Prairie Godfather

I do believe there is a place for agriculture (notice I did not say agribusiness) on portions of the prairies and plains, but it would need to be based on a new model of sustainability -- an organic culture of raising food for people carefully in places where it can better fit into the natural cycle of ecosystem processes. Wes Jackson and the Land Institute in Salina, Kan., have some good ideas. But the western regions beyond the 98th meridian, the "dry line," were never suited for the plow -- hence the reason U.S. Naval ships 200 miles out in the Atlantic were blinded by Oklahoma dust during the apocalyptic Dust Bowl as the ancient topsoil was blown out.

Our society has not yet learned to be at home on this land. Native landscapes need to be allowed to prosper within and alongside our civilization. America has sat itself down on top of an indescribably complex set of interconnected ecosystems, as if we were the only ones here, with complete disregard for wildlife, waters, Native people, etc. When we learn to become a part of those interworking relationships and seek to heal the earth and ourselves through measurable, practical implementation of visionary ideas, especially propagating a new culture of caring based on human decency, consideration, personal responsibility, and consequence of actions, I think we might finally be able to say we're evolving out of our societal immaturity and me-me-me fixations.

Specifically, we need to begin rebuilding a network of core wildland reserves and biological corridors wherever we live, and over the coming decades push to restore and reconnect the living landscape in order for life processes, wildlife, water, and ourselves to be able to weather the coming challenges that our changing world has in store. This will be much like the interstate highway system connecting large cities and smaller towns. Across the country, we need an ecological "highway" system of core reserves and networks connecting landscape-level, restored, and protected wildland ecosystems. This new restoration economy can be leveraged to provide invaluable wealth, prosperity, health, and peace to society, not just through the ecological services provided by high-functioning native landscapes, but by many, many new jobs, youth education programs, open space, community interaction, propagation of new ideas, super-clean technologies, and so much more.

We are faced with a huge challenge as our world begins to enter multisystem failure: Throw our hands up and squeak, or roll up our sleeves, let our eyes shine, seek commonality with each other and our battered ecosystems, and get to work.

This is so doable. The rebirth of the Great Plains can be a model and metaphor for people and ecosystems everywhere.

The first step is to become conscious of where you're at and work to belong to your ecological identity. Then, take personal responsibility for the specific consequences your actions have on others (people and animals) and always seek to cause less impact. True health is a three-legged stool of self, community, and the natural world. Pull any one leg out and the stool collapses. Great Plains Restoration Council calls this process "becoming an ecological participant." Ecological participants become walking role models by their actions.

And as far as confronting the violence that may be occurring in another region, where you may feel an outsider, it's good to care about what goes on elsewhere, while working on specific chosen battles. I am devastated by the catastrophic destruction of millions of acres of Indonesian rainforest, which is releasing extremely dangerous loads of carbon while pushing the orangutan and many other species to extinction, all to produce palm oil [PDF] (extreme greenwashing alert!) for "carbon-free" biofuels. But I can't fight that one; I can just pass on the word, and mention it in the larger discussion when alerting people to lies and realness when it comes to our critical energy transition process.

Specifically, if you want to help out on the Great Plains, get involved in helping stop the prairie-dog poisoning campaigns on our national grasslands, support the Great Plains National Park effort, advocate for new protected wildlands, alert everybody you know to what really is going on out West, and also seek defunding of Wildlife Services (formerly Animal Damage Control) aerial gunning, trapping, propane bombing, cyanide poisoning, etc. ad nauseam, of native wildlife. These are all things you are being forced to support. You are paying for them with your tax dollars.

Ecology is the final and greatest social struggle because it demands the interconnectedness of all living beings, and that includes us humans.

GPRC has never advocated for the return of the whole Great Plains to wilderness. It is true that tens of thousands of square miles of backcountry have reverted back to "frontier conditions" of less than six people per square mile on their own. But we're only talking about a small portion of the original 400 million acres.

A series of protected ecological reserves, connected where possible through biological corridors, that allow the buffalo, prairie dog, antelope, elk, wolf, grassland birds, and all the others to have a small portion of their homeland and freedom back will jumpstart a lucrative restoration economy for remaining rural residents, while also offering a bridge of understanding and partnership with urban people of all races, colors, and communities so that we all may grow in a serious way as a society.

Many West Texas towns in the old Rolling Plains counties, where the land is damaged, tired, and overgrown with mesquite, are losing 5 percent of their population every four or so years. Numbers like this are true of many western plains towns.

Some politicians and developers would like to change Fort Worth from "Where the West Begins" to "Where the Concrete Never Ends." But many others are coming together to save our "prairie rainforest" as the hidden crown jewel it is. Just in the last few months, Vision North Texas, Texas Prairie Coalition, and a regional greenprinting initiative led by our partner Trust for Public Land have come into being, and I am part of all three.

Serving our youth and protecting our prairie are based in strong values and a determination for a healthy, sustainable future that showcases how we can still grab the wheel and change course before we are driven 90 mph into a brick wall.

Corporations are made up of people too, and some of them certainly must care about their children, the air they breathe, etc. People who make their money from the prairie, like gas drillers and developers, should especially give back. Many kids who have so little give so much, yet many who have so much give so little.

