REWILDING EARTH UNPLUGGED Best of Rewilding Earth 2018 Edited by John Davis & Susan Morgan Rewilding Earth Unplugged: Best of Rewilding Earth 2018 Copyright © 2019 Editors John Davis & Susan Morgan Cover Design by Hammad Khalid Interior Design by Hammad Khalid Cover Image © Evan Cantor All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the publisher, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review. Published in the United States by Essex Editions. ISBN-13: 978-1-7335190-1-4 ISBN-10: 1-7335190-1-7 Library of Congress Control Number: 2019938076 Essex Editions Post Office Box 25 Essex, New York 12936 essexeditions.com [email protected] Table Of Contents INTRODUCTION:REWILDING DISTILLED .............................................................1 WILDLANDS PHILANTHROPY BRINGING BACK THE AMERICAN SERENGETI ........................................................ 8 FILLING THE ARC OF APPALACHIA: RESTORING WILDNESS TO SOUTHERN OHIO ..................................................................................................17 SAFEGUARDING AN ADIRONDACK WILDLIFE CORRIDOR, FOR WILDLIFE AND PEOPLE .................................................................................... 29 REWILDING ARGENTINA AND BEYOND: PARK BY PARK ....................................33 ORIGINAL ECOSYSTEMS EASTERN OLD-GROWTH FORESTS THEN AND NOW ............................................51 WORKING TO RESTORE THE AMERICAN CHESTNUT .......................................... 58 WILDLANDS DEFENSE DECONSTRUCTING TODAY’S GREAT LAND GRAB ................................................65 THE ATTACK ON THE NATIONAL PARK SYSTEM ...................................................77 FOREST PROTECTION IN THE TRUMP ERA ........................................................... 89 BLM UNDER TRUMP AND ZINKE: A DISASTER FOR PUBLIC LANDS .................97 POPULATION WHY FAMILY PLANNING IS GOOD FOR PEOPLE AND THE PLANET ................105 DARING TO TELL THE TRUTH ABOUT SUSTAINABILITY ................................... 113 POETRY THE GOOD NEWS ....................................................................................................... 118 THROUGH HIGH STILL AIR ...................................................................................... 119 COEXISTENCE THE SAGA OF THE MEXICAN GRAY WOLF (EL LOBO) .........................................123 WILDLIFE GOVERNANCE REFORM: WHERE TO BEGIN .....................................129 FOSTERING WILDLIFE-FRIENDLY FARMING AND RECOGNIZING BIODIVERSITY AS CRITICAL TO A FULLY FUNCTIONING FARM ......................135 BOWMAN DIVIDE CRITTER CROSSING ������������������������������������������������������������������142 WANTED: MISSING CAT ............................................................................................146 THE KILLING ROADS .................................................................................................148 REWILDING INITIATIVES MOGOLLON WILDWAY RAMBLE: FIELD NOTES FROM SCOUTING A PROPOSED NATIONAL SCENIC TRAIL .........................................................................................162 FOLLOWING ALICE THE MOOSE: NOTES FROM AN A2A RECONNAISSANCE HIKE ..........................................................................................172 FACING THE CHALLENGES OF DAM REMOVAL IN ALASKA .............................178 RESCUING AN ENDANGERED CACTUS: RESTORING THE SANTA FE CHOLLA .....................................................................184 PUMA RECOVERY FOR EASTERN WILDWAYS A CALL TO ACTION ...................188 A NATIONAL CORRIDORS CAMPAIGN FOR RESTORING AMERICA THE BEAUTIFUL ..................................................................................... 202 REWILDING BOOKSTORE REWILDING AT MANY SCALES: A BOOK REVIEW ESSAY ...................................212 APPENDIX ABOUT THE COVER ................................................................................................... 222 ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTORS .................................................................................. 223 ABOUT THE REWILDING INSTITUTE AND REWILDING EARTH .......................241 REWILDING EARTH WEBSITE POST INDEX..........................................................245 ABOUT THE REWILDING BOOKSTORE ..................................................................257 ABOUT ESSEX EDITIONS ......................................................................................... 263 SPONSORS BIOHABITATS ..............................................................................................................265 FOUNDATION EARTH ...............................................................................................267 KAHTOOLA ................................................................................................................. 