Nature // Current TV

The Scientific Facts of Lightning and Precautions to take during a Thunderstorm

Lightning is one of nature’s most awe-inspiring phenomena. As lightning is... more

CHANLEEPENG
added this
20 days ago
|
0 comments

Tree Nation: Collecting native tree seeds

Reforestation and afforestation often involves planting trees that have a proven history of commercial success, fast growth and ease of cultivation. This copies the same pattern that has seen biodiversity in crops decline around the world, as most agriculture revolves around a limited number of species. At La Pedregoza one of our objectives is to practice multispecies cultivation that includes native trees. The importance of this is obvious when one visits large teak plantations in Costa Rica, as they are usually devoid of insects, birds and local wildlife, because teak is a tree from south Asia that is not part of local niche habitats.

At La Pedregoza we rapidly focused in on the vast variety of native tree species to be found in the Orinoco River basin of Vichada, Colombia. Many of these trees have exotic qualities, be that wood, termite resistance, fruits, nuts, oils, resins or natural medicines. We soon discovered that some native trees appear to be fast growing, but that there is virtually no data available on seed germination, propagation, planting methods or best cultivation practices. During this process we learned that many species of native trees are listed in the red books of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) as endangered, vulnerable or threatened.
snip

One of the reasons it was easy for La Pedregoza to associate with Tree-Nation is a shared concern and desire to preserve biodiversity on our planet. Some 90% of terrestrial biodiversity lives in forests. Many of those animals are niche dependent, for example everyone learns in school about Koala bears needing eucalyptus trees and giant Pandas depending on bamboo forests. At La Pedregoza we have birds, amphibians and mammals that depend on certain types of native trees for food, shelter and nesting areas. Planting native tree species soon became not just an objective for La Pedregoza and for Tree-Nation, but a passion.

Due to our wet and dry seasons we are able to collect most of our native tree seeds in the second half of the dry season and the early part of the wet season. Most trees flower in the first half of the dry season, so the best time for us to collect most native tree seeds is predictable. This does not mean it is an easy process. Monkeys, macaws, parrots and ants compete with us for the fruits and seeds of several trees that are on the endangered list. Once the rains start we experience flooding in the rainforest, with seeds falling into the water and washing away. Climbing the trees can be dangerous, as many seeds can only be found high in the rainforest canopy. This makes the seed collection process expensive, time consuming and often disappointing when seeds have already been lost.

This March and April of 2012 our foreman, Bertoldo Aldana, our plantation administrator, Oscar Forero Azabache, and I were able to collect native trees seeds from a variety of species. Some of what we collected includes 3000 Congrio seeds (Acosmium nitens), 1100 endangered Sassafras seeds (Ocotea cymbarum), 6000 Saladillo blanco (Vochysia obscura), 1200 latex producing Pendare or Salivón seeds (Parahancornia oblonga), 800 threatened latex producing Madroño seeds (Rheedia madrunno), and several hundred Moriche palm seeds (Mauritia flexuosa) to plant for use by local indigenous artisans.

snip
The long term goal shared by La Pedregoza and Tree-Nation is to become a seed bank for native tree species. This is especially important for species that are endangered, vulnerable or threatened. It is our believe that if we can commercialize those species, by providing access to seeds, germination and planting instructions and information on growth expectations and carbon sequestration, then other plantations will start to cultivate these species. That in turn will reduce or remove the pressure the species is experiencing in natural forests, by reducing illegal logging and allowing for the species to recover over time. Commercializing a species may appear to some to be an unwelcome development, but it is a process that is most likely to prevent a species’ extinction and to have an impact on maintaining and conserving biodiversity.

-----------
Dexter B. Dombro is one of the founders of Amazonia Reforestation and of the Reserva Natural La Pedregoza in Vichada, Colombia.Dexter is a member of the IUCN’s World Commission on Protected Areas and is dedicated to biodiversity conservation in the Orinoco River basin.

