Headwaters Magazine - Fall 2017

Headwaters

Fall 2017

The University of Vermont’s Student-Run Environmental Publication

The Values Edition

Featured Artist: Victoria Pinheiro

U

VM alumnus Victoria Pinheiro’s work brings artistic expression to the forefront of environmental science. Working as a graphics specialist for the EarthLab & Climate Impacts Group at the University of Washington allows her a chance to use communication skills to convey environmental messages in a professional environment while still pursuing her graduate education.

Pinheiro received her first masters degree from UVM in Natural Resources, and worked in the Rubenstein School’s Ecosystem Science Lab.The pieces on display here are part of a series on zooplankton; the invertebrates are tinged with bright colors to highlight and showcase their complex systems.

By Connor Brustofski, Managing Designer

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Contents – Fall 2017 VALUES EDITION

FEATURES It’s An Everybody Problem

We Talk About Climate Change All The Time

The Power of Play

BY LEON BICK How playful minds could save the world 17

BY HALSEY PAYNE An Op-Ed on environmental values and how environmentalists frame arguments 13

Divestment at UVM

BY EMILY DAROGA | PAGE 4

BY ALANA REDDEN We just don’t realize it yet 25

Infertile Soil Brought Me to Haiti

BY JULIA PUPKO | PAGE 9

No Cars Necessary

BY IAN LUND | PAGE 5

Oyster-tecture

BY ADAM WESCHLER | PAGE 7

University Sentinel

BY GORDON COATES | PAGE 11

The Blue Revolution

BY SARA KLIMEK | PAGE 16

Photo by Julia Pupko

Trump Forest

BY LIAM MACKENZIE | PAGE 20

California Condor

BY JASPER BARNES | PAGE 21

Search & Rescue

Building a Better Burger

BY JOSCIE NORRIS | PAGE 26

BY MADELINE REILLY | PAGE 23

Vermont’s Hidden Landscape Photo by Joscie Norris

All images (unless otherwise noted) courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

Cover by Marisa Cigliano

BY TYLER PHILBROOK | PAGE 29

Contact us at uvmheadwaters@gmail.com Copyright © 2017 Headwaters Magazine All Rights Reserved.

@UVMHEADWATERS | UVMHEADWATERS.ORG

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Dear Reader, Welcome to the Fall 2017 edition of Headwaters Magazine, the University of Vermont’s student-run environmental publication. In the year since our first print publication was released, we have explored many of the nuances of environmental journalism in an attempt to define what we, as a publication, stand for. Our vision of crafting a legacy of informed student commentary on local, national, and global environmental issues remains a guiding beacon, but our staff and readers are constantly pushing us to do more, to be more.

Margaret Mead once said: “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.” Our small group of writers, editors, designers, and business associates see this magazine as our way of changing the world. We hope that the values we highlight in our pages present diverse viewpoints and inspire challenging dialogue; that they plant a seed of change.

In these pages, our contributors explore what Headwaters means to them. They watch in awe as a Peregrine Falcon takes up residence on UVM’s campus. They explore the radical concept of play. They discover what they stand for, and what they can no longer tolerate. I am proud to have seen these writers develop their values and abilities throughout the course of this semester. Now, I am proud to share their work with you.

Our magazine is made possible by the generous support of many people, including but not limited to UVM’s Environmental Program, the Rubenstein School of Environment and Natural Resources, our advisor Josh Brown, the Student Government Association at UVM, and the students who spent hours writing, editing, and designing these pages.

Love,

Jessica NeJame President, Headwaters Magazine University of Vermont ’19

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Divestment at UVM An Op-Ed on the moral basis of divestment at UVM

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BY EMILY DAROGA

he University of Vermont (UVM) paints itself as awfully green for a school still investing almost 10 percent of its total endowment in Big Oil. Each year, the school specifically markets itself toward a demographic of eager, budding environmentalists, while failing to commit itself to more systematic solutions like divestment. In response to UVM’s contradictory investment decisions, its students are demanding that the University divest. Since the movement began in 2011, the investment managers have yet to budge.The Board of Trustees (BOT) continues to justify their decisions with financial reasons; environmentalists counter with a strong moral argument. The problem is that UVM’s investment managers have financial obligations to maximize profits and Big Oil is still the financial vehicle they choose to fulfill those duties. UVM willfully contributes to the industrial complexes which keep the oil industry commercially alive and fiscally well.

Across the world, Big Oil’s 931 rigs extract and produce 82.4 million barrels of fossil fuels each day. This unsustainable rate of extraction and pollution makes the oil industry one of the main institutional calamities of our time. Environmentalists are concerned with the wellbeing of future generations and our global environment. The BOT’s financial excuses do not outweigh moral demands.

It is morally imperative that we divest from fossil fuel industries. By continuing to invest in fossil fuels, UVM is complicit in the actions of an industry that is polluting our atmosphere with dramatic effects. We cannot allow ourselves to be accomplices to ecologically damaging and inhumane activities. The University of Vermont has presented itself as an institution committed to green solutions. Considering the environmental harms of carbon pollution, aligning ourselves with the fossil fuel industry is not consistent with the university’s projected values.

Though fiduciary obligations may make this process seem difficult, it is possible to create a successful portfolio without fossil fuel assets. Considering that UVM has divested from other industries, such as tobacco, for moral reasons in the past, they must again take initiative.

However, divesting may not be a simple task for the BOT. UVM’s investment managers would first have to separate out their fossil fuel assets, then determine how much they

have been earning, how they contribute to the performance of the endowment, and finally, find reasonable replacements for those assets.

Furthermore, the managers of our endowment must maintain a spending rate of 4.5 percent to cover operational costs. Since interest rates have been down since the 2008 recession, strong dividends have been a more reliable source for investment, and fossil fuel companies have large and alluring returns.

The need to cover our operational costs, coupled with low-interest rates and short-sighted investment management has provided an excuse for the BOT not to divest. But so long as fossil fuel industries continue to profit from creating the conditions for a future Earth in ruins, and so long as we benefit from those environmental costs, our fiduciary obligations do not measure against the costs of climate change. Any and all reasonable measures ought to be taken to prevent the dramatic temperature increases that will induce droughts, disrupt weather patterns, and endanger food supplies.

Thankfully, a revitalization of the divestment movement is taking place on campus. Just two weeks ago, Student Climate Culture, a student-led environmental activist group on campus, had a silent protest at a BOT meeting. This is just one example of the tireless work being done on campus to motivate our BOT to take the initiatives for divesting from fossil fuels.

Climate change presents interesting and difficult moral considerations to us all, as it increasingly puts all organisms, Earth systems, and processes at risk of total devastation. Although UVM has many LEED certified buildings, a substantial transportation system, and a scattering of compost bins across campus, so long as our investments are in fossil fuels, we are neglecting an embarrassing environmental flaw in our institution: our contribution to the persistence of the fossil fuel industries.

There are many financially-safe ways for UVM to divest. The gravity of our ecological situation cannot withstand continued investment. So long as we are invested, our University’s green image remains a facade.

Photo by Nick Wahlers

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No Car Necessary

How one German city is changing its infrastructure to become more green

BY IAN LUND

Photo by Ian Lund

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hen I was living in Freiburg, Germany I could get out of bed at 8 a.m. on any given day, take a short walk to the bakery, buy a coffee and a Bavarian pretzel, and eat while waiting for the 8:10 tram. After a 15 minute ride I would get off in the city centre and finish the five minute walk to class, passing a supermarket, drug store, movie theatre, yoga boutique, and at least three more bakeries. If I biked I would get there even faster.

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After several weeks of this morning routine, tramming or biking to school, jaunts through the Old City, biking to nearby hiking areas, and two minute walks to the grocery store or ice cream parlors, it dawned on me that not once had I felt the need for a car. Indeed, the ease with which one can move around the city is part of what makes Freiburg one of the greenest cities in the world. And after a formal introduction to how the city was planned and the guiding “Marktzentrum� (Market Center) concept, I realized the quiet genius of the urban planners’ commit-

ment to human scale. a car, stores like IKEA are intentionally placed on the outskirts of My college town, Burlington, Vermont, and my home city, the city, drawing the majority of trips by car away from the city Newton, Massachusetts, are not poorly planned, but like most citcentre and minimizing internal traffic. Additionally, industry and ies in the United States, the landscape is dominated by the automanufacturing is located outside of the city to reduce air and noise mobile. In terms of travel time, Newton residents enjoy a similar pollution. ease of access to food, school, and friends to what I experience But the city did not stop there. New high-density residential day to day in Freiburg. The operative difference is the mode of neighborhoods, like the new model sustainable district Vauban, transport: cars in the U.S., versus bikes, public transit, or walking have drug stores, supermarkets, and general stores next to, bein Freiburg. neath, or within walking distance from residences. Additionally, What makes Freiburg so convenient is decades of holistically these neighborhoods have space built in for community members reimagining the city’s form in order to improve its to run small businesses. functions. The Marktzentrum concept approaches “One focuses on the These kind of developments reflect Freiburg’s urban development from two perspectives: one fo- city’s economy as a commitment to the social, economic, and environcuses on the city’s economy as a whole, while the whole, while the other mental dimensions of sustainability. New developother focuses on developing a hyperlocal economy focuses on developing ments are designed to counter socioeconomic inequiwithin neighborhoods. ties. Mixed-income housing requirements, proximity a hyperlocal economy In the 1970s, homes and shopping centers were within neighborhoods.” to the robust public transportation system, and easy popping up around Freiburg’s periphery; suburbanaccess to daily needs means more equitable living for ization was creeping into the countryside. Concurrent with the residents no matter their social class. sprawl was increased traffic in the city, since cars were the domiEconomically, the Market Center plan supports and privilegnant mode of transportation. To counteract the depopulation and es small businesses by reserving prime real estate in the centre for congestion of its heart, the city took action to ensure that the city them while big box stores and chains still persist on the periphery, centre remained the economic and cultural hub of the region. not dominating the local economy. Additionally, it is worth noting City officials closed more than a dozen streets passing through the that government subsidies for housing, food, public transportacentre to cars and bikes, creating a large pedestrian-only zone. At tion, and community development contribute greatly to Germafirst, the local businesses opposed the decision, fearing that loss of ny’s ability to create economic equity. traffic would correspond with a loss of revenue, but after impleEnvironmentally, even though Germans make shopping trips mentation, found the development clearly to their benefit. more frequently than people in the U.S., fewer trips are made Freiburg’s closure of the Altstadt (old city centre) to cars by car, because people can so easily walk, bike, or tram to meet closely resembles the idea behind Church Street, the pedestritheir daily needs. By eliminating malls and outlet parks, Freiburg an-only uncovered mall in the heart of Burlington, albeit on a cut down on environmental problems like asphalt runoff and heat larger scale. The streets became human again-alive with musicians, islands in parking lots. performers, friends chatting over coffee, and a constant flow of Marktzentrum is a smart design strategy and should be used shoppers moving in and out of local businesses. The plan successas a guiding ideal for urban planners everywhere. By maximizing fully revitalized the heart of Freiburg, but the city did not stop access to businesses that meet people’s daily needs, the Market there.

