1. The Royal Botanic Gardens in England announces that it’s collected seeds from almost 10 percent of the 300,000 seed-bearing plants on Earth…the first phase of a project to create a seed bank of every plant known to man. (Hat tip: Yale Environment 360.)
2. The Oregonian newspaper reports on controversial scientific findings that Chinook salmon might be adapting to survive dams on the Columbia and Snake rivers in the Pacific Northwest…by delaying their trips up the river a year and growing bigger. (Hat tip: WaterWired.)
3. Could solar panels really be contributing to climate change by reradiating heat because they’re so dark? (Come again?) Ask Pablo of Treehugger punctures the myth, started (Pablo says) by the authors of the book Freakanomics.
4. Climate change reported on TV? Not likely, says a new report in the journal Communications Research, which states people who use the Internet and read newspapers are much more likely to be concerned about global warming. (Hat tip: Mongabay.)
5. Here’s a new one on Cool Green Science: Are conservationists too optimistic? A new study in the journal Biological Conservation says “conservationists are setting population targets too low to give species a decent shot at long-term survival,” reports Journal Watch Online. (You need a miminum of 5,000 adults, say the authors.)

Indigenous Aboriginal ranger Romeo Lane points out an ancient painting of a six-legged goanna lizard to the curious crowd of media and visitors — myself included — that surrounds him.

The painting is just one of thousands that scatter the escarpments of Arnhem Land in the very northern tip of Australia’s vast tropical savanna. This rich cultural heritage belonging to Australia’s first inhabitants is in an important part of why so many of us have travelled thousands of kilometres for what is a momentous day in Australia’s history.

Last week, the Australian Federal Government and traditional Indigenous landowners achieved a major milestone for conservation in Australia: the signing of agreements establishing two immense and globally significant conservation reserves on indigenous lands in the Northern Territory of Australia.

Known as the Djelk and Warddeken Indigenous Protected Areas, the reserves are located in Western and Central Arnhem Land about 300 miles from Darwin, and span 7,889 square miles — more than twice the size of Yellowstone National Park in the United States.

The reserves stretch from the high country of the Western Arnhem Land Plateau to the islands off the Northern Territory coast and include sandstone gorges, pristine rivers, tropical savanna and coastal wetlands. The area is of global significance for its natural and cultural values.  

Under the new agreements, traditional landowners will continue to manage the reserves and will be assisted by the indigenous ranger organisations, Djelk Rangers and the Warddeken Manwurrk Rangers. The declaration follows several years of consultation with members of more than 137 indigenous clans in the region and the development of detailed management plans. 

A core part of these plans is the reintroduction of traditional burning practices that have been found to cut greenhouse gas emissions by preventing large uncontrolled bushfires. Other management approaches include control of feral animals, particularly buffalo, which cause serious damage to the region’s wetlands.

The Nature Conservancy has been working with both ranger groups in the lead up to the declaration of these protected areas and is honored to support the landowners and the Djelk and Warddeken rangers in their management of the new reserves.

The Conservancy will continue to work with the groups in securing long-term funding from private investment to ensure these extraordinary areas can be managed effectively into the future.

(Image 1: Indigenous dancers celebrate at the official declaration of new conservation lands. Image 2: Warddeken Manwurrk Ranger carries out fire control. Source: Peter Eves.)

Blane Heumann is director of fire management for The Nature Conservancy.

On August 26, a controlled burn (also known as a prescribed fire) got away from a federal fire crew in Yosemite National Park. The Big Meadow fire, which was planned to span one day and 91 acres, is being mopped up today after having spread across more than 7,400 acres of the park. The town of Foresta was evacuated for several days because of the blaze.

Like other escaped fires before it, this incident has raised awareness of a fact that every prescribed fire practitioner knows: No matter how careful you are, no matter how much training your staff have received, any time you light a match, there’s a chance that something will go wrong.

Maybe the wind picks up unexpectedly and the fire jumps the firebreak, contingency plans fail, and a barn, a house or a pine plantation burns. Or maybe some piece of equipment fails and somebody working on the fire gets hurt. Then there’s the smoke to worry about… It’s a fair question: With so much at stake, is it worth it?

