The Green Room: January 2018

😭😭 https://t.co/5ML7M9yKiy

Embed code not available

from Twitter https://twitter.com/KevinMich43L

An Ecologist Makes A Big Difference On A Small Island

Felicité island in the Seychelles archipelago near Madagacar. Photo by Maxwell Williams.

All around the world, there’s unfortunate news about the environment: reefs are bleaching, glaciers are cleaving, and superstorms are brewing. In the United States, Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke doesn’t believe in climate change, which has derailed ongoing conservation efforts. It looks bad. But on the tiny Félicité island in the archipelago of the Seychelles, there’s a reason to be optimistic. The island is undergoing an environmental rebirth. This recalibration offers us an important lesson: If we work towards the restoration of the environment, and tend to our habitats, it might be possible to undo our damage.

The view is gorgeous up here, standing a few hundred feet up on the granite boulders of Félicité. Looking out, you can see giant fruit bats lazily swooping in from the Sister Islands of Petite Soeur and Grande Soeur. A little closer is Île Cocos, known for its crystalline snorkeling, where hours before I swam with sharks, barracudas, and parrotfish. Whale sharks and the critically endangered Hawksbill sea turtles are known to dally here, too.

But a battle is raging in this tiny nation that has bore the brunt of colonialism for centuries. The cultural markings of the brutal French (and later British) rule are deeply present — from the Creole spoken by the Seychellois, to the French-influenced cuisine, to the Moutya danced at parties on the beaches. But there’s another vestige of colonialism that has completely decimated Felicité at the ecological level: the coco plum.

“Since the French settled here circa 1770, [colonists] left a very heavy footprint,” says Steve Hill, the official ecologist of the private island’s Six Senses Zil Pasyon resort, pointing to a thicket of ground cover that has almost completely destroyed the fragile ecosystem of Félicité, one of 115 islands in the Seychelles. “Unfortunately, in an island ecosystem, this is particularly damaging, because these are closed ecosystems, so even the slightest intervention from outside causes maximum disruption and unforeseen circumstances, and a prime example of that, if you just look around us here, we have this horrible shrubby stuff called coco plum, or Chrysobalanus icaco.”

South African permaculturalist Steve Hill is working to restore the natural environment on the island. Photo by Maxwell Williams.

Brought in as a cash-crop by French colonialists, the fertile coco plum’s thick brush wiped out nearly every endemic species of flora known on the island — including the exceedingly rare Wright’s gardenia trees — taking along with it many of the avian species that relied on those plants. Add to that the fact that prior to colonization, there was a large population of tortoises on Félicité, and the island now is a shell of its formerly rich, biologically diverse natural habitat.

“In the sailing ship days, tortoises were a source of fresh meat,” says Hill. “All of these little granitic islands had their own populations. They were slaughtered one at a time, because tortoises can stay alive for months without food or water. So the ships would land, pick up 50, or 100, turn them upside down on their shells on the deck, and sail off. So while you were sailing, you had fresh meat. It’s a horrible story, but unfortunately, that’s the way it was. Tortoises will, at some point, be reintroduced onto this island in a controlled way.”

The South African permaculturalist Hill, with his sun-brushed face, is dressed in a safari gear, and more often than not, offers the scientific name of things as he’s describing them — all of which adds up to give him a sort of ineffable resemblance to Sam Neill in Jurassic Park, minus the churlishness. He even claims his ancestors hosted Teddy Roosevelt on a safari. He is in the midst of explaining how the dark gray granite rocks flowing up the sides of the island often make people think it’s volcanic rock, but we’re actually standing on a splinter flung off the prehistoric supercontinent of Gondwana, when something catches his eye.

“How lucky are we?” exclaims Hill. “Isn’t that incredible? That’s a wild vanilla orchid in bloom. Endemic to Seychelles, found nowhere else in the world.”

Steve Hill exploring Felicité

Hill’s enthusiasm is infectious, even though it’s morbidly hot, and our small group — which included a local investor, her guest, and myself — is trudging up the makeshift hiking path, our shirts clinging to our backs with sweat. Hill’s giddiness at the sight of the vanilla orchid is a snapshot of a man in the midst of an ecological restoration project the likes of which the world has never seen.