Center concept promotes socioeconomic equity and decreases Planners made a distinction between which businesses are emissions by increasing walkability. Most U.S. cities will have a permitted to set up shop in the crowded city. There is a specific hard time making every change Freiburg has, like implementing concept list illustrating the divide. Allowed in the city are shops a robust public transit system and prioritizing bike travel over the with necessary wares like food, clothes, technology, accessories, automobile, especially in cities already characterized by sprawl. and other smaller everyday things. Products less in demand, like However, investing in small, accessible, and active town centers, fridges, furniture, cars, or pets, for example, are slightly less acimproving bike travel corridors, and phasing out parking are feasicessible. Since transporting these bulkier goods often necessitates ble long-term development goals for most cities.

Photo by Ian Lund

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OYSTER-TECTURE 7

Headwaters Magazine

How Oysters Can Help Build Resiliency into Staten Island and Beyond

BY ADAM WECHSLER “The island is destroyed” is the official statement on the ground in Puerto Rico following the September 2017 Hurricane Maria. If you were to walk around the island, you would find buildings in shambles, trees uprooted, and roofs and walls smashed beyond recognition. Downed power lines and flooded infrastructure make electricity scarce and clean water rare.

This is just the surface level devastation caused by Hurricane Maria’s 150 mile-per-hour winds and raging floodwaters. Providing short term aid and simply ensuring access to basic necessities has proven challenging. This does not even begin to address long term recovery and redevelopment challenges for the severely indebted island, leaving people wondering if Puerto Rico will ever be the same.

An innovative way to limit the impacts of storms like Maria lies in the ideas of landscape architect Kate Orff. In 2011, Orff introduced a concept on the TED stage that had the potential to change the way we think about design, urban spaces, and resilience. She calls it “oyster-tecture,” a portmanteau of “oyster” and “architecture.”

Orff proposed the construction of an artificial living oyster reef in the New York Harbor with a “woven web of ‘fuzzy rope’ that supports marine growth,” to dissipate the energy of waves and to clean millions of gallons of harbor water.

This a solution that could be implemented along other coastal areas and island nations, like Puerto Rico, to mitigate the impact of coastal storms.

In recent years, storms have become more intense and have occurred more frequently. This will only be exacerbated by sea level rise, which could increase by as much as one foot by the 2030s.

Storms like this are threatening coastal communities. Despite this threat, sea coasts are becoming increasingly urbanized and to date, 14 of the world’s 17 largest cities are located along coasts. These cities could house up to 61 percent of the global population by 2030. We are becoming a “city planet” as environmentalist Stewart Brand likes to say, a planet in which 80 percent of human populations live in cities.

This hurricane season, since September 24th, two Category 4 and two Category 5 hurri-

canes ravaged the Atlantic–all in the span of about four weeks. Vermont State Climatologist Lesley-Ann Dupigny-Giroux stated in a recent video that “to have that many [Category 4 and 5] hurricanes moving through the same region, affecting the same land-masses, and getting up to the highest strength that’s possible … usually means that there’s something that’s changed in the entire system.”

Furthermore, this hurricane season could become the most expensive in history. The damages caused by the hurricanes that hit the mainland U.S., Harvey and Irma, may cost more than the infamous Hurricane Katrina and three other major hurricanes did in 2005. Two storms this year might have double the economic impact that four storms did in 2005. This is not normal.

New York City, one of the world’s largest cities, is no stranger to devastating storms. Superstorm Sandy landed in 2012, causing $19 billion in damages and killing 43 people throughout the city (23 in Staten Island, which was one of the most affected boroughs). People understood something had to be done to improve the resiliency of coastal cities.

In response, President Obama issued an Executive Order in December 2012, creating the Hurricane Sandy Rebuilding Task Force. The Task Force, through the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), then launched Rebuild by Design: a design competition that challenges designers from around the world to think of innovative ways to address the difficulties of rebuilding and increasing resilience in affected areas.

Orff seeks to mitigate these problems through her New York-based landscape architecture firm, SCAPE. Her firm was waiting for the right opportunity to implement oyster-tecture on a more impactful scale. In 2014, SCAPE was selected as one of six finalists of the Rebuild by Design competition with their “Living Breakwaters” design.

As a result of SCAPE’s pioneering work, New York State was awarded $60 million in funding through a HUD disaster recovery program, in order to implement the project on the Tottenville shoreline on the south shore of Staten Island.

The Staten Island Living Breakwaters Project has three primary aims: risk reduction, ecological enhancement, and social resiliency.

The project would reduce risk by implementing a three-quarter of a mile long linear system of partially submerged breakwaters between 730 and 1,200 feet from shore. The breakwaters would attenuate wave energy, protecting the shoreline from erosion and damages to nearby buildings and infrastructure.

The breakwaters will be partially comprised of bio-enhancing concrete to support oyster spat–juvenile oysters–growth, while enabling a more biodiverse habitat for fish, oysters, and other aquatic organisms, such as lobsters. Finally, the project would engage the on-shore community to help increase awareness of risk, empower citizens, and work with local schools to educate future leaders in waterfront management.

Why oysters? Although oyster-tecture is a new concept, oysters are no stranger to New York City. New York was once considered the world’s “oyster capital,” with the Hudson River estuary supporting 220,000 acres of oyster reefs in 1609. In fact, oyster reefs once covered 25 percent of the New York Harbor.

By 1906, all the oysters in the harbor had been eaten, the reefs were dredged up or covered in silt, and water quality was far too poor to support regeneration of the oysters. Hurricane Sandy

showed that this local removal of oysters has proven to be devastating.

Oysters are amazing creatures. They were the keystone species and ecosystem engineers of the New York Harbor, providing habitat for other species while building their own reefs.

Furthermore, oysters are capable of providing important ecosystem services in the region by filtering water and dissipating the energy of bombarding waves. In their former glory, the city’s oysters could filter the entire harbor within a matter of days.

A key piece of this puzzle is the oysters themselves. SCAPE has partnered with New York Harbor Foundation’s Billion Oyster Project (BOP) to actively restore the oysters. By its namesake, the BOP is an “ecosystem restoration and education project” that aims to restore one billion live oysters to New York Harbor.

The BOP has worked with over 50 schools and thousands of local students to restore the oysters, by raising juvenile oysters on land and constructing artificial reefs upon which the oysters will live, while providing authentic, place-based science education focused on oysters. To date, the BOP has restored twenty-two million oysters in the New York Harbor, but is not stopping there.

SCAPE envisions “Water Hubs” at various points along the shore to engage the Tottenville Art by Katelyn Lipton community and provide physical and visual access to the water. These Water Hubs are public centers that would host various educational and recreational programs, while promoting stewardship of and engagement with the surrounding environment. The Water Hubs are the pinnacles of this project, investing community members in the management of their shorelines and in making sure that the city is prepared for future storms. We now know there will be more storms like Sandy, but the question is, will we be ready?

The Living Breakwaters project is still in its final design stages, but once finished will be an example to coastal cities around the world of how to incorporate resiliency and redundancy into their built environments. The design of the project is expected to be complete by the middle of 2018, and construction is expected to be completed by 2020.

Oyster-tecture is already being implemented in other parts of the country, including completed projects in Louisiana and South Carolina. However, in terms of scale, neither compare to SCAPE’s project in New York.

In this era of climate change, no idea is too visionary. We need urban designers, such as Kate Orff, to be able to think boldly and creatively to build the cities of the future, and indeed, the sustainable world we all so desperately envision.

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Photo by Julia Pupko

Infertile Soil Brought Me to Haiti The Vermont Haiti Project aims to help Haitians sustainably fight deforestation and retake their agricultural land

BY JULIA PUPKO

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e have all seen striking photos of refugees, wartorn lands, or environmental degradation that hit home. But there lies a level of unreality, a disconnect, between seeing these horrors from the safety of our homes and personally experiencing them in real life. One classic example is a 1987 photo showing the difference in forested land between Haiti and the Dominican Republic. From the photo, one can see the near-total deforestation of Haiti compared to the forested hills of the Dominican Republic. Seeing this same visual from the airplane window as I was flying into Haiti cut me deeply. Currently, Haiti has between 1.4 and 2 percent forest cover. However, Haiti was not always this way; a history of colonization, deforestation, and intensive agriculture destroyed Haiti’s once-fertile mountains.

In 1697, when the French began colonizing Haiti, the island was almost entirely covered in rainforest. Deforestation ensued immediately, as the French colonists exploited the tropical climate to produce huge cash crops of sugar, coffee, rum, cotton, and indigo. By 1789, Haiti was the richest colony in the New World.

Following the Haitian Revolution and subsequent indepen-

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dence in 1804, Western forces were terrified by the prospect of other slave-based colonies following Haiti’s lead. They sought to impede Haiti’s success as a nation through refusal to grant Haiti diplomatic recognition or set up trade agreements. On April 17, 1825, the Haitian government, struggling with a failing economy, signed the Royal Ordinance of Charles X. This granted Haiti diplomatic recognition and protection from French re-invasion in exchange for a 50 percent tariff reduction on French imports and 150 million francs indemnity to compensate for French losses. Haiti was bankrupt and had to borrow money to pay off the debt, deepening its dues to $21 billion by today’s standards. The debt was not fully paid off until 1947. Following recent natural disasters such as Hurricane Matthew, Haiti demanded that France repay all the unfair reparations that Haiti had been forced to pay France over the years, but was refused, leaving Haiti in poverty.

