Obituaries and tributes
In the second half of the 20th century, animal protection was often treated in public debate as a minor cause, sentimental at best and unserious at worst. Those who pressed the issue were commonly dismissed as eccentrics or moral scolds, their concerns indulged but not absorbed. One figure helped shift
Obituaries and tributes
The work of conservation in small island states is rarely abstract. It is shaped by land that is limited, institutions that are thinly resourced, and pressures that arrive from far beyond national borders. Decisions about forests, rivers, reefs, and historic sites are often framed as technical choices, but they are
Obituaries and tributes
Half the planet lies outside any country’s border. In those waters, rules have long been thinner than the myths: freedom to fish meant freedom to take; “out of sight” became “out of mind.” The deep ocean and the high seas were treated as a backdrop to coastal concerns, even
Obituaries and tributes
Conservation is often framed as romance or emergency. In practice it is closer to logistics: permits, budgets, awkward meetings, long drives, and the slow work of persuading people who would rather be left alone. Where the state is thin and land already claimed, success depends less on theory than on
Obituaries and tributes
The history of conservation in West Africa is often written as a record of loss: wildlife depleted, institutions stretched thin, and projects undone by conflict or poverty. Less often does it include examples of recovery that endure. When such cases do exist, they tend to rest on compromises that look
Obituaries and tributes
In the late 1980s, something began to go wrong in places that were supposed to be safe. Protected cloud forests, buffered from chainsaws and bulldozers, started losing animals that had persisted through far rougher times. Amphibians—often abundant, often overlooked—were vanishing in ways that did not fit familiar explanations.
Obituaries and tributes
For much of the late 20th century, environmental writing oscillated between alarm and reassurance. One strand emphasized catastrophe; another urged optimism. A smaller, more demanding tradition insisted on neither denial nor consolation, but attention. It asked what it meant to remain fully present to ecological loss without turning away or
Obituaries and tributes
For much of the late 20th and early 21st centuries, peatlands sat awkwardly at the edge of public consciousness. Neither conventionally scenic nor easily commodified, they were drained, burned, planted over, or dismissed as wasteland. Only gradually did they come to be understood as systems of consequence: for biodiversity, for
Obituaries and tributes
In much of Africa, conservation is discussed in the language of landscapes and species: elephant corridors, lechwe floodplains, and the slow arithmetic of births and deaths. On the ground, it is also a labor question. The work is done by people who walk long hours, sleep badly, work in dangerous
Obituaries and tributes
In recent years, one of the loudest ideas in environmental policy has been that trees are the planet’s universal remedy. Plant enough of them, in enough places, and carbon will be soaked up, water will return, and biodiversity will rebound. The proposition is tidy, optimistic, and easily communicated. It
Obituaries and tributes
For much of the late 20th century, reptiles occupied an awkward place in the public imagination. They were admired by specialists, feared or misunderstood by many others, and rarely treated with the same aesthetic seriousness afforded to birds or mammals. Field guides existed, but art that lingered on texture, posture,
Obituaries and tributes
For much of the second half of the 20th century, the American outdoors attracted a particular kind of devotee. They moved easily between disciplines, took seasonal work without much concern for titles, and regarded time in wild places as both education and obligation. Their lives did not unfold along a