Roxbury's Schaller talks of the need for conservation

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Roxbury's Schaller talks of the need for conservationBy Robert Miller, Staff

WriterPublished: 06:36 p.m., Saturday, February 6, 2010

 

ROXBURY -- More than a half-century ago, George

Schaller<http://www.newstimes.com/?controllerName=search & action=search & channel=n\

ews & search=1 & inlineLink=1 & query=%22George+Schaller%22>

went

to the northern regions of Alaska and discovered a space he still speaks of

with awe.

 

" You can hike there for a week and never meet another person,'' he said of

the 30,000-square-mile Arctic National Wildlife

Refuge<http://www.newstimes.com/?controllerName=search & action=search & channel=new\

s & search=1 & inlineLink=1 & query=%22Arctic+National+Wildlife+Refuge%22>.

" It's America's last great wilderness.''

 

He returned there in the past few years and found, to his delight, the

landscape where he once camped and studied remains unchanged.

 

" The place is the same,'' he said, speaking at Roxbury Town Hall to a

standing-room-only crowd of more than 100 people last Sunday. His talk was

sponsored by Minor Memorial

Library<http://www.newstimes.com/?controllerName=search & action=search & channel=ne\

ws & search=1 & inlineLink=1 & query=%22Minor+Memorial+Library%22>

and

the Roxbury Land

Trust<http://www.newstimes.com/?controllerName=search & action=search & channel=news\

& search=1 & inlineLink=1 & query=%22Roxbury+Land+Trust%22>

..

 

But Schaller then pointed out there are people still eager to use some of

the most beautiful parts of the world for drilling oil.

 

" Ted

Stevens<http://www.newstimes.com/?controllerName=search & action=search & channel=ne\

ws & search=1 & inlineLink=1 & query=%22Ted+Stevens%22>,

the ex-senator from Alaska, has said it's all a barren desert there,'' said

Schaller, 76, whose work as a field biologist helped create the refuge in

1960.

 

And yet, Schaller perseveres, not just in Alaska, but in Africa, in China,

and the other wild places of the world.

 

" It's your land. If you value it, it's your responsibility,'' he said.

 

Schaller -- who has lived in Roxbury for 35 years when he's not setting up

camp on the Serengeti Plain of Tanzania or the Tibetan Plateau -- is

considered to be the one of the greatest field biologists and wildlife

conservationists in the history of the environmental movement.

 

His work has led to the establishment of more than 20 substantial wildlife

refuges around the world and has been honored by the National Geographic

Society, the World Wildlife

Fund<http://www.newstimes.com/?controllerName=search & action=search & channel=news & \

search=1 & inlineLink=1 & query=%22World+Wildlife+Fund%22>,

and the Wildlife Conservation

Society<http://www.newstimes.com/?controllerName=search & action=search & channel=ne\

ws & search=1 & inlineLink=1 & query=%22Wildlife+Conservation+Society%22>,

where he is a senior conservationist. In 2008, he was the second winner of

the Indianapolis Prize, given every other year for work in wildlife

conservation.

 

He was the first man to study the mountain gorillas in their mountain

habitat in Africa.

 

Primatologist Dian

Fossey<http://www.newstimes.com/?controllerName=search & action=search & channel=new\

s & search=1 & inlineLink=1 & query=%22Dian+Fossey%22>

carried

Schaller's book on gorillas with her when she went to Rwanda.

 

In 1966, Schaller moved his field of study to lions on the Serengeti Plain

of Tanzania. The research project he began there continues to this day and

is the longest-lived study of one species of mammal on record. He

subsequently did field work on jaguars in Brazil, snow leopards in the

Himalayas and tigers in India.

 

His work in China on giant pandas was instrumental in setting up the system

of wildlife refuges there to protect the species in the wild. He is now

working with China to establish the vast 200,000-square-mile Chang Tang

wildlife refuge in Tibet -- the second-largest wildlife refuge in the world.

 

He is also working with the governments of China, Pakistan, Afghanistan and

Tajikistan to create a 25,000-square-mile international peace park in the

Pamir Mountains that straddle the border regions of the four countries.

 

" It's never easy to get the governments of four countries to agree on

anything,'' Schaller said.

 

Schaller, along with his work for the Wildlife Conservation Society, is also

vice-president of the group Panthera, which is dedicated to preserving the

world's wild cats.

 

Luke Hunter, Pathera's executive director, said Schaller's basic philosophy

has been " to go to some of the most difficult places on Earth, and study

some of the most difficult mammals to find.''

 

His results, Hunter said, are astonishing.

 

Hunter said he once went with Schaller to study the Asiatic cheetah in Iran.

He found Schaller got very bored driving to sites.

 

" He wanted to get out for a walk,'' he said. " George goes out walking with a

pair of binoculars, a pad and pencil, and he'll come back with pure gold.''

 

But Hunter said that along with being a great field biologist, Schaller is a

great conservationist.

 

" He does an amazingly good job of getting people to care about a place,'' he

said.

 

Part of his success, Schaller admits, is because of the objects of his

studies -- large mammals, whether they be lions, leopards, caribou wild

yaks, or Marco Polo sheep.

 

" If you study large, beautiful charismatic animals, you get a response from

people and governments pay more money to protect them,'' Schaller said

recently.

 

And because big species generally need a lot of territory, protecting them

and their habitats means you protect land for all the smaller species that

live there as well, he said.

 

And in the end, he said, the work becomes not just a matter of biology and

ecology and wildlife, but of humans souls.

 

" Conservation is basically a moral issue,'' he said. " It comes from the

heart.''

 

Contact Robert Miller

 

at bmiller

 

or at 203-731-3345.

 

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