First, there’s a lot that can be done to minimize the chance that something will go wrong. And a lot can be done to respond to unexpected events and contain or minimize unfavorable outcomes. In fact, as The Nature Conservancy’s director of fire management, it’s my full-time job to maintain and improve our fire staff’s ability to anticipate and respond to the unexpected. And the Conservancy staff’s record is one that considerably exceeds U.S. averages for both safety and operational cost efficiency. But yes, we are not, nor will we ever be perfect.

Second, the decision to burn or not to burn is made on a place-by-place basis. Some areas are inherently more difficult to burn safely than others, and it’s also true that some landscapes will benefit from fire more than others. We burn where and when our calculus indicates that the benefits to biodiversity far outweigh the costs and potential negative consequences. So it’s a matter of striking the right balance, and I believe that the Conservancy as well as our partners are generally prudent in this regard. But again, as the Big Meadow Fire shows, not perfect.

Most terrestrial ecosystems in North America need fire — to one degree or another — to persist. I’ve never been to Yosemite, but it’s possible, maybe even likely, when all is said and done the Big Meadow fire will have a net positive impact ecologically, and improve habitat for wildlife such as mule deer and cavity-nesting birds.

Perhaps it will reduce fuels in that portion of the park, thereby allowing future managers to let naturally ignited fires take their course. And who knows — maybe the fire will even help some of the affected areas better withstand future climate change impacts.

With 80 percent of U.S. forests and rangelands moderately or severely degraded, and with climate change making the situation worse, something needs to be done. In places where it’s not safe to let naturally ignited wildfires burn, that “something” is often controlled burning.

With more than 30 state-based fire programs that have collectively burned more than a million acres since the 1960’s, the Conservancy is working hard to do its part. (We also get a lot of help on the fireline from federal agencies and other partners.)

In some ways, it’s getting harder for land managers to maintain our current levels of burning, let alone ramp up efforts to make a bigger difference. More and more people are building homes in and around natural areas. While the majority of Americans do understand tlhat fire can play a vital role in nature, people are also quite fearful of fire, especially when someone is planning a controlled blaze close to their neighborhood.

It’s important to realize that prescribed burning can have direct benefits for people as well as nature. For example, many ranchers know that a well-timed fire can improve forage for livestock. And some experts think proactive controlled burning might have prevented the deadly Station fire near Los Angeles.

So fire practitioners must weigh a whole host of potential benefits against the actual and potential costs, and it’s conceivable that we could be taking a risk when we decide not to burn. Clearly this is not easy. But is it worth it? The answer is a qualified yes.

(Image: Bird’s nest in Shawangunk Mountains — wildlife commonly persists, and sometimes thrives, in fire’s immediate aftermath. Credit: Gabe Chapin/TNC.)

1. How is climate change like an epileptic seizure? Climate Feedback reports on two new studies warning that a “flickering” between pre-tipping and post-tipping point conditions often preshadows a seismic climatic shift.
2. India says its greenhouse gas emissions are will triple by 2031 — but that’s still lower per-capita than the global average, a fact that’s part of the country’s negotiating position going into Copenhagen, says Dot Earth.
3. Will a U.S. Senate delay on the climate bill harm global climate talks in Copenhagen in December? Most analysts say yes, but The Vine says not so fast.
4. Why are there always these wildfires in California? Bright Green Blog has a good run down of the latest science and thinking. The Vine (again) says the fires have once again focused attention on climate change and its reduction of snowpack in the Rockies and Sierra Nevadas (which leads to less water runoff, which leads to more fires…)
5. From the Weird Geoengineering to Stop Climate Change Department: Could a forest of 100,000 artificial trees stop carbon emissions from depleted oil and gas fields? A new Institution of Mechanical Engineers study says…maybe. (Hat tip: Inhabitat.)

In 1999, a year after widespread, drought-driven fires caused extensive damage to the country’s forests, the Mexican government began looking for ways to improve and strengthen its national fire program.

But, like many governments, they assumed that all burning was bad and focused their efforts on ways to prevent people living in rural areas from lighting fires in the fields and forests where they lived.

Fortunately, with some help from The Nature Conservancy and its partners, lawmakers were ultimately persuaded to take a different approach.

That approach involves recognizing that the fire practices and knowledge of rural communities can actually be beneficial, not harmful, to landscapes.

“The Nature Conservancy helped convince the government that fire was needed for the long-term maintenance of Mexico’s pine-oak forests, and that fires needed to be managed rather than always suppressed,” says Dr. Ronald Myers, a Nature Conservancy ecologist.