This economic instability led to the mass environmental degradation seen today. The forest ecosystem of Haiti was already strained by war, previous agriculture, and deforestation. With the addition of the crushing debt to France, deforestation rates hit record highs, as more land was cleared for cash crops and timber.

Since all Haiti’s resources had been channeled into paying France, deforestation and intensive agriculture continued, rather than the development of infrastructure, education, economic stability, or sustainable food production. Centuries of strain on the soil transformed Haiti from the richest colony in the New World to the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere.

It may seem strange that it has been over 60 years since Haiti finished repaying France, yet the environmental health of Haiti has only worsened. Why is the remaining forest ecosystem unable to recover in the surrounding area? The answer lies in the soil formation and characteristics of Haiti.

Soils form from a combination of five factors: parent material, climate, biota, topography, and time. Parent materials are the geological or organic precursors to the soil, such as bedrock that has been decomposed or silt deposits from a flooding river. Climate, specifically precipitation and temperature, is the most influential factor on soil formation. Climate dictates what vegetation can grow, the length of the growing season, and the nutrient content of the soil. Soils that experience periods of heavy rain are prone to erosion and leaching of nutrients. ‘Biota’ encompasses the plant and animal life in and on the soil, and the organic material (decomposing carbon-based material, such as plant or animal remains) that is added to the soil. Organic matter is very important because it holds the mineral components of the soil together in loose clumps that have enough structure to retain water, nutrients, and air—it reduces the amount of nutrients that get washed out of the soil by rain.

Based on these five factors, soils can be placed into groupings (also called orders) that share general characteristics. In Haiti, the soils are classified as Ultisols. This means that the soils are well-drained, reddish in color from iron oxidation, and frequently exposed to periods of high-intensity rain. Tropical rains in Photo by Julia Pupko Haiti leach most of the nutrients out of soils, so the remaining Ultisol is nutrient-poor.

These characteristics make Ultisols very fragile. When soil is not covered by a protective layer of vegetation, all of the organic matter and nutrients get washed out, leaving hard chunks of barren dirt that is inhospitable to plants and other organisms. The mountainous terrain of Haiti increases the amount of soil that is eroded by rain.

Infertile soil brought me to Haiti. I travelled to Haiti with Tom Tailer, one of the members of the Vermont Haiti Project (VHP). VHP is a charitable outreach program based in Vermont that works with Haitians to solve problems such as deforestation and support local business endeavors. By working with Haitians, members of VHP hope to have a lasting positive impact, as they strive to respectfully work with locals to find solutions that are

accepted by Haitian culture. In the village of Duchity, in southwestern Haiti, I joined a group of volunteers working with community members to start a school and community center, build dome-shaped shelters, and introduce bio-sand water filters and composting toilets.

The domes are small, one room structures that can function as a kitchen, home, classroom, or space for a small business. Made out of reinforced concrete panels only a few inches thick, the resulting structures are sturdy enough to withstand intense storms.

A 24-foot wide dome survived Hurricane Matthew, while the reinforced concrete walls of the building next door collapsed.

The bio-sand water filters are made from similar, smaller panels containing a biological filter system that uses benign bacteria to digest harmful bacteria, such as E. coli. The composting toilet, which Tom lovingly refers to as the Ka-ka Production System (KKP System), produces compost which is used to create healthy soil.

The toilet consists of a raised bed made from concrete panels and an outhouse. The raised bed contains a thick layer of low-grade biomass, such as lawn clippings or weeds, and a layer of soil on top. The toilet is then used, with biochar (charcoal from cooking fires) added with each use to absorb nutrients and fertilize the soil.

After the raised bed is half-way filled with this mixture, the outhouse is removed and a solar-cooker is placed over the raised bed for a month to kill most of the harmful pathogens by heating the raised bed to temperatures above 140º F. We did not have enough time to thoroughly test the solar-cooker, but were delighted to find that a thriving community of fungal hyphae, roots, and grubs had already turned the fecal matter-charcoal combination into soil, rich in carbon and organic matter. The treated soil could then be relocated to start reforestation or used as a garden.

While the soil degradation in Haiti is heartbreaking, I believe that there is hope. Haiti has been fighting a long battle, first for independence, and now a continued battle for the improvement of the land.

As Haitians say, “Beyond mountains, there are mountains.” After overcoming one obstacle, there are always more to overcome, and destroyed soil in a naturally fragile ecosystem is an enormous mountain to scale.Working with Haitian vocational students, I was filled with joy over their excitement to work on projects that they have found to benefit life in their community. Jeanfenel, one of the community members I worked with, has a vast knowledge of the plants of Haiti, how to grow them, and what to grow them with.

Hopefully, the KKP System will help Jeanfenel’s knowledge take root. Together, the bits and pieces of knowledge we all hold can come together and sprout into a strong sapling. I hope that these ideas continue to grow and evolve, so one day the saying may be “Beyond mountains, there are trees.”

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University Sentinel

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Photo by Gordon Coates

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BY GORDON COATES

n a flurry of motion, two birds became one silhouette against the blue sky. I could see a pair of wings flapping hard, but the other pair dragged upside down through the air. For a moment, I was stunned at what had happened. I took off after them as fast as my bicycle would carry me. The local Peregrine Falcon had just made a kill over Main Street.

In that moment, nothing else mattered. I raced past Jeffords Hall barely looking at the road, my attention on tracking the birds through the sky. The falcon had brought his prize to the top of Stafford Hall, next to the water tower. I stood in awe of the magnificence of nature that was happening just one hundred feet away from me. Luckily I had my binoculars, and could get a closer look at the action.

I watched the feathers fly as the falcon began his dinner. He took a couple of victory laps, taking off and flying around only to land in the same place and continue eating. Always wary of his surroundings, he was constantly checking on me and looking around.

Since falcons are not large birds, they are at risk of bigger raptors stealing their prey. This particular falcon’s small sized indicated he was male. Peregrine Falcons are a sexually dimorphic species, with males being smaller on average than females. He continued sizing me up, judging whether I was a threat. I must have passed his test, for he continued consuming his prey. After some time he took off from his perch atop Stafford Hall, flew down behind the Marsh Life Science building, and landed on top of the new central campus dorms. I followed close behind.

I stood outside the dorms for another hour with my camera and binoculars as the skies grew gray and the light faded. As a self-proclaimed “bird nerd,” I did not want to miss a second of this experience. “What’s that you’re doing?” I heard an authoritative voice say, causing me to pull my head from my camera’s viewfinder.

It was a campus police officer. Someone had reported a suspicious person with a camera and binoculars outside of the dorms. “I am so sorry, sir,” I said, launching into an excited rant on how impressive this was. “I just watched a Peregrine Falcon take a bird from the air.” He took my over-excited explanation in stride and left me to continue my observations. Not wanting to concern any other passerby, I hopped on my bike and pried myself away from the bird.

In the weeks prior to this stunning event, I had seen the falcon quite often, so often that I began calling him Perry. Birds tend to have natural schedules, and he reliably perched on the water tower

by Jeffords every day at generally the same time. As soon as I got out of class, I would walk over to hang out underneath him. I was not the only one aware of Perry’s presence. Every day I was there, people would notice me observing the falcon. Most people would glance at me, glance upward, and return to me with a confused expression. For those who asked what I was doing, I tried my best to teach them what I knew about Peregrine Falcons, hoping some of the information might pique their own curiosity about this charismatic species.

Photo by Gordon Coates

I began to wonder why Perry was hanging out in the middle of a college campus. Peregrine Falcons used to be on the endangered species list and were very rare on the east coast due to DDT poisoning. DDT, a pesticide that was heavily used in the mid1900s, would get transferred up the food chain until eventually it reached apex predators like the Peregrine Falcon. The chemical did not directly kill falcons, but instead caused their egg shells to be very thin so that most of the eggs were not viable. This caused populations to drop severely. However, thanks to an extensive captive breeding program reintroducing falcons back to their natural range and habitat in the past decade, the Peregrine Falcon has made a comeback, according to The Journal of Raptor Research.

In nature, Peregrines nest on steep cliffs where they are far from danger and can search for prey like ducks, pigeons, and other medium-sized birds. Their hunting technique is to fly high above their prey and then dive bomb, killing on impact. The fastest animal on the planet, the Peregrine Falcon is capable of reaching speeds over 200 miles per hour in their dive. Part of the reason the Peregrine population was able to bounce back is the species’ ability to adapt to the cityscape.Tall buildings like those at UVM essentially function as man-made cliffs, and prey like Rock Doves–more commonly known as pigeons–are in abundance. It made sense that

Perry had decided to take up residence atop the water tower.

Perry sits above all, his chest puffed out and his eyes watching over campus. Calm and separated, I like to think of him as the University of Vermont’s sentinel. He is the apex predator of the skies and is one of the most impressive beings to watch move and interact with his environment.

To me, Perry is the epitome of wildness: he provides a connection to nature despite the urban setting of campus. Anyone and everyone can see Perry and begin to build a relationship with the surrounding natural world. I was happy to see that for every person that was confused by my actions, there was one who knew about the falcon and had already began building a relationship of their own with him.

For people who are not bird nerds, seeing a Peregrine Falcon in their backyard is a window into the world of nature. By observing and learning about these birds of prey, people will begin to care about what happens to falcons like Perry. At the very least, they will gain a deeper appreciation and awareness for the natural world. Perry, and other wildlife ambassadors like him, can catalyze a greater conservation effort for birds and all wildlife.

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IT’S AN EVERYBODY PROBLEM An Op-Ed on environmental values and how environmentalists frame arguments

BY HALSEY PAYNE

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decided to be an environmentalist five years ago. The planet seemed like it was disintegrating and no one around me was paying much attention to it—which was worrying. Experts have told us that the impacts of climate change could kill billions of people. Forests will wither, many farms will dry out, ocean life will die, and cities will drown.The potential for mass tragedy and violence that could be caused by people scrambling for land and resources is barely imaginable.

