Summary Keynote on the Memorandum of Understanding on Cooperation for Wilderness Conservation by Sam Hamilton
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Sam Hamilton, Chief of the US Fish and Wildlife Service, US Department of Interior, gave a summary keynote following the signing of the first ever international agreement on wilderness - the Memorandum of Understanding on Cooperation for Wilderness Conservation between Mexico, Canada and the United States.
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Summary Keynote on the Memorandum of Understanding on Cooperation for Wilderness Conservation by Sam Hamilton
- 1. New Frontiers in Conservation America’s National Wildlife Refuges and Wilderness in a Changing World U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
- 20. Pelican Island National Wildlife Refuge, Florida – est. March 14, 1903 U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
- 21. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service The Dust Bowl Era: Responding to Environmental Crisis 1934-1939: 107 refuges established; now protecting over 5.7 million acres
- 23. Distribution of 500+ NWRs in an Ecosystem Vulnerability framework Resilience Climate Change Rate LOW HIGH LOW HIGH Magness, D. 2009 U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
- 25. Adaptation and the Refuge System U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
Editor's Notes
- Alaska Peninsula
- We should prepare a wilderness designation recommendation for the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge for the President to transmit to the Congress protecting the vast herds of migrating caribou and untouched tundra habitat from development. Mr. Secretary, we look forward to you “putting your feet on the ground” on Arctic NWR next June as you help us celebrate the 50 th anniversary and promote America’s wilderness as so many conservation leaders of the past have done – understanding the experience to express the vision. We should assure the Izembek Wilderness remains protected. The extraordinary abundance and diversity of waterfowl and shorebirds that rely on the Izembek Refuge and associated Izembek Lagoon, attracted global recognition by being the first site in the United States to be designated a "Wetland of International Importance" in 1986. The creation of a North Slope National Monument on the Coastal Plain of Alaska is a readily apparent option to explore - the coastal plain North of the Brooks Mountain Range from Cape Lisburne to the US/Canada border. The coastal plain of Alaska may offer polar bears a last chance to avoid extinction if they can adapt to a more terrestrial-based existence. We should work collaboratively to designate a national monument at Teshekpuk Lake. This internationally important area of 1.7 million acres provides habitat for tens of thousands of molting geese, threatened species like the Spectacled Eider, thousands of nesting shorebirds and waterfowl, and the 45,000-head Teshekpuk Lake Caribou Herd.
- Oregon Coastal Islands
- Cabeza Prieta
- Okefenokee cypress knees
- Arapaho
- spoonbiills
- Cape Romain baby loggerhead
- Radio collared bighorn sheep
- Arctic
- This is not the first time the Fish and Wildlife Service has had to respond to a conservation crisis. The National Wildlife Refuge System was born in response to a conservation crisis – the market shooting of birds. President Theodore Roosevelt established the first refuge at Pelican Island in Florida on March 14, 1903, and went on to establish a total 53 refuges. Population growth and development pressures, invasive species and other stressors are degrading and fragmenting fish and wildlife habitat. Climate change adds an unprecedented dimension to environmental change and an extraordinary challenge to the Service’s mission of fish and wildlife conservation.
- . GAO. 2007. Climate Change: Agencies Should Develop Guidance for Addressing the Effects on Federal Land and Water Resources. United States Government Accountability Office Report to Congressional Requesters. Spatial organization can inform an adaptation strategy. Rationale to organize adaptation option for national, strategic planning for refuge lands based on spatial variation in resilience and climate change rates. Dr. Hunter and McGuire folded both climate change and other stressors in their analysis of the central flyway. Alaska, the Prairie Potholes, and Southern US differed in terms of both human disturbance and climatic changes. Therefore, in the South for example, habitat acquisition was stressed and in alska prediction and facilitation was stressed.
- Havasu
- Lee Metcalf
- The Aleutian Islands contain diverse seabird and marine resources. Currently, management jurisdictions are restricted mostly to land-based capabilities. Expanding jurisdictional boundaries to the 12-mile limit would improve ability to protect the major biological resource protected by these islands. We should study and recommend the first “marine wilderness” be established at Palmyra Atoll and Kingman Reef National Wildlife Refuges. Kingman Reef and Palmyra Atoll NWRs are 1 million acres of fully protected tropical marine ecosystem exhibiting marine wilderness character, attributes, and values. The Palmyra/Kingman complex represents a fully intact marine ecosystem on a scale of atoll and marine biodiversity unrivaled in the entire equatorial Pacific Ocean: high biomass of the large predator trophic level (sharks); high coral diversity and cover, intact pelagic fish species assemblages, single aggregations of beaked whales numbering over a thousand, full complements of sea birds and migratory birds, rare coconut crabs, and manta rays and sea turtles.
- The Aleutian Islands contain diverse seabird and marine resources. Currently, management jurisdictions are restricted mostly to land-based capabilities. Expanding jurisdictional boundaries to the 12-mile limit would improve ability to protect the major biological resource protected by these islands. We should study and recommend the first “marine wilderness” be established at Palmyra Atoll and Kingman Reef National Wildlife Refuges. Kingman Reef and Palmyra Atoll NWRs are 1 million acres of fully protected tropical marine ecosystem exhibiting marine wilderness character, attributes, and values. The Palmyra/Kingman complex represents a fully intact marine ecosystem on a scale of atoll and marine biodiversity unrivaled in the entire equatorial Pacific Ocean: high biomass of the large predator trophic level (sharks); high coral diversity and cover, intact pelagic fish species assemblages, single aggregations of beaked whales numbering over a thousand, full complements of sea birds and migratory birds, rare coconut crabs, and manta rays and sea turtles.