I was listening to the radio one recent Sunday morning and the reporters were doing an in-depth story about the loss of habitat in Madagascar, the Texas-sized island off the coast of southeast Africa. The article was focused on loss of unique plant and animal life due to the increase in logging and farming in the area. There are several species of lemurs, reptiles, tortoises and other mammals affected, but also going missing are the mature forests that serve as their habitats. Instead, there are pockets of small forests.
What intrigued me was the comparison to a child cutting a snowflake out of paper. The end result of the papercutting is more edges and less paper. Turns out this is also the case in these small forests: more edges and less trees. So, who is stepping in to help the efforts to join these pocket forests into larger ones? I was surprised it is the Missouri Botanical Garden. I started to do more research into the botanical gardens and Madagascar as well.
Located in St. Louis, the Missouri Botanical Garden is widely considered to be one of the top three botanical gardens in the world. It was founded in 1859 by Henry Shaw, an immigrant from England who managed to amass a fortune in businesses like agricultural commodities, real estate, mining and fur that allowed him to purchase and develop land. His vision to make an uncultivated property outside of his adopted home of St. Louis turned into one of the United States’ first – and best - botanical gardens. Known and revered for its excellence in displays, the MBG is also famous for its heritage, its botanical research, and its conservation efforts like the ones in Madagascar.
Madagascar is one of those places on earth where life has evolved in ways found in no other place. Between 1999 and 2010, scientists discovered 615 new species on the island, including 41 mammals and 61 reptiles. Many of the plants and animals are considered to be critically threatened, and due to the nature of having evolved on an island, they will become extinct if steps aren’t taken to insure their survival.
As a gardener, I have seen the effects invasive plants can have on even a habitat as small as a back yard. Think Scotch broom or English ivy. While my heart is taken with photographs of those adorable, big-eyed lemurs, my mind realizes that the reduction of diverse plant life on our earth will impact more than just lemurs on Madagascar. It will affect us all in ways we can’t even begin to recognize.
Let’s bring it to a local level. A very local level: Tillamook County. By going to the US Fish and Wildlife Service’s ECOS website (ecos.fws.gov/ecp0/reports/species-by-current-range-county?fips=41057), I found a list of plants and animals that are endangered in our county. Sure, we have all heard about the Western snowy plover and the marbled murrelet, but Nelson’s checker-mallow, red tree vole and the Oregon Silverspot butterfly are also on the endangered or threatened lists.
What can we do? In the case of the checker-mallow, seeds are being produced by Willamette Valley farms and may be available for retail sales in a few years. But this is also the time of the year when so many organizations send out a plea for end-of-the-year giving. Many of us have favorite local, national and international groups that are worthy of our donations all year. Doing a little online research will result in a wide variety of certified, national and international non-profit organizations that are doing excellent conservation work. Make sure they are legitimate by going online to Charity Watch (www.charitywatch.org) and checking their ratings. I like this site because they give a grade to each charity listed as well as how much they spend to raise $100 and how much their executives receive in salaries. Once you start looking at this site, the hardest part will be narrowing down the selection for donating.
Tillamook – and Oregon in general - also has many local, certified 501.c.3 non-profit conservation organizations that won’t be listed on Charity Watch. Tillamook Estuaries Partnership, Tillamook Bay Watershed Council, Explore Nature, Friends of Netarts Bay, Tillamook Forest Heritage Trust, and - my personal favorite - Kilchis Point Reserve, are just a few resident non-profits that would be glad to have your donation and are dedicated to putting their funds to good use and protect our local environment.
By the way, Charity Watch also doesn’t include organizations like the Missouri Botanical Garden as they aren’t really a charity but they are a non-profit and as such, they do take donations. For a lot more information on the gardens and their conservation efforts, visit their excellent website at www.missouribotanicalgarden.org.
In this time of holiday spirit and giving, I wish you and your loved ones a most wonderful Christmas and a very Happy -and healthy - New Year!
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