The people who pay attention to these upcoming disasters know the next century may be catastrophic.Yet environmentalists are not looked at as rescuers, or even as necessary leaders of busi-

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nesses and governments. Instead, they are sidelined into communities of activism, science labs, or lobbying organizations, working desperately to convince business and government leaders that change must happen. There are many reasons why the movement is sidelined, but part of that sidelining comes from us environmentalists—having a poor definition of what we are.

The term “environmentalist” is broad. Former President Obama, advocating greenhouse gas emission standards, is an environmentalist. Students studying data on rising oceans and sustainable farming are part of the movement, and so is my living co-op, which buys local food and gets people talking about low-impact lifestyles. There is no gatekeeper for the environmental move-

ment; no person or group decides membership. Instead, an environmentalist is someone who has a specific ideology about the way humans can improve their relationship with the planet.

That definition is at the heart of our problem. No matter how necessary environmentalism may be, it is hard to describe, harder to implement, and easy to ignore if the language of the practice is unfamiliar. Students and experts become accustomed to the jargon— for example, “biodiversity loss” or “ocean acidification” can be talked about over coffee—but the language of environmentalism is tough to translate to my family over the Thanksgiving table.

Despite how difficult it is to describe the work of sustainability simply or briefly, environmentalists are motivated by a certain need to protect the people and planet around us. I am accustomed to reading long pieces about clean energy plans or heroic efforts to protect endangered species, all filled with the passion and invention of talented people trying to solve a problem. But the sense of urgency motivating clean energy plans gets lost in the technical language. Every human being should be able to describe in emotional terms why this work is important.

A word like “war” can be described emotionally. “War” means separated families and demolished homes, ruined economies, and mass tragedies. Every person has an immediate and visceral understanding of war. “Environmentalism” means saving families and protecting homes, repairing economies, and diverting tragedies. Yet, “environmentalism” does not carry the same immediate weight or earn the same attention as “war” — despite sharing the scale, universality, and consequences of large-scale violence.

Environmentalism tends to get pushed aside to make room for other priorities: Trump wants America to be “Great Again,” the Republican Party wants government away from business, and Bernie wants rich people to stop stealing everything. Everyone can argue over those stances, but at least we know what motivates them. How do environmentalists express what we want? What is our rallying call?

How about the Clinton campaign’s stance on climate change?

Let’s Make “America the world’s clean energy superpower and create millions of good-paying jobs, take bold steps to slash carbon pollution at home and around the world, and ensure no Americans are left out or left behind as we rapidly build a clean energy economy!” I can get behind that policy, but it will not fit on a lawn sign or work as a rally chant.

That long, bulky sentence, and the whole Clinton campaign encapsulates the problems of environmentalism: we think that strong policy can take the place of strong emotion or powerful values. Like Clinton’s carefully crafted healthcare strategies, defined budget priorities, and qualified staff, environmentalists have plans that could start tomorrow. We could begin building solar panels and replanting forests tomorrow.We could aggressively tax oil and reinvest that money in green, affordable communities, tomorrow.

We could start saving the world tomorrow. All of the plans are there, the technology is ready, and a trained corps of passionate people are prepared to get to work.

But we will not save the world tomorrow. After Presidential debates that did not mention climate change, Shell and Exxon’s plans to drill for more and more oil in the melting Arctic Circle, and an American Congress controlled by people who refuse to ad-

dress our most pressing problems, it should be painfully clear that having good plans to solve everything is not good enough.

I am bringing up the 2016 Election for a reason. President Trump’s victory, along with the empowerment of the American far right, was disruptive. “What happened?” will be asked for decades, but one part of the answer is clear already: Trump had good messaging. He was—and is—compelling. Although many environmentalists remain staunchly opposed to Trump’s rhetoric, we should learn something from him.

Trump ran a scandal-stuffed campaign that nevertheless spoke to Americans who thought their government had stopped serving them. He spoke with a loud and clear message–America is losing and I will make it great–and he won with it. No real details, but no room for confusion either, Trump defined a problem and put himself up as the only solution. He was weak on nuts-and-bolts policy; this past year has shown us how poorly-prepared his administration was to govern, but Trump only needed a message to win.

Clinton did not let her campaign take an equally simple, aggressive, risky stance to motivate American voters. Instead, she had a steady and sober message backed by complex policies and well-laid plans. It was an articulate, peer-reviewed, technical, and workable campaign, just like the IPCC recommendations for Climate Change Action. She lost. Environmentalists have lessons to learn from that loss, especially since our job has become harder after 2016 and the Republican majority that came with it.

Environmentalism was founded on and is driven by science.

Silent Spring, which started our movement, was written on an incredible base of research. So were the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, and the Endangered Species Act. Climate change, biodiversity loss, and the rest of our grand challenges are observed by a web of satellites, air samplers, test tubes, and the scientists that use them. Science allows us to understand our world, and gives us the tools to sustain it.

But, the fact that we are based in science does not mean that we should restrict ourselves to it. Most people are not scientists, or are even very scientifically literate. “Carbon dioxide,” “carrying capacity,” and “biodiversity” have weight to us–a well-trained environmentalist can make a thousand connections from each term.

But a voter in front of the evening news has more of their mind activated by threats from “immigrants!” and “terrorism!” Again, why?

Environmentalism is pushed off of the front page because fear is old and climate change is new. Trump wove fear through his platform – fears of job loss, of border security, of non-whites – and the same tricks have appeared across our art, culture, and history for millennia. A list of deeply rousing emotions occupies our ancestral memory. Trump staked out the darkest ones, but there is a brighter side: love, community, hope, and change. Clinton had excellent plans but forgot to bind them to the brighter forces on the list, the ones that inspire people to overcome fear and hatred.

Solutions to greenhouse gases and ocean acidity, no matter how many charts and citations we present them with, will never be able to compete with people’s emotions.

With that said, however talented we are at pursuing science, environmentalists are horrible at explaining environmentalism in human terms. We do not need to reinvent persuasive language

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to win the American environmental debate. We do not need new environmental jargon, better social media, or flashier graphs. We need to claim the moral high ground.

What does the high ground look like? It means standing and telling everyone that environmentalism is the greatest mission of humanity, then refusing to compromise the values that we believe in as our position is challenged. Donald Trump is an embarrassing exemplar of clear values defended well, but there are better role models that we can be proud of.

Dr. Rachel Carson supported Silent Spring through science but wrapped it in a love of humanity and natural communities.

As she saw forests wither and go silent, Carson wrote: “Man is a part of nature, and his war against nature is inevitably a war against himself.” The rest of Silent Spring’s research backed that statement, but this sentence captured her argument.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. addressed complex racial histories and hatreds, but did it through calls for unity and by owning the word “justice.”

The systemic oppression of black Americans was and is an evil, wickedly complex thing.

But King began simply: “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” That sentence told every American, of any race, why they ought to care, and declared to everyone that King was on the right side of history.

Art by Jess Savage Importantly, both King and Carson made their goals strong and simple: Dr. King and his movement declared that racism was intolerable, while Dr. Carson and the environmentalists of the 1960s and ‘70s stated that poisoning our world was insane.

Their positions were met with incredible resistance, but they could back their elegant message with a weight of knowledge and data.

I believe that American environmentalism today has all of the data it needs to prove that our country and planet are facing catastrophes. Yet, it lacks an elegant, simple sentence that all of this science can defend. Our data is so clear, and so compelling that action must be taken, that we assumed the need for our work is self-evident. In our hurry, we forgot to tell anyone why we need to save the world. Anyone can find out for themselves – the data is all there in the open–but people are motivated by emotions, not data.

We must begin speaking passionately, not scientifically: climate change should not be stopped because a carbon content above 350 parts per million is unsustainable; we should stop it because we love our children and we want to give them a planet to live on. Fisheries should not be saved because their decline endangers local economies; we should save them because we care

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about our neighbors, and their families will starve without fish.

Ecosystems should not be managed so we can preserve keystone species; we ought to tend to them because life is beautiful, and it motivates us in mysterious ways. No environmentalist entered this field merely because of the data and the jargon—we were drawn in by tremendous emotion. It is time to begin expressing ourselves.

Somewhere, there is a sentence like Carson’s or King’s that will speak for environmentalism in the 21st century. Some sentence with a certain kind of beauty can distill all of the complication behind our motivations and make people understand why this work is important. I think that we all should begin to look for our

sentence and to start our arguments and begin our conversations with it. I do not know what the perfect sentence is. But, I have two paragraphs which may become a sentence one day: Why should humanity become sustainable? Because we cannot do anything else. Every good and beautiful thing that has been made over the human millenia, every single thing that we value, needs a planet to continue on. Nothing can be right or fair that threatens the wonderful legacy of men and women who have sacrificed to build a better world for their children.

Nothing unsustainable can be excused. There is no justification for burning the next gallon of oil, no good reason for paving over the next wetland, no defense for ruining cropland that can feed the next generations. Staying silent as the world falls apart risks everything. This next century must be an uncomfortable one, defined by hard work, harsh criticism, and a message of love and duty to the future. We environmentalists must begin by putting our message on the high ground, above all the other ones—because we cannot do anything else.

The Blue Revolution Putting the benefits of aquaculture into perspective

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BY SARA KLIMEK

y uncle is a fisherman. He owns a few vessels, dock space, poles, and bait—I am a fisherman too, but I do not rely on the ocean for my catch. Instead of an ocean, I have several 600 gallon tanks, a set of oceanographic probes, and a desire to change the way humans view seafood. I am an aquaculturist.

Since 1970, oceanic wild fish populations have declined by nearly 50 percent and scientists estimate that we will run out of seafood by 2050. The crash of wild fish populations will threaten the job security of nearly 50 million people around the world.

How do scientists plan to fix our current global trajectory and halt this ecological and social nightmare?

Conservationists turn to aquaculture as a plausible solution.

Aquaculture is defined by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Organization (NOAA) as the “breeding, rearing, and harvesting of plants and animals in all types of water environments, including ponds, rivers, lakes, and the ocean.” Aquaculture is particularly valuable in arid climates and in urban spaces because its scale can be modified to the size of the setting. Backyard aquaponics, where fish and plants are grown together, has been increasing in popularity because it produces more nutrients with less waste. The fish supply nutrients to the plants, which in turn absorb toxic organic compounds. Despite aquaculture’s potential, many consumers

continue to doubt its safety to both human and environmental health.

