An intricate balance has existed between man and the environment since the evolution of the Homo-sapiens’ species. At times throughout history, human ingenuity and will-power seemed to best nature, such as the transportation of water for miles across land in Roman aqueducts, the circumscribing of the globe by Amerigo Vespucci, or the first flight by the Wright brothers in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina; but although these feats were great, until the last few hundred years, the beast that is nature remained unconquered and undisturbed. With the dawn of the industrial revolution in the 1700’s the scale began to tip in favor of man (Industrial). Mass production and industrialization led to environmental destruction via pollution and urbanization. Luckily, for both the planet and mankind, this destruction was recognized and began to be counteracted. President Theodore Roosevelt was one such individual; he stated that, “there can be no greater issue than that of conservation in this country,” and set aside 230 million acres of protected nature in the form of national parks, forests, game preserves and bird reservations (Almanac). Since his pioneering preservation acts, states, counties and even nongovernment-affiliated organizations have set aside and preserved land. One such organization is the Little River Wetlands Project whose mission “is to restore and protect wetlands in the watershed of the Little River, a major tributary of the Wabash River, and to provide educational opportunities that encourage good stewardship of wetlands and other natural ecosystems” (Little).
Founded in 1990, the Little River Wetlands Project is a nonprofit land trust with the goal of restoring and preserving the wetlands in the watershed of the Little ...
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...ns and Values of Wetlands. Retrieved from: http://www.ecy.wa.gov/programs/sea/wetlands/functions.html
(July 24, 2013). Verbatim: New Eagle Marsh barrier planned to stop Asian carp. The Journal Gazette. Retrieved from: http://www.journalgazette.net/article/20130724/BLOGS01/130729787
Little River Wetlands Project. Retrieved from: http://www.lrwp.org/page/about#mission
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In Mark Fiege’s book “The Republic of Nature,” the author embarks on an elaborate, yet eloquent quest to chronicle pivotal points in American history from an environmental perspective. This scholarly work composed by Fiege details the environmental perspective of American history by focusing on nine key moments showing how nature is very much entrenched in the fibers that manifested this great nation. The author sheds light on the forces that shape the lands of America and humanities desire to master and manipulate nature, while the human individual experience is dictated by the cycles that govern nature. The story of the human experience unfolds in Mark Fiege’s book through history’s actors and their challenges amongst an array of environmental possibilities, which led to nature being the deciding factor on how
The first mitigation banking guidance was released in 1995 by the EPA and Corps of Engineers. The most recent wetland mitigation banking guidance was released in 2008. The idea behind both wetland mitigation banking and conservation banking is to provide compensation for unavoidable impacts to resources prior to the environmental impact taking place (FWS, 2003). Based on the rules set forth in section 10 of the Rivers and Harbors Act and section 404 of the Clean Water Act, wetland impacts are reduced by using the following sequence of steps: avoiding impacts, minimizing impacts, and as a last resort, mitigating for impacts. Although the Corps has enforced a mitigation policy to reg...
Theodore Roosevelt: The Great Environmentalist This Paper will outline President Theodore Roosevelt’s role in helping to conserve our environment during his administration (1901-1909). It will also examine his theory of a stronger American democracy through environmental conservationism. “The movement for the conservation of wildlife, and the larger movement for the conservation of all our natural resources, are essentially democratic in spirit, purpose, and method.” (Roosevelt 274)
DUI’s vision is, “…wetlands sufficient to fill the skies with waterfowl today, tomorrow and forever.” The site’s main focus stays true to DUI’s vision; protecting important waterfow...
The effects of erosion and loss of marsh land in the Southern United States has devastating consequences to all of these benefits, both local and national. The loss of land can mostly be attributed to subsidence, erosion, and severe weather events. The USGS reports that a total of 118 square miles of land has been transformed to new water areas in a 9,742 square mile area from the Chandeleur Islands to the Atchafalaya River. This land loss is from fall of 2004 to the fall of 2005, after Hurricanes Katrina and Rita (USGS, February 2006).
The Conservation movement was a driving force at the beginning of the twentieth century. It was a time during which Americans were coming to terms with their wasteful ways, and learning to conserve what they quickly realized to be limited resources. In the article from the Ladies’ Home Journal, the author points out that in times past, Americans took advantage of what they thought of as inexhaustible resources. For example, "if they wanted lumber for their houses, rails for their fences, fuel for their stoves, they would cut down half a forest at a time; and whatever they could not use or sell they would leave to rot on the ground. They never bothered their heads to inquire where more wood was coming from when this was gone" (33). The twentieth century opened with a vision towards the future, towards preserving the land that had previously been taken for granted. The Conservation movement came along around the same time as one of the first major waves of the feminist movement. With the two struggles going on: one for the freedom of nature and the other for the freedom of women, it stands to follow that they coincided. As homemakers, activists, and citizens of the United States of America, women have had an important role in Conservation.