268 PATAGONIA ................................................................................................................ 269 INTRODUCTION: REWILDING DISTILLED ewilding, in essence, is giving the land back to wildlife and Rwildlife back to the land. It is restoring natural processes and species, then stepping back so the land can express its own will. Rewilding often focuses on the apex predators—like wolves, great cats, crocodiles, sharks, and salmon—and other keystone species that tend to need wild space and be lost quickly in domesticated or exploited lands and waters. Rewilding thus aims for restoration at a grand scale, the scale of conservation needed by wide-ranging species. Rewilding Earth celebrates, though, restoration efforts at all scales and in all places, while always aiming for as big and wild and connected and biologically complete as possible. The term ‘rewilding’ was coined by Dave Foreman, co- founder of Wild Earth magazine and The Wildlands Project, in the early 1990s. The concept of rewilding was further articulated by Michael Soulé and Reed Noss in their classic Wild Earth paper “Rewildling and Biodiversity: Complementary Goals for Continental Conservation” in 1998. Other leading conservation biologists, including John Terborgh, Jim Estes, Susan Morse, John Laundre, and Cristina Eisenberg, have further elucidated the rewilding concept and added to its scientific rigor through their books (some of them available through our Rewilding Bookstore), articles, and classes. As these and other naturalists and conservation biologists have shown, top carnivores are not just pretty faces or effective icons for endangered species campaigns; they are central players in healthy ecosystems. Removal of apex predators has had cascading effects (‘trophic cascades’ is a term some biologists use) in terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems around the world. To give 1 just two from a growing litany of examples: Since the eradication of pumas and gray and red wolves from the eastern United States, white-tail deer have become unnaturally abundant and sedentary, and they are now browsing eastern deciduous forests to the ground. In the western US, since the extirpation of wolves, elk and/or mule deer are similarly overpopulating and over-browsing aspen groves and other sensitive plant communities. The science clearly shows that restoring the missing predators is essential to restoring the plant communities. Rewilding, though, is as poetic an idea as it is scientific, and may sometimes be best expounded through art and direct experience on the ground. A painting of a gray wolf pack taking an old lame moose, or better yet the thrill of watching that scene through binoculars in real life, may realize the rewilding concept better than any scientific paper could. Thanks to the good work of conservationists and restorationists the world over, rewilding is happening in many places. Rewilding Europe has helped restore beavers to parts of Scotland, wolves to many parts of mainland Europe, and lynx to Iberia. River liberators have removed dams and reopened salmon runs from the Kennebec and Penobscot Rivers in Maine, the Elwha River in Washington, the Eklutna River in Alaska, and hundreds of other places. Wolves have been famously restored to the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem and from there have recolonized as far away as northern California—to the redounding benefit of riparian forests and the many creatures who depend upon those lush ecosystems. Peregrine falcons and bald eagles are now numerous again in much of North America, since successful restoration programs and the banning of DDT many years ago; even the highly imperiled California condor is now soaring again over some of its old southwestern strongholds. Cheetah and lion restoration efforts have succeeded in some parts of southern Africa. Conservation Land Trust is systematically restoring extirpated species to Argentina’s vast Iberá wetlands, with 2 Jaguars, largest of the Western Hemisphere’s many cat species, once ranged across much of the US Southwest, as well as Mexico and Central and South America. Their attempts to recolonize habitats north of Mexico are now imperiled by the US border wall and proposed mines in southern Arizona. © Robin Silver Photography 3 pampas deer and lowland tapir and giant anteater already back out there and jaguars being raised for release. Tallgrass prairie and savanna naturalists have restored many sites in the Midwest US. Wildlands philanthropists with the Southern Plains Land Trust and the American