Like any agricultural field, there are companies that choose to use aquaculture sustainably and those that do not. The media often targets unsustainable facility production methods and the direction of waste production via aquaculture systems and labels them as representative of the entire industry. However, most aquaculture systems actually have a reputable waste system, including several filters for solid waste and toxic compounds.

What the media often does not show, however, are the innovations in aquaculture that are making it an essential agricultural field. Ornamental aquaculture is especially vital to the aquarium supply and the economies of developing regions. Ornamental fish trading is so prosperous that poor fishermen facing homelessness and starvation will risk their lives to capture as many vividly-colored fish as they can. Aquarium organisms like clownfish, yellow tangs, and shrimp is often done in coral reefs via cyanide or dynamite fishing, killing coral and endangering non-target species. By growing these species in a lab, aquaculturists are able to supply the global aquarium market and protect fragile ecosystems.

I had the amazing experience of working with one ornamental species, the royal gramma, a colorful saltwater fish. This species is native to Puerto Rico, where it has been driven to near-extinction by the industrial pollution of waterways and overfishing.

My research has allowed scientists to replicate royal gramma reproduction in a larger facility, which will support sustainable harvesting practices. Continued research into species like the royal gramma will allow us to use aquaculture techniques to ensure that global aquarium markets and fish populations have a sustainable relationship.

Aquaculture has the potential to feed societies around the world. One organization, Aquaculture Without Frontiers (AWF), has gained momentum travelling to developing regions around the world to teach communities about aquaculture.They utilize resilient, warm-water fish like tilapia to help feed communities where traditional farming is not practical.

Aquaculture has also been popping up in food-desert cities where aquaponics systems help generate organic produce and fish. Inner-city programs, like those in Harlem and Berlin provide employment and engineering skills for youth while reducing the scarcity of fresh food.

Aquaculture is just a small component of the “blue revolution,” a social movement to protect our oceans. Despite the media’s harsh labelling of the industry, aquaculture professionals are motivated to identify stigmas associated with production, reduce dependency on the ocean, and provide needy communities with skills to combat food injustice. All of these components are necessary to create a more sustainable method of food and ornamental production.

Photo by Burt Lum, Flickr Headwaters Magazine

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Art by Katelyn Lipton

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BY LEON BICK

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he impacts of climate change are clear this fall in Vermont. According to meteorologists, heat records in September and October have “shattered” records. As a result, it is becoming increasingly urgent to explore ethical questions about what to do in response to climate change. In order to ensure a path toward a sustainable future, we must look into what brought us to this point.

Our culture is deeply entrenched in practices that continue to degrade the natural world, despite our knowledge of climate change. This is largely driven by capitalism prioritizing short-term profits over long-term security and exploiting both people and the environment.

These oppressive forces have another major implication: obscuring the importance of play in our lives. Play is a way for people of all ages to engage with the world. It gives people the opportunity to express themselves through style, dance, flavor, movement, and games. Play is crucial because it teaches us the virtues of cooperation, personal responsibility, and creativity. Although play is often an important method for the development of self-expression and togetherness, not all types of play are “good.” It is important to distinguish between play that is “good” and play that is not.

Good play engages bodies and minds, requires critical-reasoning skills, and inspires the unexpected. It cannot be found in Candy Crush, which disengages people from their direct surroundings, or bullying, which reinforces the hierarchy that a new culture of play will seek to undermine. Good play is fun and it makes us laugh. Through play we engage with our environments, communities, and selves. Playful environments have the potential to improve quality of life and facilitate personal development and learning. Playing leads to more fulfilling personal lives, and can be central in the environmental movement to create a sustainable future and mitigate the effects of climate change.

My intentional living community, Slade, is a place that facilitates good play. One Slader, Giannina Gaspero-Beckstrom, says “[Slade is a] platform for young people to come together and when we are together [a playful mentality] is a natural thing for us to fall back on.” Slade aspires to foster a culture of respect for the environment and community and to be a model for community-gathering spaces where people can find refuge in play. At their bi-weekly open-mics performers interact with the audience with sing-alongs, call-and-response poetry, drum circles, and storytelling. “There’s no off-limits in terms of creativity,” Gaspero-Beckstrom says.

Bad play can be seen in the sort of “locker room talk” between President Donald Trump and television host Billy Bush which was publicized in 2016. It is easy to play off that sort of comment as a joke, but the reality is that such heinous comments are not funny.

Instead, comments like these are rooted in the systemic oppression of women. Trump’s ascendence to the presidency is just one more drop in the bucket of proof that exploiters are tolerated in our society.

Play has the potential to liberate society from what ecofeminist Karen Warren calls “oppressive conceptual frameworks.” She

has identified that the subjugation of people and the exploitation of the environment both stem from the misguided mentality that if two things (species, groups of people, value systems, etc.) are different from each other, it follows that one of those things must be better than the other. Therefore, the thing that is better has the “right” to dominate the other. The United States is founded on this framework; the massacre and exploitation of non-white bodies and landscapes we justified by portraying and perceiving these “others” as different (and thus lesser) than European imperialists.

The framework that leads to the exploitation and degradation of people and the environment relies on the stamping out of play because play undermines the mechanisms by which the status-quo perpetuates itself.

In our society, play is repressed in many little ways: we do not have the time, we do not have the money, or we simply do not know how. It may appear that people do not play because they make the individual choice to abstain, but in his 2012 book chapter, “Technological Fixes and the Design of the Good Life,” philosopher Albert Borgmann identified that people act in accordance with the systems that already exist around them. For many people, acting, jumping, reading for pleasure, cooking without a recipe, and any other form of play imaginable simply do not occur to them as options because their lives are structured by a culture and setting that inhibits play.

The structure of our society makes it practically impossible to avoid negatively impacting the environment. Even if an individual has every intention of being an environmentally-responsible consumer, they encounter institutional hurdles that deter them.

For example, they would ride their bike to work to decrease their carbon footprint; they want to buy organic produce at the farmer’s market; they know they should take the train... but they have to drop their children off at school across town from their office, and they would hate to appear unprofessional, dishevelled, and sweaty at work, so they drive; they go to the supermarket because it is more convenient and less expensive; and they find it significantly faster to travel by airplane. This consumer is already a step ahead of most; many people do not even know that they have a carbon footprint. This consumer is also cut off from social and cultural activities that foster playful engagement with their environment and community.

Even if they could be the perfect conscientious consumer, what difference would it really make in the face of impending climate chaos? When it comes to climate change, it is difficult to pin down who is responsible and who is most impacted. Clearly the impacts of factories that pour toxic chemicals into rivers and the 91 percent of U.S. commuters who continue to drive personal vehicles to get to work, overshadow the thoughtful actions of individuals. Although some may feel that they are not doing enough, they will likely feel inconsequential and powerless when they try.

It is time-consuming and difficult to live a “green” life, and it is especially out of reach for people who do not have the privilege of being able to orient their lives around the environment.

We must face the problem of climate change as a problem of play. Play is repressed because it is unpredictable. As a culture, we

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have lost touch with values of cooperation, personal responsibiliThe international corporations are racing to exploit the comty, and creativity in favor of competition, personal advancement, mon resources of the planet, despite vehement scientific warnand conformity.We can break out of this framework, solve climate ings that this exploitation is not sustainable. In a culture of play, change, and become better people by engaging in play. Spaces that the community would prioritize “enoughness” for all, rather than facilitate free thinking would challenge this status quo by encourgrowth for the sake of growth. The international market would aging cooperation, personal responsibility, and creativity that prioritize respecting the limits of the world’s resources and the would inspire people to find different, better ways to do things. rights of all to have fair access to the commons. Further, individuWhite supremacy and sexism are two manifestations of opals would be more creative and find innovative ways to find alterpressive thinking that are major forces opposing play, and are natives to a carbon-based, exploitive society. rooted in the same logical framework of self-interest that leads to How can you uproot the basis of an entire society? In addidomination over the environment. Scholar Dorothy Roberts astion to environmental co-ops like Slade, there are also large-scale serts in her book Fatal Invention that race was socially constructed projects that can be started to lead the country toward a culture by white magnates as a means to justify slavery of play. We can fund humanities programs for and, later, to maintain a source of cheap labor “Play is a way for people children to teach them the value of music, by keeping workers divided along racial lines. reading, and playing outside. We can change Conservative white men are six times more of all ages to engage with the structure of physical education classes likely to deny climate change than the average the world. It gives people to get children away from the four walls of person, and it is in their best interest to do the gymnasium and outside on region-speso. This is because a society-wide approach to the opportunity to excific outings. Vermont students can ski every addressing climate change would threaten the Tuesday. Montanans can learn to fish in grade systems that keep them comfortable and sta- press themselves through school. Washingtonians can study marine ble in the apex position of influence. habitats as they kayak in bays that lead to the style, dance, flavor, Using the power they harness from ecoPacific Ocean. Teaching children to play and logical destruction, corporations have nearly movement, and games.” how to play well, focusing on cooperation untempered influence over the context and rather than competition, personal responsirules by which society functions. One way they do this is by manbility rather than bullying, and creativity rather than destruction, ufacturing and marketing problems to consumers and then selling will lead to a more playful society as members of younger generathem the solution. For example, body hair removal became a sotions establish themselves in the world. cial obligation for women in the 1910s and 1920s when adverWe can also fund community theaters, the National Endowtisements began to market hair removal products to women by ment for the Arts, libraries, community spaces, and parks to enconstructing the idea that body hair is not feminine. The campaign gage people of all ages in the value of play. Through these types of had two results: it led to the growth of a huge and wasteful indusprograms, communities can learn necessary skills about coping try and it added to the systematic objectification of women. Corwith loss, anger, and grief that will lead to a more emotionally porate campaigns like this have created widespread dissatisfaction, intelligent population. Perhaps the most challenging step will be which consumers are conditioned to cure by buying more things. to start the “play movement.” By being fun, inclusive, and creative, According to Whose Common Future?, a book published by The Ecolwe can all show by example how valuable it is to take a break and ogist in 1993, people are more likely to find a sense of satisfaction laugh. and personal fulfilment when an economic obsession with growth In the meantime, play has to be accessible to everyone. This over well-being is put aside. A rise in consumerism has dangernecessitates the expansion and subsidization of childcare, housing, ous implications for the environment because the manufacturing and other benefits targeted toward low-income communities. This sector is energy intensive and exploitive of people and resources. money can be sourced from carbon taxes that take more money In this way, a culture of play can ethically solve a common from top polluters. thought experiment called the Tragedy of the Commons. AccordSerious environmental and social issues call for serious play. ing to Garrett Hardin’s famous thought experiment, an individual We can address climate change while tackling social and economic is rationally incentivised to over-exploit a common resource for problems by being playful with the world to foster community, a personal gain, even if their exploitation ultimately leads to the sense of place, compassion and innovation through the virtues of collapse of that resource. Imagine that there are ten cattle farmcooperation, personal responsibility, and creativity. In his justificaers who share a plot of land. The land can support 100 cows, and tion for pulling out of the Paris Climate Accord, President Trump each farmer has ten cows. Even though it makes sense long-term disparages the values of play, asking, “at what point do [other counfor each farmer to maintain their herd of ten cows, one farmer tries] start laughing at us as a country” for investing in cooperative decides to buy another cow to gain profits. As a result, the other strategies to fight climate change? My response, Mr. President? farmers decide that they have the right to more cows, as well, and Hopefully they start laughing as soon as possible. very quickly the land is overwhelmed and all the cattle starve and die. The farmers lose everything.

