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SBCP participates in 100th Ecological Society of America (ESA) Conference

The Sub-Antarctic Biocultural Conservation Program, The Department of Biological Sciences, and The Department of Philosophy and Religion supported four faculty members and three Ph.D. students to attend the Ecological Society of America (ESA) 100th Annual Conference in Baltimore, MD from Aug. 9 – 14, 2015.

Drs. Rajan Rijal (Left) and Jaime Jiménez (Bottom) also presented posters on their research conducted on CHBR.

The SBC Program worked with our partner institution in Chile, Institute of Ecology and Biodiversity (IEB) by providing workers for the ESA Latin American Chapter booth at the international conference. The two institutions have collaborated on various projects for a decade.

Dr. Rajan Rijal presenting his work on Field Environmental Philosophy and Ecotourism in High Latitude and Altitude Remote Zones of Chile and Nepal.

Dr. Ricardo Rozzi was the organizer of a Special Session at the international conference held on Tues., Aug. 11th. The Special Session, Earth Stewardship: Linking Ecology and Ethics in Theory and Practice speakers were Drs. J. Baird Callicott, F. Stuart Chapin III, Roy May Jr., Manuel Maass, Laura Ogden and Eugene Hargrove. Earth Stewardship signals a broader understanding of the expanded role of science in society. To engage science in reducing the rates of anthropogenic damage to the biosphere, the ESA launched the Earth Stewardship Initiative in 2009. This session emerged from the new Ecology and Ethics book series and elaborates a conceptual framework for continuing Earth Stewardship as an integral part of ESA's new century. Understanding and respecting biocultural diversity, with the multiple forms of land stewardship that it implies, will allow us effectively and justly to confront local and global socio-environmental challenges. The session explored stewardship across scales and disciplines, including the humanities as well as the sciences.

Ph.D students Ramiro Crego and Amy Wynia presented posters regarding their research in the Cape Horn Biosphere Reserve (CHBR) in southern Chile on Navarino Island.

A new Ph.D. student in environmental science, beginning this fall, Pradeep Khanal also presented a poster on Human Wildlife Interaction and Cultural Diversity in Terai Arc Landscape, Nepal. Mr. Khanal is from Nepal and will be working with Drs. Jeff Johnson and Ricardo Rozzi during his Ph.D. studies.

Ph.D. student Rocio Jara presented a poster on gray wolf research in the U.S.

The SBC Program also co-hosted the Springer Book Series book launch event of the same title as the special session on Tues. afternoon. This book was volume two in the series. Linking Ecology and Ethics for a Changing World was volume one which was released in 2013. For information on book purchases, please see http://chile.unt.edu/biocultural-conservation-editorial-line. E-books are available as well as hardback books.

For more information, please contact the Sub-Antarctic Biocultural Conservation Program, chile@unt.edu via email.

Ennead Teams up with Chilean Architects to Design Cape Horn Sub-Antarctic Center

As a result of a public competition, the Chilean Regional Government has commissioned Ennead Architects to collaborate with Chilean architects Cristian Sanhueza and Cristian Ostertag on the design of the Cape Horn Sub-Antarctic Center. Planned for a site within the UNESCO Cape Horn Biosphere Reserve in Puerto Williams, a town on Navarino Island in the Chilean Sub-Antarctic Province, the center will provide a home for the Biocultural Research and Conservation Program led by Dr. Ricardo Rozzi, Professor at the University of North Texas, the Universidad de Magallanes and the Institute of Ecology and Biodiversity.

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Magallanes tendrá dos centros para apoyar a los científicos que viajan hacia la Antáritica

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Buena Vista Global Fellows 2016 selected

and will participate in UNT's Tracing Darwin's Path study Abroad course to Chile

Buena Vista Global Fellows 2016 selected and will participate in UNT's Tracing Darwin's Path study abroad course to Chile

Buena Vista University (BVU) of Storm Lake, Iowa has selected the next Global Fellows 2016 who will participate in the University of North Texas (UNT) study abroad course to Puerto Williams, Chile. Dr. Melinda Coogan continues to lead the student group from Iowa to Chile for the fifth year. Dr. Matthew Packer joins Dr. Coogan this year to assist in leading their 6 students during the course.

Front row from left: Rosalind Russell, Kyle Wiebers, Emma Konkler. Back row from left: Dr. Matthew Packer, Tanner Cook, Jacob Braddock, Dong Wang, Dr. Melinda Coogan.

The study abroad field course "Tracing Darwin's Path" has been co-taught by UNT and the University of Magallanes (UMAG) for the last decade. Students enrolled in the course receive exposure to interdisciplinary research, conservation and education at one of the most pristine wilderness areas remaining in the world. The course explores ways of defining, studying, communicating, and conserving biocultural diversity. This is achieved by exposing students to a first-hand experience in the Omora Ethnobotanical Park (OEP), a long-term ecological study site that serves to link society and development with biodiversity, history and ecosystems in the Cape Horn Biosphere Reserve with an active hands-on biocultural conservation approach. Students are encouraged to share their perspectives on environmental ethics as it relates to their countries and the world.

The field course is held roughly ninety percent outdoors with activities of mountain hiking and a three day overnight camping trip. They will see glaciers and a penguin colony as well as participate in bird banding and mist netting, and also experience the life cycles of major aquatic invertebrates in the Robalo Watershed on Navarino Island. Students will get first-hand encounters with the diversity of people inhabiting the sub-Antarctic Magellanic ecoregion that includes handcrafters from the indigenous Yahgan community, teachers from local schools as well as the Latin American and Chilean students.

For more information, contact the Sub-Antarctic Biocultural Conservation Program Office at 940-369-8211 or email chile@unt.edu

The 10th semi-periodic reading!!!

Marti Lathrop,12 year veteran Instructor at our own Elm Fork Environmental Learning Center, will be reading Lorax.