Wild Ones #3: Save Our Public Lands!
A new Patagonia documentary on the fight for America’s public lands, the lost art and science of breathing, sea turtle conservation, and more!
What I’m reading
‘Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art’ by James Nestor. A few years ago, I read Nestor’s fascinating book DEEP: Freediving, Renegade Science, and What The Ocean Tells Us about Ourselves. In that book, he explores how otherwise ordinary people develop the extraordinary capacity to hold their breath for over 10 minutes and dive hundreds of feet underwater. In Breath, Nestor delves further into the emerging science of breathing and how profoundly breathing better can transform our health. I’ll be writing more about the ideas in this book soon so stay tuned.
What I’m watching
Public Trust: The Fight for America’s Public Lands. I watched this eye-opening documentary made by Patagonia Films this morning, followed by a fantastic discussion and Q&A with community activists, conservationists, scientists, and filmmakers fighting at the frontlines protecting public lands.
You’re probably aware that the Trump administration is hell-bent on dismantling environmental policy to privatize public national parks, monuments, and forest reserves and open them up to oil, gas, and mining companies.
A key point I learned from the film is that the seemingly benign discourse of ‘let’s return public lands to the state’ is sly, but sloppy way to expedite privatizing public lands. This is because states have little resources to manage these enormous swaths of land and would quickly be forced to ‘put them on the auction block’ as one journalist in the film says.
Much of the administration’s ability to gut environmental protections rests on our lack of knowledge of what they’re doing. So educate yourself about the issues you care about. Some great ways to do that?
text DEFEND to 71333 and learn more about how you can protect public lands.
Learn what Indigenous land you are living on at https://native-land.ca and connect with Indigenous people in your area.
If you’re a white dude or dudette who loves the outdoors and cares for our public lands, learn about outdoor allyship. The Mellanin Base Campe Guide to Outdoor Allyship is an excellent place to start. Learn more about why Black Lives Matter is a “clarion call for the climate movement,” and “must jolt us out of our climate inaction,” as author and climate activist Naomi Klein puts it.
What I’m listening to
Since this week is international Sea Turtle Week, I’ve been thinking about sea turtles more than usual, which is already quite a bit.
Sea turtle conservationist Brad Nahill, and co-founder of SEE Turtles, recently started his own podcast, ‘Save the Wild Podcast.’ The podcast highlights stories of people saving wildlife around the world and features conversations with people striving to improve human-wildlife relationships around the world.
But since Nahill’s main passion is for sea turtle conservation, the first half of each episode is devoted to sea turtle conservation, while the second half explores stories of other wildlife and the people who protect them.
In this episode, Nahill talks about both the positive and negative consequences of Covid-19 on sea turtle conservation efforts around the world, covering issues from ecotourism to poaching.
The first episode also delves into the career of Archie Carr (1909-1987) ‘the godfather of sea turtle conservation,’ as Nahill puts it. The episode features stories from Carr’s family and colleagues about his life and legacy for sea turtle conservation.
Be sure to check out Brad’s other conservation initiatives doing great work for sea turtle conservation, like Billion Baby Turtles and Too Rare to Wear.
Photo: Archie Carr watching sea turtles hatch in 1961. From The Man who Saved Sea Turtles: Archie Carr and the Origins of Conservation Biology.
Eco-tool I’m using
Global Footprint Network’s Global Data Map: “Humans use as much ecological resources as if we lived on 1.75 Earths. The Ecological Footprint is the only metric that compares the resource demand of individuals, governments, and businesses against what Earth can renew.”
Quote I’m pondering
“The reason for writing is simple. Through writing you will learn what you think and you will come to know yourself. Write to find out what you think. Unless you know what you think, you will always be subject to the will of others.”
–Deborah J. Haynes, in Art Lessons: Meditations on the Creative Life