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The Trump Forest Rejecting Trump’s energy policies, one tree at a time

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BY LIAM MACKENZIE

n March, President Trump signed an executive order rewriting the Obama Administration’s Clean Power Plan. The Clean Power Plan was an attempt to reduce harmful carbon emissions projected into the atmosphere by investing in renewable energy, building a greater number of energy efficient facilities, and significantly reducing the number of coal-powered facilities. In contrast to Obama’s approach, Trump seeks to revive the deflating coal industry, even though burning coal releases a tremendous amount of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.

Without the Clean Power Plan, approximately 650 million tons of carbon dioxide could be released into the atmosphere, resulting in warmer global temperatures. We have a president who does not believe in climate change and wants to revamp an environmentally harmful industry. Many Americans are outraged not only by Trump’s rewriting of the Clean Power Plan, but also by his decision to pull the United States out of the Paris Climate Agreement despite harsh criticism from fellow government officials. Prominent businessmen such as Elon Musk and Lloyd C. Blankfein agree, arguing that withdrawing from the Paris Climate Agreement could harm the economy by reducing jobs in the clean energy sector. Despite these claims and Musk’s resignation from Trump’s economic advisory council, Trump believes that 2.7 million jobs would be lost by 2025 if the U.S were to remain in the agreement.

Fortunately, a group of individuals are raising awareness about issues related to carbon emissions and political ignorance. Three environmentalists in New Zealand have started what they call the “Trump Forest.” The Trump Forest is not a real forest, but an online platform where individuals can donate trees to offset the carbon emitted during the Trump presidency. Dan Price, Jeff Willis, and Adrian Taylor began the Trump Forest in March 2017 with the ambitious goal of planting over 10 billion trees. They already have over 800,000 trees pledged and more than $100,000 donated. Donated trees will be planted around the world through the help of Eden Reforestation Projects, a nonprofit organization that employs local residents in developing countries to rebuild forests. These men will not profit financially from their endeavors, as all money raised will be used in climate mitigation efforts.

I had the opportunity to speak with

Jeff Willis, co-founder of the Trump Forest. According to Willis, Americans view climate change as a partisan issue, meaning there is political debate over the legitimacy of climate change. Although mounting evidence supports its existence, politicians cannot seem to agree. Willis argues that political change begins with awareness.

“We’ve got to break through that partisan barrier in the U.S., and a good place to start is just by talking about climate change,” he explained. Willis believes that simply bringing up the topic of climate change at the dinner table can make a big difference.

When asked what we can do to make President Trump aware of the issues related to climate change, Jeff Willis stated that we need to put pressure on the government as a whole to consider this issue more seriously. “Getting people to engage with the topic is step one,” he said. Americans can attend town hall events and call local representatives to inform them of our environmental concerns. Willis also tries to “tweet at the President about climate change at least once a day.” Trump maintains an active Twitter presence, so linking the President to news articles related to climate change could have an impact if large numbers of people begin to tweet at him daily.

All individuals, especially those in government, need to understand that the global environment is in danger. The dramatic increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide can no longer be denied, particularly at the political level. The more individuals raise awareness and speak about these issues, the more likely we are to engender environmental and political change. Jeff said that “individuals can make a positive impact, but at some point we need systemic change that will need to be driven from the government level.” It is up to us as individuals to make our peers and our political leaders more aware of these issues. The Trump Forest provides us with a political platform upon which we can unite together, face the dangers that stand before us, and create the change we desire.

Courtesy of Trump Forest

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Art by Katelyn Lipton

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The California Condor Can America’s largest bird come back from the brink?

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ne warm April day in Pinnacles National Park, I saw something I will never forget: wild California Condors. I had been scouring the chaparral with the Santa Cruz County Bird Club since 8:30 AM. We had already seen a couple condors that afternoon, albeit without great views; they were probably about a mile away from us. We were watching a Golden Eagle and a Red-tailed Hawk soar over the mountains at the end of the day when someone pointed up their binoculars, exclaiming, “Condors!” They appeared almost out of nowhere. Above the eagle and the hawk soared two of the biggest birds in North America, with 9-foot wingspans and distinctive white wing patches. It was truly majestic, and a sight I will never forget.

California Condors have flown the skies of North America for the past 40,000 years. During the last Ice Age they ranged from Florida to California and up to Vancouver Island. As the megafauna they relied on for food vanished, the condor’s range contracted.

About 500 years ago, the California Condor was only found as far East as Texas, and in the early 1800s, condors were found by Lewis and Clark at the mouth of the Columbia River in Washington.

With the Gold Rush of 1849, the California Condor’s population began to decline more significantly. Over 300,000 gold-hungry settlers travelled to California, one of the condor’s last strongholds due to the abundance of marine mammal carrion. As camps were set up, mines were dug, and towns expanded, more and more people came into contact with the birds. Settlers had misguided fears that condors were a threat to livestock, and would shoot them out of the sky upon sight. Other farmers laced their livestock carcasses with poison to kill predators, which inadvertently included scavengers like the condor. Additionally, taxidermy and egg collecting of the condor became popular among museums and private collectors who wanted to display their rarity and charismatic nature.

Without a doubt the most serious threat to condors—one that still continues to this day—is lead-poisoning from their food.

Lead bullets fired by hunters often shatter into hundreds of tiny pieces upon collision with their targets and spread throughout a shot animal. If this animal or any of its remains are left outside by hunters, scavengers like the condor will eat it, and in the process give themselves an often-lethal case of lead toxicosis.

These factors accelerated the condor population decline already taking place due to the prominent use of the pesticide DDT, which bioaccumulates in top predators and softens eggshells, and deforestation, which destroys potential nesting habitat in redwood trees. By 1987, only 27 California Condors were left in the entire world. These birds were caught and bred in captivity by the Los

BY JASPER BARNES Angeles Zoo and the San Diego Wild Animal Park.

Thanks to the efforts of these facilities, the program was a resounding success. There are now 446 California Condors in existence. Notably, 276 of them—close to two thirds of the population—now live in the wild in California, Utah, Arizona, and Baja California.

Any condor birthday is a success story, but there have been some notable ones as of late. Topa Topa, the oldest California condor in the world, recently celebrated his 50th birthday. He was found in the wild in 1967 as a fledgling, and has fathered over thirty chicks. Another success story features a condor hatched at Pinnacles National Park. He is the first to be successfully fledged there in almost 120 years. Another condor, born in summer 2017, is the first known second-generation chick in the world since reintroduction began. Both the chick and its parents were born in the wild. These milestones are extremely promising when it comes to conservation, because they indicate that the birds are starting to sustain themselves in the wild.

Unfortunately, even to this day, lead poisoning is responsible for about two-thirds of adult wild condor deaths. Legislators in California have responded by passing the Ridley-Tree Condor Preservation Act. The act prevents the use of lead bullets in the condor’s known breeding range, which should save many condor lives. Hunters are not necessarily bad news for condors though.

Without them, condors might be in even more trouble. The carrion they leave behind provides one of the most consistent sources of food for the birds since the extinction of large mammals at the end of the Ice Age. Not only is the California Condor a vital part of the ecosystems it inhabits, it is also spiritually important to a large number of indigenous groups. In the Sechelt Indian Band in Canada, for instance, it was believed to be a protective force for good, fighting against the destructive Thunderbird. The Yuki people of northern California believed that one of the two Great Spirits appeared in the form of a condor. In 2003, the Yurok people voted to attempt a reintroduction of the bird into their lands near Eureka, California. They hired biologists to analyze the area, and in 2008, the US Fish and Wildlife Service agreed to work with them. Hunters in Oregon and lumber companies are not happy about the legislation coming their way since they will have to give up on lead bullets and logging areas, but the USFWS is likely to go ahead with the plan anyway. The introduction will be safe and well-planned, increasing the likelihood of success. With some careful efforts, the California condor could claim the Northern California skies once again.

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Building a Better Burger The case for using alternative meats to combat carbon emissions

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BY MADELINE REILLY

ou are sitting down for dinner and burgers are on the menu. They are cooked like meat, they look like meat, and—you take a bite—they taste like meat. All in all, it feels like a pretty standard burger-eating experience. But what if you learned that your burger was grown in a lab?

If your appetite just plummeted, be prepared, because this may be the future of meat consumption. The emerging “clean meat” industry is comprised of a small number of food technology companies that share the goal of producing real meat, poultry, and seafood in an ethical and environmentally-conscious way.