“But realizing that they did not, and probably would not, have the capacity to do that management, Mexico’s National Protected Areas Commission proposed to work with local communities to adapt traditional burning practices and knowledge to meet both conservation and rural community needs.”

According to Mary Huffman, a Nature Conservancy ecologist who has studied community-based fire in southern Mexico: “Farmers in some parts of Mexico have depended on fire for their survival for millennia, so of course they have deep local knowledge about the use of fire in some ecosystems.”

People use fire to prepare fields for planting, and they also burn pine forests to facilitate travel and control pests. Some also use fire to improve forage grasses that grow beneath the pines.

Wildfire is a common occurrence in this part of the world, and so farmers developed a technique called quema de cuchillo (see photo above) to prevent the spread of both wildfires and intentional burns into fields and villages. This involves burning ridge tops (because fires are too hard to control on steep slopes) to create fire breaks.

The Conservancy’s project focused on preserving these local burning techniques and expertise to not only meet traditional needs but also to maintain the pine forest.

In La Sepultura Biosphere Reserve in the southern state of Chiapas, the Conservancy has worked with two communities to gather information, develop consensus on where fire would and wouldn’t be allowed, and craft detailed fire-management plans. We’re also working to replicate this framework in other rural communities in Mexico and in countries across the region.

The La Sepultura project also contributed to the development of conservation-friendly, national fire management policy in Mexico. In many countries, even though enforcement capacity is limited, it’s technically against the law to use fire in forests, even to manage fire-dependent ecosystems within a protected area. This was the case in Mexico until recently.

According to Myers: “What we accomplished was official recognition that fire can play a positive role — both ecological and economic — and under appropriate circumstances rural people and professionals in Mexico can now legally use fire in both forested and agricultural settings.”

This experience adds to a growing body of knowledge around the world that integrates fire ecology, fire management and rural community livelihood needs.

The Conservancy’s term for this approach — Integrated Fire Management — is the centerpiece of our strategy for addressing the fire-related needs of both people and ecosystems.

Wendy Fulks is a member of The Nature Conservancy’s Global Fire Team.

(Top image: Using Ocote, a traditional method for igniting fires. Bottom image: a quema de cuchillo, or ridge-top burn. Credits: Victor Negrete.)

In the last issue of Nature Conservancy magazine, writer Madeline Bodin reported on white-nose syndrome in bats. Unfortunately, as today’s lead story shows, the situation is getting worse. Read on to learn more… and check out all of today’s top news stories from the enviro-web.

1. The U.S. Forest Service has ordered thousands of bat caves closed due to deadly white-nose syndrome, and lawmakers are seeking funding to learn more about the problem. To help in the awareness effort, 10,000 Birds deviates from it’s all-avian norm to highlight the problem.
2. Could wind and renewables be the new money-maker for Indian reservations? Environmental Capital says reservations should forget casinos and go where the wind blows.
3. Climate scientist and blogger Gavin Schmidt has come out with a new book of photos depicting climate change. Read an interview with him at Green Inc. 
4. Researchers in Japan have found a new method of fighting fires: a frozen mixture of water and CO2 can put out fires quickly, using less water and releasing less CO2 than other fire-fighting methods.
5. Last but not least, The Vine tipped us off to this humorous headline from the BBC: “Eco-Sailors Rescued by Oil Tanker.”

(Image: dead bats on the floor of a cave in New York. Source: USFWS, from 10,000 Birds.)

Swine flu may have all the news attention today, but let’s re-focus our thoughts on… frogs. Today is the first-ever international “Save the Frogs Day.” Learn more about how to save one of the world’s most threatened animal groups, and then check out all of today’s top news stories.

• Save the Frogs Day: Never heard of it? That’s because it’s brand new. Today is the first of what founder Dr. Kerry Kriger hopes will be an event of global importance to save amphibians.
• A Lake Without Fish? Turns out, that’s not such a bad thing. Fishless lakes are actually full of biodiversity, but their numbers are dwindling due to fish-stocking  programs.
• Clinton and Climate Change: The leaders of 17 nations — representing 75 percent of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions — are meeting in Washington, D.C. this week to begin laying the groundwork for December’s Copenhagen meetings. The Vine wonders what this forum will accomplish, and Bright Green Blog says we shouldn’t expect any big break-throughs.
• Flammable Planet: A new study says climate models do not accurately take into account the influence of fire, with up to one-fifth of greenhouse gas emissions coming from intentional fires. Considering that climate change will cause more drought and wildfires, seems like we’ve walked into a ring of fire.
• Leave It to Spain… to come up with a potential break-through in harnessing solar energy that involves oil and salt. Why not add a little arugula with that and call it a meal?