More at the linkReforestation and afforestation often involves planting trees that have a proven... more

JanforGore
added this
23 days ago
|
4 comments

Photography: super moon and electrical storm over Denver | Scholars and Rogues

Two shots from Supermoon Saturday night in Denver from Greg Thow. The electrical storm... more

hoosierdaddy
added this
24 days ago
|
6 comments

"God" is Cruel - We Must Conquer His "Nature"

Religion is an obstacle to progress, claims a transhumanist. Amoral murderous... more

googygood
added this
30 days ago
|
0 comments

Reality Check: Polar Bear Population is Increasing

IQALUIT, NUNAVUT—Nunavut says a new survey shows Canada’s polar bear population hasn’t significantly declined in the last seven years as predicted and that the iconic mammal has not been hurt by climate change.

An aerial survey done in August by the Nunavut government, in response to pressure from Inuit, estimated the western Hudson Bay bear population at around 1,000.

That’s about the same number of bears found in a more detailed study done in 2004. That study, which physically tagged the bears, predicted the number would decline to about 650 by 2011.

Last year’s survey found fewer cubs — about 50 — than in previous years, but officials say the new figures show the “doom-and-gloom” predictions of environmentalists about the demise of the polar bear have failed to come true.

“People have tried to use the polar bear as a bit of a poster child — it’s a beautiful animal and it grabs the attention of the public — to make people aware of the impact of climate change,” said Drikus Gissing, Nunavut’s director of wildlife management.

“We are not observing these impacts right at this moment in time. And it is not a crisis situation as a lot of people would like the world to believe it is.”

Environmentalists have warned the bears are under serious threat as climate change melts the sea ice, giving the animals less time to bulk up on fatty seal meat. Canada is home to about two-thirds of the world’s polar bears, but environmental experts say climate change could make the Hudson Bay population extinct within a few decades.

Inuit hunters have insisted the population is healthy. They say they are seeing more polar bears and say they aren’t as emaciated or in the poor condition scientist suggest.

...

You global warming losers are victims of scientific fraud, lies and deception. The debunked theory is based on Goldman Sachs carbon tax/derivatives trading Ponzi schemes, not environmentalism. If you care about nature, you'd wake up, do real research and address real issue to save the environment b/c it is being destroyed...just not by CO2.IQALUIT, NUNAVUT—Nunavut says a new survey shows Canada’s polar bear... more

rodstradamus
added this
1 month ago
|
2 comments

Rare Bay Bridge lightning strike caught on camera

The San Francisco Bay Area has been buffeted by bad weather lately, and as a rare... more

JanforGore
added this
1 month ago
|
6 comments

I am woman

I am woman... creator of all life the planter of seeds healer of the earth...... more

JanforGore
added this
1 month ago
|
21 comments

Freedom

"Ha!!! I thought this was Cool as Hell and a Must Share!!! Kinda brought a Smile... more

KB723
added this
1 month ago
|
37 comments

Earth's day celebration!

All people share a single common thing... along our journey through life, Our Mother... more

djexplorer
added this
1 month ago
|
0 comments

Margaret Hiza Redsteer uses Navajo memories to track climate change

Margaret Hiza Redsteer has long known the Navajo Nation. Of Crow descent, she grew up near the Montana-Wyoming border, and in the 1970s moved to an area of Arizona then shared by the Navajo and Hopi tribes. She married a Navajo man and they had three children. While living on the reservation, she often heard people talk about how much the land's vegetation had changed. "But at that point," she says, "it hadn’t really clicked what that meant – that it indicated climate change."

In 1986 the 29-year-old Hiza Redsteer and her family resettled in Flagstaff, where she began to study geology at the university. After 14 years of schooling, she returned to the Navajo Nation with a Ph.D., as an employee of the U.S. Geological Survey in the early 2000s. Her research specialty was studying volcanic deposits near Yellowstone. But, as she grew convinced of the harmful effects of climate change on reservation livelihoods, she decided to switch focus. Her pioneering work using aerial photographs, GPS maps and remote laser sensing data to track landscape level changes on the Navajo Nation was written about in "Shifting sands in Navajoland," (HCN story; 6/23/08).

Now, Hiza Redsteer is pushing to find out even more about ecological changes her original data could not track by incorporating a rarely-used form of climate data into her research -- the accounts of Indian elders. She has extensively interviewed many elders, and now their perspective is illuminating new aspects of the region's environmental history.