Back in 2006, the United Nations’ (UN) Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) released Livestock’s Long Shadow, an extensive look into the link between animal agriculture and climate change. The numbers were startling then, and 11 years later, they continue to grow. Animal agriculture is responsible for more than 14.5 percent of total greenhouse gas emissions and occupies nearly a third of the earth’s cultivable land. The UN estimates the earth’s population will increase from the current 7.3 billion to 9.8 billion by 2050. Our food supply will need to match that increase.

Unless there is a dramatic shift in our diet, our planet’s future is looking bleak.

Strategies for reducing the environmental impact of our diets include swapping main offenders, like beef, for poultry or plant proteins, or adopting a plant-based diet entirely. Despite the growing popularity of plant-based meat substitutes, like tofu, many people still crave the real thing. What if there were a way to satisfy the desire for meat while significantly reducing its environmental impact? Mark Post, the CEO of the first successful lab-grown meat company, MosaMeat, offers his answer: “We are producing meat, it’s just not in a cow.”

The complex process of producing and marketing lab-grown or ‘cultured’ meat can be divided into four main steps: 1. The Sample: An initial sample of cells is harmlessly acquired from a living animal. Ideally, immortal cell lines will be established from this sample, eliminating the need for an animal past this step.

2. Proliferation: The cells are then placed in a bioreactor (similar to what beer is brewed in) with a growth factor that provides the cells with nutrients so they can replicate.

3. Maturation: The cells are moved to another bioreactor

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to begin differentiating into, for example, muscle or fat cells, and growing along a scaffold. Scaffolds are biodegradable, edible structures that produce the familiar shapes of ground beef or a chicken breast.

4. Marketing/Distribution: Once the meat is grown and distributed to stores, it has to be well advertised, affordable, and appealing to consumers.

If companies can streamline this method, cultured meat is projected to be a key player in fighting our current climate crisis, as well as in promoting human health and animal welfare.

Since clean meat aims to eliminate the need to sustain livestock with food, water, and land, widespread acceptance is estimated to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 78 to 96 percent, land use by 99 percent and water use by 82 to 96 percent (as compared to conventional meat production). Clean meat could free up resources that could address world hunger; the grain currently grown for livestock feed in the U.S. alone could potentially feed 880 million people.

By moving meat production to a lab, cultured meat could spare billions of animals suffering on factory farms, garnering support from animal welfare groups like Mercy for Animals.

Memphis Meats CEO Uma Valeti sums up their mission: “Transform a giant global industry while contributing to solving some of the most urgent sustainability issues of our time.” This will take time, but with recent investments and advancements, mainstream clean meat is well on its way to becoming a reality.

Until then, dietary adjustments remain the best way to lessen our individual footprints, but we might soon see the day when environmentalism, ethics, and better health will exist together on one plate.

Lab-grown meat has so far only been produced in small batches and many of these statements are just projections. Clean meat still faces technical and ethical challenges, as many environmentalists oppose genetic modification and other forms of bio-engineering.

Additionally, the growth medium used by clean meat laboratories is controversial. Fetal bovine serum—fetal calf blood—is needed to start production. Besides turning off any self-respecting vegan, it is counterintuitive to use the resources needed to raise a cow for the very meat whose purpose is to avoid that. Furthermore, this serum is expensive, difficult to obtain, and can carry

disease.

Leading companies like MosaMeat, Memphis Meats and Hampton Creek have all pledged to find alternative plant-based growth mediums such as algae or cyanobacteria. Emily Byrd from the Good Food Institute, a nonprofit supporter of clean meat, promises that “there will be no animals used in media by the time clean meat is commercialized, for both ethical and practical reasons.” Scaffolds are also traditionally composed of animal collagen, but another food tech company, Geltor, is pursuing animal-free alternatives.

The biggest hurdle at this point is lab meat’s price tag, though it is worth noting that the price has fallen dramatically in just a few years. In 2013, MosaMeat’s hamburger cost $330,000, but by 2016 it cost about $11 per burger. The price is not quite competitive with conventional meat yet, but it is closer than ever. With more funds, animal-free ingredients and larger bioreactors can be purchased to enable production on an industrial scale, which will lower the market price.

Big names like Bill Gates, Richard Branson, and Google co-founder Sergey Brin have already invested in Memphis Meats

and MosaMeat. On consumers’ perception of cultured meat, Brin feels that “if what you’re doing is not seen by some people as science fiction, it’s probably not transformative enough.”

While MosaMeat made the original lab hamburger, Memphis Meats successfully made the first lab-grown meatball in 2016, and the first lab-grown chicken and duck in March 2017. In a recent press release, Memphis Meats announced their goal of hitting consumer markets in 2021. Though MosaMeat predicts another 10 to 20 years will be needed before clean meat is fully commercialized.

On the other hand, another company, Hampton Creek, has lofty plans to bring cultured meat to supermarkets by 2018.

Mark Post, a Dutch tissue engineer, painted this picture of the future in his TED talk about lab-grown meat: “20 years from now, you walk into a supermarket and you see two meats. One is made in the lab, it’s cheap and the same price, same taste, same color, and same mouthfeel. And you have this other product that now has an eco-tax, it’s four times more expensive because it’s scarce, and it also has this nasty little label that animals have suffered for that product; what are you going to choose?”

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We Talk About Climate Change All The Time

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BY ALANA REDDEN

o challenge poses a greater threat to future generations than climate change.” Two years later, the majority of Americans are still in agreement with this quote from former President Barack Obama. President Donald Trump is not one of those Americans. Nor are the 180 members of Congress who have collectively received $82 billion from the fossil fuel industry and remain climate-deniers. Although 97 percent of publishing climate scientists are in agreement that human-induced climate change is both a real and dangerous phenomenon, our current political climate in the United States does not reflect our environmental one.

This is puzzling, however, due to the fact that national news stories and our politicians themselves regularly discuss climate change.

We simply call it by different names. Climate change endangers our safety, our health, and our economy. People’s lives are at stake.

Some of the necessary conversations are underfoot, but few are able to bring themselves to speak the whole truth.

War The production, transport, and use of oil are leading contributors of air pollution, greenhouse gas emissions, and environmental degradation. The U.S. has amassed upwards of $8 trillion in foreign debt to bankroll a war that was largely fought to gain access to one of the most damaging natural resources. In the subsequent fourteen years, over 1.17 million people in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan – U.S. soldiers included–have lost their lives due to the regional invasion. The U.S. has spent upwards of $4.8 trillion dollars on this war. In recent years, high ranking government officials have admitted that the “war on terror” was largely set in motion over a key natural resource: oil. Iraq oil reserves were completely nationalized prior to U.S. military counterinsurgency operations. Since 2003, the largest global oil companies like Exxonmobil, Shell, BP, Chevron and Halliburton (formerly run by then-Vice President Dick Cheney) extract massive quantities of oil in Iraq.

Water could be the next oil. As climate change causes weather patterns to shift, droughts are becoming increasingly severe worldwide. Rising land and air temperatures caused by global warming result in increased evaporation of groundwater. With 844 million people currently lacking access to clean water and the threat of a global water crisis looming, water conflicts have broken out all over the world. In 2008, Goldman Sachs convened a conference panel that declared that a global water shortage could be more detrimental to humanity than food or energy shortages. Therefore, water could become a highly valued commodity. Goldman Sachs and other banking tycoons are investing enormously in the $425 billion industry by buying up lakes, aquifers, water rights, water utilities, and water technology globally. In 2003, Congress decided to invade the Middle East for a natural resource and a

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million people lost their lives while Wall Street made a fortune. If we did it for oil, why would we not do it for water?

Healthcare On an unusual day this past September, the political left applauded Republican John McCain when he voted against the repeal and replacement of Obama’s Affordable Care Act, killing the bill that would likely cause 23 million Americans to lose their health insurance over the next decade. Some of the most alarming changes in this proposed piece of legislation, formally known as the Better Care Reconciliation Act, were the replacement of the Medicaid system with per capita caps or block grants (potentially skyrocketing premiums) and reduced mandatory coverage for people with preexisting conditions. Although the legislation did not pass, it put millions of Americans at risk of losing coverage altogether or being strapped with plans that would cover fewer conditions at higher prices.

When we talk about health insurance, we talk about providing affordable access to medical care for the treatment of health issues that are increasingly amplified by the effects of climate change.

Certain medications, such as those taken for heart disease, reduce the body’s ability to regulate internal temperature and hydration levels, making extreme – and worsening – heat waves increasingly dangerous. Those with respiratory conditions like asthma and severe allergies are more likely to develop serious complications due to air pollution. In a report on climate and preexisting conditions, the EPA cites mental illnesses such as dementia and Alzheimer’s as factors that impair senior citizens’ judgment and responses in weather crises, increasing their risk for injury and death. Higher water temperatures can give rise to toxic algal blooms and hazardous waterborne diseases in previously unaffected areas. The most vulnerable groups to develop climate change related health issues include low income families, communities of color and indigenous peoples, immigrants, pregnant women, children, the elderly, people with preexisting conditions, and disabled people. These are the same communities at risk of losing access to healthcare coverage.

Federal Spending Federal spending is a contentious partisan issue; the Tea Party wants to cut federal spending, and Democrats are calling for an investigation into President Trump’s personal profiteering off of federal spending. But few are talking about the extraordinary federal spending figures that will be distributed over the coming years for natural disaster relief from storms that are exacerbated by climate change. While President Trump pushes for tax reform and tax cuts in his now-approved 2018 budget, an estimated $115-290 billion will be necessary to rebuild Texas, Puerto Rico, and Florida after the calamitous effects of Hurricanes Harvey, Irma, and Maria. Since 1980, the United States has suffered 212 extreme weather events; the total cost of these disasters exceeds $1.2 trillion. Due to climate change, these storms have become more frequent, more severe, and more expensive. The United States government foots this bill.

Climate change is the common denominator that melds all of these national policy issues together. One can only turn a blind eye for so long. Climate change must be rendered visible.

