With the support of U.S. National Science Foundation Grant (IIA 1261229) Patagonia Research Experiences for Students in Sustainability or “PRESS“, 5 undergraduate and graduate students from Northern Arizona University (NAU) arrived to Ushuaia, Tierra del Fuego to initiate their projects with Argentine mentors from a suite of partner institutions. In the coming years, the project will fund 7-8 students per year, and after the ending of the NSF funds the programs sustainability is ensured by being part of the Global Science and Engineering Program at NAU and internationalization efforts in Argentina. In 2015, OSARA is proud to coordinate the following projects.

Erik McCaughan, B.S. Biology, studying the trophic and population ecology of native southern river otters and invasive American mink under the guidance of Drs. Alejandro Valenzuela (Argentine National Parks Administration-APN and National University of Tierra del Fuego-UNTDF) and Laura Fasola (Austral Center for Scientific Research-CADIC). Tierra del Fuego & Santa Cruz Provinces, Argentina.

Faythe Duran, B.S. Biology, studying the soil conditions in a national observatory site for desertification under the guidance of Dr. Alicia Moretto (CADIC-UNTDF). Tierra del Fuego Province, Argentina.

Montana Johnson, B.S. Environmental Sciences, studying stream macroinvertebrate assemblages associated with different habitat types in Tierra del Fuego under the guidance of Dr. Christopher Anderson (CADIC-UNTDF).  Tierra del Fuego Province, Argentina.

Taylor Oster, B.S. Environmental Engineering and B.A. Spanish, studying indicators of trail sustainability in Glaciers and Tierra del Fuego National Parks under the guidance of Laura Malmierca (APN).  Tierra del Fuego & Santa Cruz Provinces, Argentina.

T.J. Schmidt, M.S. Climate Science & Solutions, studying the carbon footprint of the wool industry in Santa Cruz Province, Argentina under the guidance of Dr. Pablo Peri (National Institute of Agricultural Technology-INTA and National University of Southern Patagonia-UNPA). Santa Cruz Province, Argentina.

Since 2012, Northern Arizona University and a suite of partners in southern Patagonia, coordinated by OSARA, have forged new and productive relationships in the area of conservation, socio-ecological research and sustainability science. The first fruit of this relationship was the NSF International Research Experience for Students grant, known as “PRESS“.

Now, as these relationships have grown, a new proposal has been funded by both Argentina’s National Council for Scientific and Technological Research (CONICET) and the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) as part of international cooperation efforts. This new project, entitled Understanding biotic and institutional drivers that facilitate or constrain watershed restoration: a comparative study of two iconic landscapes from Patagonia and Grand Canyon will fund Drs. Christopher Anderson and Sebastian Ballari from Argentina to conduct work at NAU, while Dr. Erik Nielsen will come to collaborate in Tierra del Fuego.

The line of research of science and tourism, which is led by Ernesto Davis at the Center for Quaternary Studies (CEQUA) in Punta Arenas, Chile, has received significant new support from the Chilean Science and Technology Commission’s “Linking Science and Industry” (VCE) Program. In addition, the VCE Program highlighted Mr. Davis’ previous efforts as exemplary at the national level for the type of projects they seek to fund and institutionalize. The new grant will allow the previous experience working with the Australis Cruiseline to be used to expand training efforts throughout the region, as well as continue to strengthen citizen science training on board the boats. The ultimate goal is to formalize a strategy that integrates academics and tourism operators in a reciprocally beneficial relationship. Beyond just the traditional “outreach” model of training guides or preparing educational materials, this effort seeks to include the guides and the tourists themselves in the research, and show the value of this approach to companies.

With the support of a CONICET grant to Dr. Christopher Anderson, concrete strides are being made to strengthen research between Tierra del Fuego and Alaska. From November 2014-February 2015, distinguished scientist Dr. Merav Ben-David from the University of Wyoming conducted a sabbatical at the Austral Center for Scientific Research (CADIC) in association with the Argentine National Parks Administration (APN). Dr. Ben-David is a recognized expert in wildlife biology and management, particular in polar and sub-polar biomes in North America, where she works with species like otters, mink, beaver and polar bears, among others.

