Earth Matters

A tracker ponders the meaning of tracking

By George Leoniak For the Gazette

What is tracking? Trying to pin down an answer to this question is just as elusive as the animals I track. I’ll track an animal all day with the hopes of catching a glimpse, even though 99 percent of the time I will not see the animal at the end of the trail. Yet I continue to follow the tracks as they pull me deeper into the world of that animal, deeper into my world and deeper into the world we share.

Valley views through the artist’s lens

By Elizabeth Farnsworth For the Gazette

Perhaps it’s said a bit too often that a picture is worth a thousand words. Yet art does reveal the natural world in a way that sometimes eludes the casual observer. To paint a painting or draw a drawing or shoot that spellbinding photograph takes hours or even days of patient observation. When I sit down to sketch a plant or a panorama, I’m blessed with the luxury to just notice, and to build an appreciation that I couldn’t achieve by just passing by.

Envisioning a fossil-fuel-free Massachusetts

By Michael Dover

As this goes to press, the world awaits the results of yet another climate change conference. Hopes are high that we’ll see some movement toward reducing greenhouse gas emissions rather than the usual stalemate. But climate change is already upon us. The critical question now is whether we can prevent global catastrophe. To reach that goal, climate scientists and advocates are coalescing around two principles: first, that most of the known fossil-fuel reserves in the world should stay in the ground, and second, that the world must stop using all fossil fuels by 2050 — if not sooner — if we are to have any chance of keeping the Earth from warming more than two degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit).

Saved by the soil: Climate change and the earth beneath our feet

The challenge of climate change presents a dizzying array of choices and obstacles to consider as we try to develop global solutions. As an activist and a gardener, I’ve been heartened to know that part of the answer lies right beneath my feet: the soil.

Mourning dove, a bird for all seasons

By David Spector for the Gazette

One of the pleasures in observing nature is that repeated encounters with familiar species can evoke ever deeper fascination and appreciation. The mourning dove, one of the most common and widespread birds in North America, is a case in point.

A climate activist reflects on what was and what’s to come

By Margaret Bullitt-Jonas

One day I come across a report that in a far-off cave in South Africa, scientists have discovered the bones of a previously unknown branch of the human family. A photo shows an ancient skeleton, neatly laid out from head to toe. The bones of the feet, says one scientist, are “virtually indistinguishable” from those of modern humans. Named after the cave, Rising Star, in which the fossils were found, these ancestors are called Homo naledi (“star” in the local Sesotho language). Time will tell if these are proven to be our distant relatives, but I found this discovery compelling.

Plant changes brought by climate changes will force us to change, too

By Lawrence J. Winship

From the Vatican to the White House we are hearing increased acceptance of and concern about climate change. Even the U. S. military has finally acknowledged that sea level rise is a threat to national security, such as causing the flooding of Norfolk Naval Base. We find our attention grabbed by dramatic events such as storms, drought and sea-level rise. Yet more subtle changes may be even more significant for long-term prospects of the world as we know it.

The Outermost House: A Year on the Great Dune of Cape Cod,” is an eloquent account of life on the beach at Cape Cod

By Michael Dover

Once in a while a book speaks to me in a certain way, and I read it and reread it, gleaning something new each time. One of those is “The Outermost House: A Year on the Great Dune of Cape Cod” by Henry Beston, first published in 1928.