High Country News If I was a Navajo child, what would I hear about the weather and climate growing up?

Margaret Hiza Redsteer The elders often talk about the difference in grass, how tall, how thick, how much of it there used to be. Some people say when they were young and herding sheep they had to stay right with the herd. If they didn’t the sheep would get lost in the grass. It's not like that now.

HCN What have you learned from these oral histories?

Hiza Redsteer The elders' memories can give us information that the physical records can’t. They give a much better picture of what the ecological changes have been. For example, people talk about how, in the winter, the snow was chest high on the horses. They talk about using particular streams for irrigation of crops, but many of those aren’t even flowing now,

It helps us fill in gaps too. There are huge time gaps in some of the earlier photography. We have a photo set from 1936, for instance, but then the next photo set we have from the area is from 1954. That’s a huge gap in time when you’re trying to unravel how the landscape changed and what caused it.

HCN Is there a difference between the kind of information you can get through oral and analytical methods?

MHR We can model evapotranspiration rates based on temperature; we can make observations of soil moisture. But one thing that we can't do very easily is project back to what those conditions were like when there was more snow. One of the things we’ve learned (from oral accounts) is that soil moisture conditions were much different. In the Southwest we expect precipitation during two distinct periods: winter rains, followed by a dry windy spring, then the summer monsoons. Springs have become much warmer; we can see that in the meteorological record.

We've learned from the elders that the soil stayed moist all through the spring until the summer monsoon arrived. Now, if you were to go out in the springtime during the dry windy season, you could dig a very big trench and not run into any wet sand or soil. The ecological effects are huge because shallow rooted plants aren't going to do as well.

It's also hard to reconstruct where plants and animals were in the past. The elders have told us that when there were cottonwoods in the Little Colorado river there were lots of beavers. They used to see cranes migrate through the area in the spring, stopping in the marshes around lakes that aren't there now.
by Danielle Venton
More at the linkMargaret Hiza Redsteer has long known the Navajo Nation. Of Crow descent, she grew up... more

JanforGore
added this
1 month ago
|
14 comments

Don't Frack Colorado's Future

Meet Rod Brueske. Like thousands of Coloradans, his family and property is being... more

JanforGore
added this
1 month ago
|
7 comments

Beekeepers & Anti-GMO protesters march in Warsaw

Warsaw - Around 1,500 beekeepers in Warsaw made a strong point by dumping thousands of... more

JanforGore
added this
2 months ago
|
17 comments

Video: Shut down Monsanto protest at the Gates Foundation

Positive action for positive change... As part of the Global Day of Action to Shut... more

JanforGore
added this
2 months ago
|
23 comments

Epic Frog Escape

Ninja frog does parkour escape thrill.

Crauly_Fingers
added this
2 months ago
|
0 comments

Photography: Greg Thow’s Colorado (part 2 – Nature)

Aspen, high clouds, flora, mountains... Amazing stuff from my new favorite Colorado... more

hoosierdaddy
added this
3 months ago
|
0 comments

First Gorilla Genome Map Offers Clues to Human Evolution

CNN... First gorilla genome map offers clues to human evolution By Matthew... more

EthicalVegan
added this
3 months ago
|
6 comments

The Legalized Killing of Every Person on Earth (with pesticides)

(NaturalNews) Can you imagine making a profit by killing or maiming millions of... more

rodstradamus
added this
3 months ago
|
0 comments

GMO free Ireland: The next target of GM invasion

Destroying our reputation as Ireland – the food island If the EPA allows... more

JanforGore
added this
3 months ago
|
14 comments

Stopping the threat of genetically engineered trees

NOTE: A highly informative appeal for support from the STOP GE Trees Campaign - a... more

JanforGore
added this
3 months ago
|
14 comments

Ocean acidification "a dangerous game"

Current rate of acidification faster than at any time during the past 300 million... more

JanforGore
added this
3 months ago
|
20 comments

select your country

Community Spotlight

TAGS

tagged w/ Nature

top videos

find current on tv

find current online

recent comments

© 2012 Current TV, LLC All Rights Reserved

the basics

follow us online

tools

stay in touch

© 2012 Current TV, LLC
All Rights Reserved