This episode of Renegade Naturalist Radio features journalist and bestselling author Charles C. Mann, author of 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus, followed in 2011 by 1493: Uncovering the New World Columbus Created (audio player above.)In addition to his immensely popular and highly readable books, Mann is also a correspondent and contributing editor for … [Read more...]
Renegade Naturalist Radio #4: Interview with National Parks Author and Expert, Alfred Runte
This episode of Renegade Naturalist Radio features Alfred Runte, the author of National Parks: The American Experience and an expert on the meaning of protected landscapes (audio player above.)In the interview, Runte discusses the ongoing debate about the appropriate use of national parks by visitors as described in the Organic Act, written by Frederick Law Olmsted, Jr. in … [Read more...]
Urban Ecological Restoration: The Gowanus Canal, Brooklyn, NY
Gowanus Canal in New York City’s Brooklyn is said to be one of the oldest, shortest, and most polluted canals in the United States. Before European settlement, the area was a typical coastal salt marsh. But with the building of the canal in 1869, boats and barges could come in from the ocean almost two miles inland, making the canal’s shores a good industrial location. By the … [Read more...]
Renegade Naturalist Radio #3: Interview with Conservation Trailblazer, Richard Rice
This episode of Renegade Naturalist Radio features Dr. Richard E. Rice, Co-Founder and President of the Conservation Agreement Fund (audio player above.)The Conservation Agreement Fund is the only non-profit devoted exclusively to supporting conservation agreements in developing countries, serving as, in Rice’s words, “a kind of mother ship” for their projects, providing … [Read more...]
Science, Open Space, And The Future Of Our National Parks
The following was originally published a guest column for National Parks Traveler and is reprinted here with permission. For additional information about National Parks Traveler, you can read the original article here.A Note from From National Parks Traveler Editor: Late in August the National Park Service released the Revisiting Leopold report, a 23-page report summoned by … [Read more...]
What is an Old-Growth, Virgin Forest Like?
In the twentieth century (and for centuries before), it was believed that ancient, never-cut forests were mainly very large, widely scattered trees which shaded the ground between them to such a large degree that few younger trees could survive. As a traveler in the 18th century described it, this kind of forest was supposed to be so open between the huge ancient trees that you … [Read more...]
Cahokia Mounds, The Largest Pre-Columbia Earthen Human Settlement in the New World
I recently revisited Cahokia Mounds Historical Site in Collinsville, MO, just a few miles outside of St. Louis, in September, 2012.Cahokia Mounds is remarkable not only because it is the largest pre-Columbian earthen set of human-built structures, not only because much has been learned about this previous little known Mississippian culture, but also because it is so little … [Read more...]
My Father and The Books That Shaped America
With my new book available just this past week, The Moon in the Nautilus Shell, it seems a perfect time to celebrate another book by a different Botkin, the American classic, A Treasury of American Folklore by my father, Benjamin Botkin.It was a wonderful honor to learn recently that my father's book was selected as one of the first group of books for the Books That Shaped … [Read more...]