(Image: Frog in Costa Rica. Source: Ken Miyata.

Happy Arbor Day! Happy Arbor Day? Sadly overshadowed now by Earth Day, Arbor Day (celebrated in the United States on the last Friday in April) is almost forgotten in the green blogosphere today. Still, why not plant a tree and connect with one of the original American ways of making Earth a little greener? Then read the other green stuff going on this morning…

• Is Environmentalism Bad for the Environment? Yes, when it prioritizes the local over the global — like residents of Cape Cod blocking wind farms there — writes Edward L. Glaeser on Green Inc.

• Because It’s Worth It: L’Oreal, the European company whose hair coloring product Preference had the famous tagline “Because I’m worth it,” is going to use methane from cow manure to power one of its haircare products factories. (It’s all part of a drive to reduce the company’s CO2 emissions by 50 percent in five years, reports GreenBiz.)

• Somebody Yell “Fire!”: Fire is the unspoken culprit in climate change, says a new report in Science — with up to 20 percent of manmade CO2 emissions coming from intentional fires set to clear forests. (Hat tip: Journal Watch Online.)

• Hypocrisy! I’m Shocked, Shocked! While the Global Climate Coalition — a group of oil, coal, and car companies — was casting doubt on the reality of climate change in the 1990s, the group’s own scientists were telling it the opposite, reports Andrew Revkin in The New York Times.

• Biomass to the Rescue: The Democratic Republic of Congo’s Virunga National Park, one of the last homes of the mountain gorilla, is being chopped down for charcoal. Could an alternative briquette made of biomass stop that? asks 60-Second Science.

(Image: Tree planting at York University, Toronto, Arbor Day, 2008. Credit: alexindigo through a Creative Commons license.)

It’s a dewy green morning here, but not so much in the Brazilian Amazon, where forest destruction has led to nighttime dew loss, which has led to declines in rodents, which has led to… well, read on for the rest of this cascading calamity. But never fear, there is some hope in this morning’s top green news stories.

• Green on the Mind: Can social scientists help us find climate change solutions? A group of behaviorial scientists are looking at how people make decisions in times of environmental uncertainty.
• I Could Have Told You That: The EPA officially ruled that greenhouse gases endanger public health and welfare. Which means the agency should now be able to regulate emissions… theoretically.
• In Times of War, Issue Bonds: The executive director of an investment company thinks the government should issue “environment bonds” to help raise money for clean technology and carbon reduction efforts.
• Rodents Feel the Heat: A researcher with the Smithsonian Institute found that burning of the Amazon reduces nighttime dew, which has led to declines in species of guinea pigs, rats, mice and other native rodents that are preyed upon by larger animals like the maned wolf.
• Limit One Carry-On Per Animal: Assisted migration, managed relocation, Noah’s ark… call it what you will, but some scientists think the best way to save endangered species from climate change is to move them to more hospitable locales.

(Image: Brazilian guinea pig. Source: Claudio D. Timms through a Creative Commons license.)

We’re covering the globe today… from Australia to Bolivia to Oregon to the depths of the ocean, here are the top green news stories you should read.

• Australia Holds the Grim Distinction… of being the place scientists point to for evidence of climate change. Drought, wildfires, heat waves and agricultural collapse plague the country, and the social and psychological impacts of this climate change are building, reports the L.A. Times.
• Recycle Your Cell Phone for Earth Day: So says the EPA, who calculated that if 100 million phones are turned in for recycling, almost 20,000 homes could be powered.
• Taxing Your Two-Wheel: An Oregon state representative thinks bicyclists should abide by the same rules as motorist – including registering their “vehicles” and helping to support the costs of bike lanes and other infrastructure.
• My, What Sensitive Ears You Have: A new study proves that military sonar harms the hearing of dolphins and whales. The BBC’s Richard Black and Short Sharp Science both report.
• Bolivia Children Pay the Price: Andean glaciers in Bolivia are melting so fast that a child born today won’t see much ice by the time he or she reaches adulthood. And this rapid ice melt threatens the water supply of 77 million people.

(Image: Bolivian children. Source: Immbastos, via a Creative Commons license.)