Lowman’s interest in biology started as a grade-school girl catching bugs and collecting leaves in her West Elmira back yard. She’s now an internationally recognized naturalist whose back yard has extended to the world’s most exotic treetops.
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The Tanglewood camp familiarizes girls with what scientists do, their field equipment, biodiversity, rain forest research and more.
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As a tropical biologist, Iceland was never on my list of global destinations. No landscape could be more different from our subtropical ecosystems of Florida. Imagine my surprise (and delight) to visit this “land of fire and ice” for a board of directors meeting of the Explorers Club. The president of Iceland hosted our international group to officially christen his new Icelandic club chapter. Here I met volcanologists, climbers who had scaled Everest, sailors of Viking ships, and scientists who investigate the hardy mosses and lichens dominating this barren country. These intrepid explorers of glaciers and lava shared stories about their extreme environments, including the success of developing Iceland’s clean, low-cost geothermal power. Despite our different backgrounds, we shared a common mission –to scientifically explore our natural areas to facilitate sustainability in the future.
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Upon first glance, it is a mouthful to pronounce — Myakkahatchee Creek Environmental Park. But this long name is appropriate for a place that amounts to one sizable natural wonder. The name Myakkahatchee comes from the Seminole language: “miarca” meaning “big water” and “hatchee” alluding to “river.” Approximately 10,000 years ago, this creek with its surrounding forest hammock was a prime hunting spot for the Paleo Indians, according to local lore. Today it represents an important part of our water catchment in Southwest Florida.
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Nestled amidst the growing number of housing developments in Sarasota lies Red Bug Slough. Formerly known by some locals as Skeeters’ Drain, this nature preserve is one of several recently acquired natural lands of Sarasota County. Several other counties in Florida are also exhibiting good stewardship of their lands by purchasing ecosystems as a legacy for future generations and for sound conservation management. But why go to the trouble to buy up parcels of land just to leave them wild and free?
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On the ground below, an unusual activity is taking place. People are lurking behind tree trunks, crawling on the forest floor, rigging branches with climbing ropes, and sweeping the shrubbery with nets. Their mission is to count and survey as many species as is humanly possible during a three-hour stint. The scene is a Biodiversity Blitz in the forest hammocks of Myakka River State Park, between Osprey and Arcadia. A BioBlitz is best defined as a rapid biological survey, designed to assess diversity in a specific site. One of the biggest challenges in current field biology is the slow methodology for classifying and counting species. Approximately 7,000 species are catalogued per year on Earth, but an estimated 98 million remain unclassified and undescribed. At this rate, extinction is outpacing science. New methods of rapid assessment are required, and the BioBlitz is one solution.
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A new term has emerged in the world of business and ecology, called biomimicry. Defined from the Greek bios, meaning life, and mimesis, meaning imitation, biomimicry is not new — for over 3.8 billion years of evolutionary time, the natural world has been tinkering with what works best on our planet. But only recently have humans turned to natural systems to seek solutions to our technological problems.
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Their equipment list was unusual — carabiners, 200 feet of rope, strips of towels, water, clippers, tree harness, ice chest, plastic bags, notebooks, growth hormones, tin foil and cameras. This month, the New College Tree Climbing Club participated in an important scientific mission, and also a once-in-a-lifetime climbing assignment. They scaled the world’s largest known slash pine (Pinus elliottii), located on the campus of the New College of Florida, and cloned the tree as part of a national tree conservation project.
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In south Sarasota County where I live, the residents mark their seasonal clocks with the arrival of baby sand- hill cranes. These awkward, almost prehistoric-looking creatures are an endearing feature of the natural landscape in wet marshlands of Southwest Florida. My children have an annual competition to be the first to see a baby accompanying its parents for an early dawn breakfast along the roadsides near Publix or along Central Sarasota Parkway. The roadside as a dinner table, you might inquire in horror? What is an endangered species of wading bird doing in such a dangerous place near fast-moving traffic? Their story is a wonderful success illustrating that wildlife are adapting to urban sprawl.
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Dr. Margaret Lowman talks about her personal philosophy of nature in this first addition to the new semimonthly column, Nature’s Secrets, in the Sarasota Herald-Tribune.
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