It’s a long way to that ultimate goal. Hills describes the rehabilitation of the island as being 90% cleared on one-third of the island, and 0% done on the other two-thirds. That means he will rely on steady funding from outside sources to continue clearing all the coco plum, and reintroducing endemic plants.

A coco de mer palm at Vallee de Mai forest in the Seychelles. Photo by Alberto Pizzoli AFP/Getty Images

The Seychelles has long been an idealist in environmentalism. Their president France-Albert René, known locally as “the Boss,” devoted large monetary resources to the country’s environment during his tenure from 1977 to 2004, which has set a precedent for his successors. Since Félicité is a private island — Six Senses Zil Pasyon is an ultra-luxury resort with cushy villas, best accessed by helicopter — it isn’t getting much of that institutional support. But that doesn’t make it any less of an important environmental study.

Case in point, deeper into the forest, where Hill has stemmed the coco plum’s invasion under the shaded cover of tall palms and hardy Takamaka trees, Hill points out Félicité’s other natural wonder, a grove of six coco de mer trees (though the coco de mer is not actually endemic to Félicité, it is to nearby Praslin Island, and this grove is several hundred years old). These massive palms are bearers of the largest seed in the plant kingdom. And due to the males impressive inflorescence, and the booty-like appearance of the female seed, the subject of much folklore.

“A huge number of local legends have grown up about the male and female trees — stormy nights is when the mating takes place,” he says with a laugh.

The legendary coco de mer nut. Photo by Maxwell Williams

Though Hill is somewhat unsung, there’s a sort of unbelievable quality to his successes. He drew up the blueprint for the restoration of another private island in the Seychelles called Frégate. His Frégate project helped bring back the Seychelles white-eye, a tiny passerine bird with a white ring around its eye, from the brink of extinction. Thought to be completely gone, it’s now listed as merely “vulnerable.” Similarly, the Magpie-robin, once one of the rarest birds in the world — there were less than 25 of them left in 1970 — is now thriving on Frégate.

“[With the restoration of the habitat on Frégate] we saved the species from certain extinction,” he says. “Today, they are spread around five different islands on the Seychelles. That’s what happens when you click on the right thing.”

Add to those successes a booming tortoise population — he says there are now over 4,000 tortoises on Frégate — and the island has officially achieved an ecological resurgence that has stunned Hill’s fellow scientists. But Frégate had the boon of a billionaire owner, says Hill, and though he’s getting support now, he is always hunting for more if he hopes to return five native birds to the island, along with planting thousands of endemic timber trees — including the Takamaka — and restoring of a tortoise population as was done on Frégate.

It’s an uphill battle, says Hill, who has been wrestling with Félicité for nearly 11 years now. Once the island has been cleared of coco plums, consistent clearing has to continue for two or three years before it’s certain that the plants has been eradicated. “Until the seed bank is exhausted, they keep coming back,” he says with a sigh, implying the need for a team of ecologists working with him to make sure the island is properly reconditioned. “This is the foolishness of man — bringing an alien species into an enclosed environment.”

In humanity’s most recent epoch, stretching from colonization, to industrialization, humans have destroyed most of what they have touched in this world. But with care and cunning, it’s possible to reverse much of the damage that we’ve wrought. What it takes is people like Hill. His plan for global change starts with awareness of his local successes. By sharing his work with the world, and he hopes others will inspired to enact ecological change in their own neighborhoods and environments. And together, these these small victories can add up to big win for a sustainable future.

“My great passion is collecting all the rare things and putting them back where they’re supposed to be,” he says. “And at the end of the day, you have an ecological jewel, and what could be more marketable in today’s world than that? There’s such a lesson to be learned about what you can do here, and the more that that message can be spread, the happier I’ll be. Whatever newspaper you will open, you’ll hear the doom and gloom, but if you can find the few bright spots in the world, what a difference that will make.”

from GOOD http://ift.tt/2nui1s4
via IFTTT

Surfers Against Sewage urge MPs to make parliament plastic-free

Ruth Bancroft Garden: everything but the kitchen sink

Last Saturday the Ruth Bancroft Garden in Walnut Creek opened early for a 7:30 am sunrise photography session. This was not a traditional workshop; instead, participants were able to do their own thing and turn to instructor John Ricca for assistance as needed.