During her time in Tierra del Fuego, she offered two workshops for local researchers and students, regarding non-invasive methods of estimating animal populations and using stable isotopes in ecological research. She also conducted extensive field work with Dr. Alejandro Valenzuela in Tierra del Fuego and Glaciers National Parks to get to know the situation of the endangered southern river otter (Lontra provocax) and the invasive American mink (Neovison vison). With Dr. Andrea Raya-Rey she also participated in studies on Magellanic penguins (Spheniscus magellanicus). Finally, in association with the Center for Quaternary Studies (CEQUA) in Punta Arenas, Chile, she is advising a scientific tourism project on the cruise ships of the Australis company, assisting in the integration of citizen science methods to this initiative.

Based on these efforts to re-enforce relationships between the polar and sup-polar regions of North and South America, new projects are being developed. In June 2015, Dr. Valenzuela of the APN will travel to Alaska to participate in coastal otter monitoring programs, and plans are being made to present new training grants for Argentine and U.S. students to work in both Patagonia and North America on similar issues related to wildlife and conservation issues.

Yet again, OSARA has helped facilitate a successful Fulbright application to work in Patagonia. This time, Dr. Erik Nielsen from Northern Arizona University (NAU) will recieve the award to conduct a sabbatical from January till May 2016. During that time he will offer two courses at the National University of Tierra del Fuego. One will be on social dimensions of conservation and the other about interdisciplinary teaching practices for university professors. In addition, he will conduct research in association with the Austral Center for Scientific Research concerning the social and institutional aspects of conservation, including control of invasive beavers and restoration of native forests.

A recent publication in the journal Ecological Restoration, led by Fulbrighter and NatGeo Young Explorer Jonathan Henn, finds that survival of transplated lenga (Nothofagus pumilio) seedlings in abandoned beaver meadows depends largely on the abiotic conditions of microhabitats within the meadow and the invasion of herbaceous (often exotic) plants. The research, coordinated under the guidance of Dr. Guillermo Martinez Pastur (ECO-Link Senior Personnel) and Dr. Christopher Anderson (ECO-Link PI), is the first pilot effort in Tierra del Fuego to conduct active forest restoration, which is one of the goals of the binational agreement between Chile and Argentina regarding the management of the invasive beaver.

Via its Audio-visual Production Program, the National University of Tierra del Fuego (UNTDF) has released a short trailer to a longer documentary film on the social, ecological and ethical dimensions of invasive exotic species, such as the beaver and mink in southern Patagonia. Click here to see the video.

From 30 June to 5 July, more than 20 students from Argentina, Chile and Paraguay came to the National Patagonia Center (CENPAT) in Puerto Madryn to participate in the graduate course entitled “Humans Dimensions of Conservation,” coordinated by Dr. Alexandra Sapoznikow. Invited lecturers included social and natural scientists. Guest professor Dr. Christopher Anderson stated “this course in Puerto Madryn is the ‘sister’ course to one we offer in Ushuaia on ‘socio-ecology’. With Alexa we have decided to offer each every other year and re-enforce one another, rather than compete, as a way to united our efforts from southern and northern Patagonia.” In 2015, the next version of this series will be offered in Ushuaia, associated with the Argentine Marine Sciences Congress, under the motto “integrating forms of knowledge.”

Source. Scientific American. Reported by Katie Worth. See slideshow.

Argentina and Chile Decide Not to Leave it to Beavers.

Importing the incisor-toothed hydrologists from Canada to the southernmost tip of South America seemed like a good idea in 1946, but it wasn’t. 

Rarely has the inception of an environmental disaster been so triumphantly documented.

In a recently unearthed black-and-white newsreel, which played before movies in theaters across Argentina in 1946, a newscaster reported that 20 beavers have been trapped in Canada and flown to Tierra del Fuego—the island that straddles the border between Argentina and Chile at the southernmost tip of South America. Argentine Pres. Juan Perón’s administration had imported the animals in hopes that they would thrive and reproduce, fostering a fur trade in the economically lackluster territory. “The beavers, who eat branches of trees and bark, will find abundance here,” the newscaster stated, as the camera pans across kilometers of virgin Fuegian forests. The beavers, released from their cages, slip into a river as the voice added gravitas to the dam-building beasties’ entry into their new environs, “Now they are in God’s hands.”

Abundance they found. Six decades later the descendants of those 20 pioneers number in the tens of thousands in Patagonia. The beasts have swum from Tierra del Fuego to the continent and beyond, and now occupy an unknown number of islands in the vast uninhabited archipelago off the coast of southern Chile. As they waddle their way north, building dams, creating ponds and procreating, they lay waste to vast tracts of land, which appear scorched or bulldozed. The destructive power of the beavers in Patagonia surprised ecologists in North America, where the same animals have been reintroduced to wetlands in need of restoration. Read more by clicking here.