Search and Rescue

The role of gender in wild spaces

BY JOSCIE NORRIS

Photo by Joscie Norris

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une 3rd, 2017: my first Saturday night serving dinner at a White Mountain Hut in New Hampshire, where I worked on crew (lovingly referred to as croo) this summer. Each high mountain hut is operated by about seven college-aged mountain folk who are responsible for feeding fifty guests each night, carrying supplies up and down from the huts, cleaning, and providing environmental education and trail advice. As night fell, a storm rolled in over Mount Lafayette. Despite the sheets of rain pouring down in the forty degree air, spirits remained high inside the hut. Many visitors see these huts as a vacation destination, so one of the duties of croo members is to keep guests entertained. That evening, we cooked a turkey dinner while dressed in hippie costumes and Hawaiian skirts, as the guests’ rambunctious children ran between the bunks. As the night wound down, we joked about how unfortunate it would be to get caught in the storm, acknowledging that experienced hikers would know better

than to attempt the summit in these conditions.

This humor quickly faded when an hour later, four girls, blue and soaked, stumbled into the hut. They had been separated from their school group hours earlier. We worked to peel off their layers and tend the injuries they had sustained from falling on the trail.Their clothing - mainstream fashionable athletic cottons - had done little to protect them from the elements. As we worked, we learned that they had been a group of five; one girl was still out on the mountain, alone in the elements. Chills ran through me as I thought about the conditions on the ridgeline. A search team was quickly dispatched from the hut to find the final member of the group somewhere on the Franconia Range.

As night turned to early morning, I waited up with the other croo members who stayed behind while the search continued. We were nearing the time to call off the search. The hut was quiet; the only sound was the wind rattling the stove pipe. I sat in the attic where the girls were trying to sleep and looked down the ladder,

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Photo by Thomas Ernst

thinking through every scenario. A radio call finally came. She had been found below the summit, alive, against all odds.

They brought her to the hut wrapped in layers of borrowed jackets. Clouds settled on the peaks as I found myself talking with the fifth girl. She continued to go through the sequences of each decision she had made. “I was looking for somewhere to curl up and protect myself and lie down.” She said that she had hunkered down and told herself to hang on and stay awake. She thought about saying something to her mother, how much she loved her. “I thought no one would look for me. I thought I would die, maybe.

I couldn’t go on. I was so cold and couldn’t move, my legs hurt, and I kept...” A visitor from Quebec, she lacked the English words to explain, so instead she motioned with her hands to describe rolling down the trail, and gestured to the bruises up and down her sides. She described feeling like she was in a vague dream with lights in her mind, an indication that she was hypothermic. She had heard someone calling out a name, but was too disoriented to answer the shouts. The second time, she used all her will to stand and respond.

“Would I have died out there?” She asked. I was unsure.

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Near tragedies are unsettling for rescuers; in these moments, both men and women are called to question why we are here. I was scared watching my croo members disappear into the rain and wind searching for this hiker. In the aftermath, what scared me the most was something deeper; it was a fear that this incident would enforce for these girls the belief that women are not strong enough for the mountains.

Society’s perception is that these untamed out-of-doors spaces are unsafe for women; that women are unfit to walk alone. Like so many women, when I plan a solo hike, I am questioned if that “is a smart idea” and am told, “I hope you can make it without help!” This sexism is nothing new. Historically, women were not permitted to hold public land positions in the United States. In these perceived masculine spaces, women were barred from equal employment. To this day, we face workplace sexual harassment. If you do not look like a Boy Scout or a gruff, white-bearded male, your ability is undermined by constant microaggressions.

I know from my experience in the outdoors that women are just as capable as our male counterparts. We can carry a century on our shoulders up thousands of feet in rugged elevation. We too

Photo by Joscie Norris

can bushwhack through the un-blazed wilderness. I climb rock and ice with females that are stronger and more skilled than their male partners. Women lead, guide, and instruct others as safely and preparedly as men; when chaos breaks loose, we problem solve. Although we are built differently, the women I work with have endurance both athletically and emotionally to be adept in the backcountry.

There were moments that night when we were sure that the last girl would not make it off the mountain alive. The radio callout warned it was a “life or death situation.� It was clear from the other members of her group that this was their first time out in the wilderness and her school group had left her with no means of navigation. My colleagues had run hard to find her in the driving wind and rain, and even their lives were on the line in these conditions. They had found her, but it was she who pushed herself to seek shelter off trail and continue eating food. She persisted after more than twelve hours out in the wilderness and hiking extra mileage in the wrong direction because the signs were concealed by clouds. Hypothermia is insidious as it slowly shuts down the body and takes control, yet she summoned the energy to move

forward that night and beckon the search team. Her own perseverance kept her alive.

I believe that this experience highlights the fortitude of these girls. In a search and rescue situation like this, it is the combined efforts of the croo and the lost individual’s fight to survive that shape the outcome. She faced a situation that even experienced hikers would balk at. Nevertheless, people who heard her story criticized how stupid young women can be. Coming from an underprivileged area, this girl was never taught to hike safely or how to survive exposure to the elements on a mountain ridgeline. Yet she had made it out alive.

This averted tragedy should not be seen as a reason to keep women from the wild; rather, it demonstrates the inherent strength that will carry these girls through their journeys. Instead of discouraging girls from potentially dangerous excursions, empower them by giving them the tools and knowledge to love and explore the wild. As a fellow woman on the mountain, I hope that our interactions instilled some confidence that they too belong out here. Equipped with the proper skills, our capabilities in the backcountry and beyond are limitless.

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Vermont’s Hidden Landscape Reading the land through natural history

BY TYLER PHILBROOK Photo by Nathaniel Sharp

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wake up early, throw on my hiking gear, and get in my car to hike Mount Mansfield for the first time. I beat the sun once again; this small victory to start my day puts a groggy smile on my face.

After an hour of driving, I finally arrive at my destination. I grab my gear from the back seat and use the shadowed light of the rising sun to guide me to the trailhead. Upon entering, I am greeted by trees. On the way down, the same trees bid me farewell. I get back in my car, wondering about this silent, still forest.

During a later visit, I see signs of life and movement that I have not noticed before. Since my last hike, I had taken the time to learn more about Vermont’s landscape and natural history.

Using natural history to read the landscape, everything came to life before my eyes. The forest became a booming, thriving community to me. Species within an ecosystem are always in constant competition, while at the same time vitally supporting each other. In these forest ecosystems, everything is fighting for survival. Every tree, vine, shrub, and microorganism lives and dies through the passing of another’s life. In the natural landscape, death brings new life. It is a ruthless, cyclical beauty. Certain trees are climax trees, overtaking the same trees that allowed them to grow. Other trees and plants grow only to foster the growth of other trees, and are soon overtaken by larger plants. This ever-shifting community prompted my curiosity, because it did not just suddenly appear . Every natural environment has a rich, interesting history dating back millions of years that explains how it has reached its current state. By understanding the natural history of Vermont, I found I could understand the inner workings of this vibrant natural landscape.

Vermont has a fascinating history. In each layer of soil, each rock, and each tree, a new piece of this history can be found.

Each piece of the natural landscape is like a word. You can put these words together with other words that, when strung together in the right way, form a sentence. As we read the landscape and start to find more words and form more sentences, stories start to take shape. Each one of these stories began somewhere, and Vermont’s story began with the gigantic glaciers of the past.

The story of the glaciers begins three million years ago, in the Pliocene Ice Age. Snow accumulated and then froze in layers, forming ice. As the snow layered and froze, the glaciers grew. They became so large that one glacier encompassed the whole of Canada, Greenland, and parts of the U.S. As it shifted, this growing glacier shaped the landscape by crushing, spreading, and pushing materials all over Vermont.

Back on the mountain path, I see beech, maple, and birch trees. The soil here is rich in nutrients, well-drained, and, in places, sandy. After reading Vinson Brown’s book, Reading the Woods, I know that these species of trees all prefer soils with these qualities. Without using a shovel, I can determine many important soil characteristics simply by being mindful of the trees that I am seeing. Knowing this, I can see how these species are well-suited to the soil conditions on Mount Mansfield.

By understanding the soil, I can picture the lively world hiding beneath my well-worn boots. Nutrient rich soil is loaded

Photo by Connor Brustofski

with organic matter. The cycling of organic material through the upper soil layer is facilitated by microorganisms that decompose plant and animal material. If the soil is rich, then it must have a good supply of the microscopic animals and plants that make up organic matter.

The acidity of the soil is a result of the climate in the lower part of the mountain. It is warmer and more humid at lower elevations, compared to the higher regions where it is colder and drier. Acidic soil comes from these warmer, humid environments that facilitate water flow, which cycles vital materials like organic matter and minerals.

Looking at the species in an area can give you clues about the soil. Much as the beech tree indicates nutrient-rich soil, you can use other tree species to identify nutrient-poor soil. The presence of Eastern white pines, which can tolerate very dry conditions, can indicate infertile soil depending on climate and soil properties.

Looking into the past can paint a vivid picture of an area that has not yet recovered from the heavy agricultural practices that occurred in the 19th century, when agriculture was a thriving industry in Vermont. Biota in certain areas was depleted, which removed nutrients that would have normally been cycled in the topsoil.

Mount Mansfield formed long ago from a continental collision between plates in the Earth’s crust in a mountain-building event called an orogeny. The Green Mountain and Taconic Mountain chains were formed during the Taconic Orogeny, meaning that

before this event, the Green Mountain State was a primarily flat, featureless landscape. Then, one continent collided with another, creating intense pressure and volcanic activity which eventually created the mountains we know and love.

I can feel this volcanic heat surround me, and the mountain begins to rise. The mountain stops rising and I find myself on the slope of a former continental edge. It is a steep slope, one that provides the ideal conditions for these species of trees to grow. This slope and others like it allow for well-drained soil, which allows trees such as these beeches and maples to thrive.

All of these natural pieces have been accumulating and shifting for eons to form the natural landscape that we see every time we step outside: the soil on Mount Mansfield, the trees in Centennial Woods, or the tributaries of the Lamoille River.

A few steps can place you in the middle of a former volcano.

You can be standing at the bottom of a former ocean. You may be walking through a valley once occupied by a glacier the size of a continent. The best part is knowing the history. When you know the natural history of your surroundings, you can feel the heat of the volcano as the magma bubbles around you.You can swim with the sea creatures of the past.You can feel the weight of the glacier as it paves the world around you into the shape it has become.

When you understand the landscape, it speaks, it dances, it cries, andit smiles. To the ones who look, the world will never sit still again.

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