I loved being able to roam free for 2½ hours before the garden opened to the public. Even though there were a dozen photographers in attendance, there was very little talking. Instead, everybody was focused on taking pictures and enjoying the peace and quiet.

As I was walking through the garden, Ruth Bancroft was very much on my mind. She passed away in November at the age of 109, but she left behind a marvelous gift for us and future generations. The fact that she didn't start her succulent garden until she was in her 60s should be an inspiration for us all: You're never too old to create something new!

Yucca rostrata (right) at sunrise

This post includes photos of just about everything in the garden exception for aloes. Many aloes were in flower and putting on a fantastic show so I'm going to dedicate an entire post to them (coming soon).

Saturday started out overcast but the sun did break through a few times just after sunrise. By 9:30am most of the high fog had burned off and the light became glary and contrasty—time to put away the camera. Fortunately, I'd already taken 200 photos!

Looking toward the construction area where the new Visitor and Education Center is being built

Weeping myall (Acacia pendula) and agaves

Zigzag wattle (Acacia merinthophora)

Acacia merinthophora flowers

The red-flowering shrub is Templetonia retusa

Templetonia retusa is native to South and Western Australia

It's a member of the pea family (as you might have guessed from the flowers) and goes by the common name "cockies tongue," "cockie" being short for cockatoo

Acacia aphylla, known in Australia as the leafless rock wattle. As the name already suggest, it has no leaves. Photosynthesis is done by the blue-green wiry stems. This reduces the surface area through which precious water could be lost through transpiration, allowing the shrub to survive very harsh conditions.

Agave schidigera 'Shira ito no Ohi'

Aloe 'Snow Glow'

Yucca 'Bright Star'

Moroccan mound (Euphorbia resinifera)

Euphorbia meets euphorbia: The medusa heads on the left are likely hybrids, the one of the right looks like Euphorbia esculenta. The blue-gray plant is Euphorbia myrsinites.

More Euphorbia myrsinites, creeping along between clumps of Mammillaria geminispina

Mammillaria geminispina and Euphorbia myrsinites

Barrel cactus with brilliant red spines. Possibly Ferocactus pilosus.

Lobivia formosa (left) and Echinocactus grusonii (right)

Yucca linearifolia

Back to front: Agave ovatifolia, Cylindropuntia sp., and what looks like a cross between Agave bovicornuta and Agave colorata

I received a similar looking agave hybrid from Greg Starr (he named his 'Mad Cow')

Agave colorata and Opuntia sulphurea

Opuntia sulphurea

Notocactus magnificus

Cactusland against the east fence

This is one of the classic vignettes at the Ruth Bancroft Garden. The plastic-covered frame on the left is to protect sensitive cacti against excessive rainfall.

This Agave pablocarilloi (better known under its former name Agave gypsophila) sending up a flower stalk, marking the beginning of the end

Echeveria 'Lace'

Variegated Agave potatorum, possibly 'Snowfall'

Arctostaphylos 'Ruth Bancroft', a truly stunning manzanita hybrid that popped up in the garden a few decades ago (probably involving Arctostaphylos glauca, the common bigberry manzanita)

Arctostaphylos 'Ruth Bancroft' flowers

Another Yucca 'Bright Star'

Tradescantia pallida looking sharp against this moss-covered rock

Agave vilmoriniana 'Stained Glass'

One of the newest additions to the garden

Aeonium close-up I

Aeonium close-up II

Aeonium and Aloe mutabilis

Aeoniums and Agave americana (planted by Ruth Bancroft as Agave rasconensis)

Agave americana 'Variegata'. The silver shrublet in this photo and in the two below is cushion bush (Leucophyta brownii), another wonderful gift of nature from Australia.