Trip to Amazon Reveals Threats to Ecosystem
Alma College Associate Professor Mark Seals is back in Alma after
spending 10 days deep in the Amazon rain forest where he caught and
cooked a piranha for dinner, took more than 500 photos and learned
first-hand about an ecosystem that is severely threatened due to the
expansion of petroleum company exploration.
“It was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity,” says Seals, who teaches
science to education students. “I came back with lots of phenomenal
facts and teaching tools that can impact students at Alma. This was an
eye-opening experience that makes you realize how fragile the
environment is.”
Mark
Seals, second from left on top row, was one of eight educators who
spent 10 days at the Tipuini Biodiversity Station in eastern Ecuador.
Seals was one of eight science educators from across the United
States who received a grant to travel to the remote Tiputini
Biodiversity Station in eastern Ecuador. Seals flew to Quito on Dec.
31, where he met up with his colleagues. The group ventured more than
six hours, mostly by motorized canoe, to reach the 1,500-acre rain
forest site operated by the University of San Francisco-Quito in
collaboration with Boston University.
With no roads or villages for dozens of kilometers, the Tiputini site
is considered to be one of the most biodiverse areas remaining on
earth, according to Seals. More than 10 different species of monkeys
regularly pass through the station area. Plants dominate with a rich
distribution of palms, legumes, lianas and bromeliads, including many
still unnamed or even undiscovered. Insect life is profound, and more
than 2,000 species of fish are speculated to exist in the Tiputini
River.
However, the Northwest Amazon biodiversity is at risk because of
expanding oil exploration, says Seals. The sounds of pumping and
drilling can be heard from a petroleum operation about 12 kilometers
away, and recent plans supported by the Ecuador government call for
another plant and pipeline expansion just across from the Tiputini
Station.
“I learned some phenomenal facts, such as one year of oil removal from
the region only supports four days of energy used in the United
States,” says Seals. “It’s one thing to hear statistics like that; it’s
another to really face it and see the effects first-hand.”
Most of the U.S. companies have pulled out of the Amazon because the
good oil is depleted, says Seals. But China and other third-world
countries have purchased large tracts of land to drill for the
mid-grade oil that remains.
“Every drilling platform that goes in has a bleed-off of propane gases,
much like you see when driving on U.S. 127 by Clare,” says Seals. “But
in the rain forest, there’s no capture of these gases. You’ll see
flames 40- to 100-feet tall.
“Image a dark space, with millions of insects, and this large light,”
he says. “There are insects there that pollinate plants used for
medical cures, but many of these insects are being destroyed. It’s very
scary how the chains of the food web there are being impacted by oil
exploration.”
The research station where Seals stayed consisted of a cafeteria, a
small dormitory for workers, and sets of bamboo huts or cabins with
cots and showers.
“It was actually quite comfortable,” says Seals. “It sits on the edge
of the beautiful Tiputini River. We did a lot of neat things, such as
catching a piranha and cooking it for dinner one day.”
As part of the grant, Seals will integrate rain forest ecology and
related conservation knowledge and issues into coursework for Alma
College students who seek to become teachers.
Joining Seals in the project were science educators from Bard College,
Bethel University in Minnesota, Brooklyn College-CUNY, Muskingum
College, Olivet Nazarene University, San Diego State University, and
Tufts University.
Posted: Mon, January 26th, 2009 at 10:52AM
