Guardians of
GREEN MEET FOUR LOCALS WORKING TO PRESERVE THE HEALTH OF OUR PLANET AND THE ECOLOGY OF THE SUNSHINE STATE
A half-century ago, school kids were taught that they could survive the nuclear apocalypse by ducking under desks. These days, it’s an ecological apocalypse they worry about—and there’s not much we can tell them to do to prevent the climate from warming or the water from continuing to creep up our shorelines. Still, there’s hope. From sea life to sea level change, meet the people on the front lines of the fight to save the planet. They toil in the obscurity of government, fight in courtrooms, and wrestle bureaucracy in board meetings, all in an effort to advocate for the ecological future of South Florida.
By ERIC BARTON | Portrait Photography by AUSTEN AMACKER
JESSICA HARVEY: TRACKING THE CREATURES HER FATHER PAINTS You likely know of Jessica Harvey’s father, Guy: the painter of billfish and maker of T-shirts, who is responsible for an entire industry that sprung up around his popular ocean-centric clothing. Jessica Harvey, though, is equally as deserving of fame. She’s a project manager and board member at the Guy Harvey Ocean Foundation, a group her father founded to help protect the seas. Today, it awards grants to researchers looking to save endangered sea creatures. The younger Harvey grew up in the Caymans and went to boarding school on Vancouver Island. She studied zoology at the University of Edinburgh and has spent four years at the foundation, which is headquartered in Fort Lauderdale. Among the foundation’s projects is an effort to tag and track sharks and billfish. One of the studies found that short-fin mako sharks travel much farther than
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previously believed—some of the sharks regularly passed through the waters of 17 countries. What that means is that more coordination is needed to make sure government regulations are protecting species that are in danger or already overfished, Harvey says. The studies also found that the mako were harvested more than anyone knew, and overfishing sharks can lead to a collapse of ecosystems. “It’s an alarming rate, and if we don’t do something soon it’s going to have widespread effects on our species,” Harvey says. While it can be “super depressing and overwhelming” to work every day with studies that show just how much the oceans are threatened, Harvey says there are bright points. “If there’s anything that gives us hope, it’s the next generation that comes up with new ideas,” she says. “Our environment can bounce back if we give it a chance.”
11/29/21 2:16 PM
