"In the late twentieth century, residents of the Blue Ridge mountains in western North Carolina fiercely resisted certain environmental efforts, even while launching aggressive initiatives of their own. Kathryn Newfont provides context for those events by examining the environmental history of this region over the course of three hundred years, identifying what she calls commons environmentalism--a cultural strain of conservation in American history that has gone largely unexplored. Efforts in the 1970s to expand federal wilderness areas in the Pisgah and Nantahala national forests generated strong opposition. For many mountain residents the idea of unspoiled wilderness seemed economically unsound, historically dishonest, and elitist. Newfont shows that local people's sense of commons environmentalism required access to the forests that they viewed as semipublic places for hunting, fishing, and working. Policies that removed large tracts from use were perceived as 'enclosure' and resisted. Incorporating deep archival work and years of interviews and conversations with Appalachian residents, Blue Ridge Commons reveals a tradition of people building robust forest protection movements on their own terms."--p. [4] of cover.

This book is a magical collection of seven bedtime stories for 6 to 9 year olds -- one story for each night of the week, each featuring one of the seven colours of the rainbow. The stories are all new, yet have a timeless, dreamy quality to them, which is perfect for sleepy night-time reading.The seven stories form a harmonious circle: the first story features a small girl wearing a dress as white as the stars, who discovers a casket of jewels in a forest of blue trees. In the last story, a pink butterfly flutters from an old woman's garden to a hut in the woods, where a girl in a white dress sleeps.In between are a host of other wonderful characters, including a red bird whose song inspires dreams, a boy with a golden flower, an astrologer who paints stars from his purple tower, fish that transport raindrop-jewels to an underwater sea cave, and a mother and baby possum who discover a mysterious green sanctuary.Parents and children alike will delight in the vivid imagery in these enchanting tales, which lead the imagination from the clear outlines of the waking world into the elusive realm of dreams.

Across the inland West, forests that once seemed like paradise have turned into an ecological nightmare. Fires, insect epidemics, and disease now threaten millions of acres of once-bountiful forests. Yet no one can agree what went wrong. Was it too much management—or not enough—that forced the forests of the inland West to the verge of collapse? Is the solution more logging, or no logging at all? In this gripping work of scientific and historical detection, Nancy Langston unravels the disturbing history of what went wrong with the western forests, despite the best intentions of those involved. Focusing on the Blue Mountains of northeastern Oregon and southeastern Washington, she explores how the complex landscapes that so impressed settlers in the nineteenth century became an ecological disaster in the late twentieth. Federal foresters, intent on using their scientific training to stop exploitation and waste, suppressed light fires in the ponderosa pinelands. Hoping to save the forests, they could not foresee that their policies would instead destroy what they loved. When light fires were kept out, a series of ecological changes began. Firs grew thickly in forests once dominated by ponderosa pines, and when droughts hit, those firs succumbed to insects, diseases, and eventually catastrophic fires. Nancy Langston combines remarkable skills as both scientist and writer of history to tell this story. Her ability to understand and bring to life the complex biological processes of the forest is matched by her grasp of the human forces at work—from Indians, white settlers, missionaries, fur trappers, cattle ranchers, sheep herders, and railroad builders to timber industry and federal forestry managers. The book will be of interest to a wide audience of environmentalists, historians, ecologists, foresters, ranchers, and loggers—and all people who want to understand the changing lands of the West.

Part of the SAGE Reference Series on Leadership, this 2-volume set tackles issues relevant to leadership in the realm of the environment and sustainability. Volume 1 of Environmental Leadership: A Reference Handbook considers such topics as environmental thought leadership (environmental ethics, conservation, eco-feminism, collective action and the commons and what we have termed contrarians); political leadership (the environmental challenge context for the expression of political leadership); governmental leadership (government initiatives to provide leadership in environmental management); private sector leadership (private sector leadership in environmental management as individuals, through organizations or through specific initiatives); nonprofit leadership (nonprofit sector leadership in topical areas such as conservation, advocacy, philanthropy and economic development); signaling events (events and their impact on the exercise of environmental leadership through individual, political and organizational actions); grassroots activism (profiles of individual environmental activists and considerations of how environmental leadership is exercised through activism); environmental leadership in journalism, literature and the arts; and environmental leadership in education. In Volume 2 we cover topics that confront the particular intractable characteristics of environmental problem solving. Individual chapters focus on how environmental leadership actions or initiatives may be applied to address specific problems in context, offering both analyses and recommendations. Overarching themes in this volume include taking action in the face of uncertainty (mitigating climate change impacts, adapting to climate change, protecting coastal ecosystems, protecting wetlands and estuaries, preserving forest resources, protecting critical aquifers, preventing the spread of invasive species, and identifying and conserving vital global habitats); promoting international cooperation in the face of conflicting agendas (designing and implementing climate change policy, reconciling species protection and free trade, allocating scarce resources, designing sustainable fisheries, addressing global overpopulation, preventing trade in endangered species, conserving global biodiversity, and mitigating ocean debris and pollution); addressing conflicts between economic progress and environmental protection (preserving open space, redesigning cities, promoting ecotourism, redeveloping brownfields, designing transit-oriented development, confronting impacts of factory farming, preventing non-point source agricultural pollution, confronting agricultural water use, addressing the impacts of agrochemicals, designing sustainable food systems, and valuing ecosystem services); addressing complex management challenges (energy efficiency, solar energy, wind energy, hydrogen economy, alternative vehicles, solid waste disposal, hazardous waste disposal, electronic waste disposal, life cycle analysis, and waste to energy); and addressing disproportionate impacts on the poor and the weak (preventing export of developed world waste to developing countries, minimizing co-location of poverty and polluting industries, protecting the rights of indigenous peoples, preventing environmental disease, protecting children′s health, providing universal access to potable water, and protecting environmental refugees). The final three chapters examine next-generation environmental leaders.

Discover Earth's most beautiful and fascinating natural landmarks. From the spectacular granite domes of Yosemite to the reefs of the Bahama Banks and the ice sheets of the Antarctic, this is an unparalleled survey of the world's natural treasures. From the Rocky Mountains to the Great barrier Reef and everything in between, Natural Wonders of the World combines breathtaking landscape photography and illustrations with 3-D terrain models and other explanatory artworks to reveal what lies beneath the surface and explain the geological processes to show how the features were formed. Plants and animals that inhabit each environment are also included, making Natural Wonders of the World a complete celebration of our world. Produced in association with the Smithsonian Institution.

God helps you through Angels and you don’t know that He is helping you until He shows you through people.....