John Muir helped the development of the American conservation movement during the late nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth century. The creation of the National Park Service, the creation of several major national parks, including Yosemite National Park and the creation of the Sierra Club were all because of John Muir. In the late nineteenth century America was in a stage of expansion and economic development that used as well as threatened much of the natural world. Much of the economic development was in the form of industrialization that took its toll of the environment with both its consumption of natural resources as well pollution. This expansion and economic development had adverse consequences on the environment of the United States. During this time of development many became aware of the damage being done to the natural world and attempted to prevent or limit this damage being done. It is during this time of both industrialization and spiritual awakening that the conservation movement arose with one of its most famous activists, John Muir.
People in the northern United States during the early nineteenth century wanted to rapidly industrialize and increase the amount of money they were making. The Erie Canal they believed was a great way to reduce the distance and time of shipping goods to the west. They also realized that the canal would probably increase their markets, which would mean a larger profit. The problem with all of this was how people had to destroy parts of nature in order for this to happen. Nathaniel Hawthorne, a prominent writer during the time, described the canal as “too rapid, unthinking advance of progress.” (57) Hawthorne and his supporters were very upset to see how forests and swamps were being destroyed and ruined in order t...
In 1989, seventy five percent of Americans identified themselves as environmentalists, and the number has continued to grow since then (Walls 1). Environmentalism is now the most popular social movement in the United States, with over five million American families donating regularly to environmental organizations (Walls 1). Environmentalists today focus on what kind of world they hope to see in the future, and largely deal with limiting pollution and changing consumption rates (Kent 1 and 9). Modern environmentalists also have much different issues than those Carson’s America faced. With climate change becoming more threatening each year, protection of the natural world is needed more than ever. Pollution has caused the warmest decade in history, the deterioration of the ozone layer, and species extinction in extreme numbers (Hunter 2). It not only threatens nature, but also human populations, who already suffer from lack of clean water and poisoning from toxic chemicals (Hunter 16). Unlike environmental actions in the 1960’s, which were mostly focused on protection, a massive increase in pollution has caused efforts to be focused on environmental restoration (Hunter 16). Like in the time of Silent Spring, environmentalists are not only concerned with one country. Protecting the environment remains a global issue, and every nation is threatened by the
...n, the Louisiana wetlands are an extremely valuable asset to the State of Louisiana and the United States. The continual loss of Louisiana wetlands has the potential to have an immensely negative effect on the economy at a state and national level. Over 2 million people live in the Louisiana coastal parishes (Field et al., 1991). The majority of people living on the Louisiana coast make their living from things that are directly related to the wetlands. The Louisiana wetlands make up the largest wetland community in America and is being lost at a rate greater than the other wetland communities in the country. The suggested strategies that are being taken into consideration could be helpful but it seems that the State of Louisiana is not as concerned as it should be given the future consequences and much like climate change coastal erosion is not being taken serious.
Magoc, Chris J. Environmental Issues in American History: A Reference Guide with Primary Documents. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 2006. Print.
...he preservation of these precious ecosystems so that future generations can appreciate the serenity and value of the wetlands.
When thinking about the transcendental period and/or about individuals reaching out and submerging themselves in nature, Henry David Thoreau and his book, Walden, are the first things that come to mind. Unknown to many, there are plenty of people who have braved the environment and called it their home during the past twenty years, for example: Chris McCandless and Richard Proenneke. Before diving into who the “modern Thoreaus” are, one must venture back and explore the footprint created by Henry Thoreau.
* Daily, Gretchen C., ed. Nature’s Services: Societal Dependence on Natural Ecosystems. Washington, D.C.: Island Press, 1997.
The history of national parks, their establishment and propagation, demonstrates all three of these intervention principles. Until the early 1800s, the American public viewed nature and the wilderness as something to tame or overcome. Thanks in large part to artistic movements which portrayed unsettled lands as beautiful, public opinion evolved and gave rise to the moral imperative of preservation. In 1864 political, ethical, and economic reasons for intervention furnished momentum to legislation regarding Yosemite Valley; a California senator sponsored a bill which was eventually signed in to law by President Abraham Lincoln and would transfer national lands to the State for “preservation” and “public use, resort, and recreation” (The National Parks, 2005, p. 12-13). In this case, the ethical reason for intervention (land preservation) was largely supported by the American public and the contemporary shift in public opinion, additionally rendering it a political reason for intervention. As for economic reasons for intervention, the land was recognized as a n...