Scientists from the University of Magallanes in Chile have teamed up with colleagues in Argentina at the National Parks Administration, the National University of Tierra del Fuego and the Austral Center for Scientific Research to develop an innovative project that links science & tourism and bridges the historical gap between the two countries in the Tierra del Fuego Archipelago. In general, such collaborative ventures are considered “outreach,” whereby the scientific organization “helps” the private sector. In this project, funded by the Chilean Science and Technological Commission – CONICYT, the dialogue is reciprocal; scientists not only are training local tourism guides, but also involving them in the research and monitoring projects in the archipelago.

The goal is to value the deep knowledge and capacity of the tourism industry to generate new information, monitor its own impacts and provide a service to the academic community by helping implement a monitoring and sampling network in remote parts of Tierra del Fuego, where few scientists venture. Working in this pilot effort with the company Cruceros Australis, the project’s directors have begun five new data collection protocols: a) following of plant phenology, b) description of intertidal marine communities, c) monitoring of invasive species and birds, d) sampling ocean chemistry and e) recording trash throughout the navigation routes. In this way, scientists and the private sector hope to promote a binational approach to sustainable development options via ecotourism and also implement much needed long-term research and monitoring in one of the world’s most remote archipelagos.

Jean-Paul Zagarola and colleagues from the U.S.A. and Argentina recently published the cover article in the journal Environmental Management entitled  “Perceiving Patagonia: An Assessment of Social Values and Perspectives Regarding Watershed Ecosystem Services and Management in Southern South America.” This research, which was funded by a Fulbright student grant and a U.S. National Science Foundation IRES award, was the first of its kind by simultaneously exploring the mentalities of “regular citizens” and “specialists” on both sides of the Fuegian Archipelago.

Research on human dimensions of ecosystems through the ecosystem services (ES) concept has proliferated over recent decades but has largely focused on monetary value of ecosystems while excluding other community-based values. This study conducted 312 surveys of general community members and regional researchers and decision makers to understand local perceptions and values of watershed ES and natural resource management in South America’s southern Patagonian ecoregion. Results indicated that specialists shared many similar values of ES with community members, but at the same time their mentalities did not capture the diversity of values that existed within the broader community. The supporting services were most highly valued by both groups, but generally poorly understood by the community. Many services that are not easily captured in monetary terms, particularly cultural services, were highly valued by community members and specialists. Both groups perceived a lack of communication and access to basic scientific information in current management approaches and differed slightly in their perspective on potential threats to ES.

Zagarola et al. 2014 – Perceiving Patagonia. An Assesment of Social Values and Perspectives Regarding Watershed Ecosystem Services and Management in Southern South America

After several years of research and preparation, Drs. Andrés Moreira (P. Univ. Católica, Chile) and Axel Borsdorf (Univ. of Innsbruck, Austria) have published an edited volume, entitled Chilean Biosphere Reserves – Laboratories for Sustainability, which includes conceptual and practical analyses of how to compatibilize human well-being and environmental conservation and provides descriptive case studies for the 10 biosphere reserves found in Chile. Dr. Christopher Anderson was invited to contribute the chapter on Cape Horn.

So, what do the Grand Canyon and Patagonia have in common? Well, they are both places whose names evoke iconic imagery of some of the world’s most amazing landscapes. Now, they are also the sites of a binational project funded by the U.S. National Science Foundation entitled Patagonia Research Experiences for Students in Sustainability (PRESS):  Understanding Social-Ecological Drivers & Consequences of Global Change.

This project will fund up to 8 students per year from Northern Arizona University to conduct research with mentors based at the Austral Center for Scientific Research, the Argentine National Parks Association, the National University of Southern Patagonia and the National University of Tierra del Fuego to study i) climate and land use change, ii) invasive species and iii) tourism/development in protected areas. For more information see: http://nau.edu/CIE/Global-Science-Engineering/Destinations/PRESS/. OSARA is proud to coordinate this new US-Patagonia link.

Between 9-14 December 2013, 19 student participants came together in the Austral Center for Scientific Research (CADIC) to participate in a course organized by the National University of Tierra del Fuego in conjunction with the Department of Forest Resources and Environmental Conservation at Virginia Tech. The course, entitled “Integrating Human and Natural Dimensions to better Study and Conserve Socio–Ecological Systems,” brought together professors from the U.S. and Argentina and students from Argentina, Chile, U.S. and Columbia to explore what and how to incorporate humans not only into our studies of the world, but also the very way we conceive nature and the “human-nature” relationship.