I see major opportunities here. If we move forward utilizing the state-of-the-art conservation design and conservation biology principles that exist now, blended into our brand-new ecological health movement, Texas for once can lead the nation instead of following or being dead last. We're on our way, and the fact that this is a multiracial effort in a newly minority-majority state is something hot to watch and get involved in!

Right now, our new 12,000-acre project in West Texas, in a very rural, predominantly Anglo community, has got us all jazzed because the people are so friendly and enthusiastic to create a restored wilderness economy. Some of my friends, when they heard me recounting my first visit and planning meeting out there, joked that I must have gone into the Twilight Zone. But everything was and is for real. People were honestly friendly, and very enthusiastic. They even took this ol' 'hood rat to meet the bank president and one of the county commissioners. I had never even been into a friendly non-Black or non-Indian rural community before.

What a contrast to, say, Logan County, Kan., which is trying to force itself onto the private property of a rancher who actually wants to protect prairie dogs, and poison his prairie-dog ecosystem which he wants to serve as a safe haven and reintroduction site for endangered black-footed ferrets. (Black-footed ferrets are so rare they were thought extinct until some were found a couple decades ago in Wyoming. Ferrets depend on prairie dogs for survival, and because of the great poisoning of the continental prairie-dog ecosystem last century, they crashed.)

I do see hope as more citizens get involved and lead. Here in Fort Worth, the Tarrant County Commissioners Court passed a beautiful resolution in unanimous support of the Fort Worth Prairie Park. But certain members of the Fort Worth City Council worked hard against protection, even though it will be a huge economic boon and civic prestige. I scratch my head sometimes why some people would work so hard to commit such acts of violence.

Like the old inner-city urban garden mural I saw long ago, all I can say is: The Struggle Continues. La Lucha Continua.

The things that bother me about meat-based diets concern not only the killing of wildlife, but the pollution, the environmental racism of meat-packing and rendering plants, worker maimings, the massive amounts of water needed to produce one pound of flesh protein vs. one pound of plant protein, the dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico from all the waste runoff, the strange, fearsome new diseases and terrible old diseases like diabetes and colon cancer, and the confinement cruelty to domestic animals as they are moved into feedlots and then to the hellhole of the slaughterhouse, where they often "die piece by piece," as an immigrant ex-worker told The Washington Post.

GPRC's own website is currently undergoing a complete upgrading, and we will be placing an energy section there to help further and disseminate this work. For grassland enthusiasts, the exciting research that appears to be arising is that highly biodiverse native prairies do very well in the overall carbon-sequestration process. We know forests are good carbon sinks, but unlike temperate forests, grasslands don't hold heat, so some research is looking into the possibility that native prairies might perform equal or even better in the overall equation. I will be posting some photos on my blog (I don't get to it that much, but hope to do better) of a cutbank in the Fort Worth prairie where it's almost shocking how much carbon you can see in the soil exactly down to the line where the native grass roots end. The dark and light contrast is really profound.

In any case, GPRC looks forward to participating in the upcoming carbon-sequestration and offset programs, and certainly the nation should get behind efforts to create another set of lungs in the Western Hemisphere. For those looking for carbon offsets, they can help us create a few million acres of peace on the Great Plains and good health and help for the earth's atmosphere.

Often, people who fight colony by colony are so overwhelmed because it's only a matter of time before another "baby is thrown into the river," and it becomes an endless cycle of trying to save individuals. Yes, saving the individuals is very important; but why not go upstream to stop the problem at the source for larger effect? I argue that this effort needs to be tied to coordinated, positive, measurable efforts by neighbors, communities, cities, and counties to rebuild and connect larger prairie-dog towns, so that not only the perritos can survive long term, but also all the native wildlife, birds, etc. that depend on their towns.

Just like a coral reef attracts much more marine wildlife than the surrounding ocean, so does the prairie-dog colony. The prairie-dog ecosystem is the coral reef in the sea of grass, and both have been shattered, bringing a whole million-year-old way of life closer into the extinction spiral. We must focus and coordinate to create and build larger reserves, rather than just constantly reacting. We and the perritos will always be kept down until then.

You see that I am constantly stressing the need to establish core reserves and biological connectors in the landscape. Just like the ocean would stagnate and die if you walled it off with concrete into 160-acre sections, so too the prairie ocean.

The prairie earth is gasping; she needs to breathe again, and she needs all of our help!

I like to make sure people have open access to information so they can make their own informed decisions. I also do not preach. I let the facts speak for themselves. And I offer that being a vegetarian is so much a reward, rather than a punishment. Life, the pure sensory experience of life itself, is so much more pronounced within a clean body. I don't have to eat sludge, I don't have to eat suffering or factory farming or aerial gunning, I don't have to eat weird antibiotics and growth hormones and confinement-fostered diseases.

And for people seeking to recover from illness, I see quantum leaps with healthy vegetarian diets over the standard American diet. I know many people have started adding meatless meals to their week; hey, even a flexitarian decreases her or his impact, and anything we can do to lessen our impact is a celebration. It's all good. I strangely have hope for the future.

As with all of the questions above, and the whole movement for true wellness, health, and sustainability in this critical moment in time, knowledge coupled with incisive action is our crucible and salvation.

Thanks to everybody for caring.