocal in battling the very notion of putting a new airport near Hazleton. And think how you would reply to this question: If there’s such a grand need for a new “cargo” airfield, here or anywhere else in the Northeast or mid-Atlantic, how come the many ex-military airfields that dot a map have not already been pressed into service for such a mission?

 

Oddly, this ongoing discussion and debate brings to mind a late-afternoon chat I had with a pickup truck driver on a road splitting apart a Pennsylvania Game Commission holding in the Lehigh River watershed. The motorist (also a hunter, as evidenced by the .30-.06 rifle in the window rack behind his head), lamented that he didn’t see one white-tail, not even one, while driving down the road.

Give everyone, not just license buyers, a chance to fund conservation

That’s the theme of my latest newspaper column. You can read it here.

Some good words for ancient trees, aka ‘old growth

I recall standing next to giant old-growth trees in the Grove of the Patriarchs, a wonderful place within Mt. Rainer National Park. When I got to Pennsylvania two decades ago, after three years of hiking and watching big trees in the Adirondacks, I was chagrined to find only pole sticks in most of the woods with a half-day’s reach of our home near the old coal mining town of Hazleton. Eventually I did see some big trees, in a niche of Ricketts Glen State Park, Pennsylvania, but as showy as they were (and still are, I hope) the trees were just that – trees – and were not really part of a forest, certainly not a forest of big old trees with ecological roles to play. Chances for me to find old-growth within the confines of a state park, Nescopeck, I visited for days on end in the 1990s were eliminated by the Pennsylvania Game Commission’s “management” of wildlife habitat – management that included the bulldozing of trees to create more edge habitat – edge habitat favored by white-tailed deer – a “game” species. Read about big old trees.

As hunting tradition wanes, conservation funding dries up

This trend has been in place for more than a decade, I’m sure. Still, nearly all states, including Pennsylvania, have not taken legislative steps to get all citizens — hunters and non-hunters alike — involved in the funding of conservation programs and efforts, like land acquisition. The Pennsylvania Game Commission, which, by the way, operates independently of the state’s fish (and boat) agency, gets nearly all of its operating dollars from hunting and trapping license revenue. Why not have all citizens involved in funding? Say one-eighth of one percent of the every state sales tax cent directed toward conservation. Missouri does this. Why can’t Pennsylvania and other states? Duh? Read the NY Times’ article about the hunting tradition and the conservation follar right here.

I especially like this quote from my friend Jerry Feaser, the Game Commission’s press secretary:

“Whole farms turned into housing developments or shopping malls,” he said. “Once that land is lost, you can’t get it back.” Right on Jerry.

New York DEC chief’s ouster not a popular move

That’s putting it lightly. A too-gentle headline from the Buffalo News for this fine editorial. The New York Department of Environmental Conservation, by the way, looks after the more than three million acres of public land that’s part of the six-million-acre Adirondack Park. And, unlike Pennsylvania which stupidly still has four entirely separate agencies tasked with enforcing (among other things) enforcing conservation and environmental regulations), New York has one, the DEC, which, in turn, has divisions for this and that. Why? Because Pennsylvania refuses to allow the non-hunting and non-fishing resident participate in the actual funding of on-the-ground conservation work. That’s why the state Game Commission (not “wildlife”) still depends almost exclusvively on the revenue from the sale of hunting and trapping licenses for its operating revenue. And that’s why the state Fish and Boat Commission similarly gets operating revenue from the sale of licenses. And that’s why the revenue from the sale of “trout stamps” goes almost exclusively into operating fish hatcheries to continue the debacle of put-and-take fisheries across the state. The Fish and Boat Commission actually buy land to protect a stream? Are you kidding.

In face of rneweed ESA listing, Idaho F&G to explore wolf hunt possibility

This is predictable. All the way. Extremely so for a wildlife agency that’s dependent on the revenue from license/tag sales for its budget dollars. It is time – NOW – for states to bring all citizens to the management table. To do that, all citizens – hunters and non-hunters alike – should participate in the funding of their state’s wildlife agency. Missouri does so by dedicating a slice of every sales tax penny to funding its conservation department. Just the whole notion of a state having a “game” agency, like Pennsylvania’s Game Commission, is way behind the time. Read what Idaho wants to do now that the wolf has been returned to the Endangered Species Act list.