WHAT IS BIOCITIZEN? The word “biocitizen” is a contraction of “biotic citizen,” a term and idea conceived by Aldo Leopold (1887–1948) who is widely celebrated for conceiving the “land ethic.” A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise. A...Continue Reading
This post is written by Sabrina Moore, who will assist Dr. Boyd Kynard in our innovative Living Rivers School, that lets middle and high school -aged students participate in conservation biology research that, when published and shared, increases public knowledge of the living systems that sustain us. When we know what sustains us, we take...Continue Reading
Biocitizen began in the forests of Cape Horn, when Kurt Heidinger, Francisca Massardo and Ricardo Rozzi developed Tracing Darwin’s Path, an interdisciplinary learning-adventure that immerses students in the biocultural history of that sublime portion of the earth. With others, they established the Omora Ethnobotanical Park as a Field Environmental Philosophy research and development “laboratory”. Their...Continue Reading
Kurt here—once upon a time (1998) I was invited by Ricardo Rozzi and Francisca Massardo to visit Navarino Island, where they were conducting conservation biology research. I am not a scientist, so while they were busy I freewalked the Dientes Range. In 2000, they invited me to be a co-founder of the Omora Ethnobotanical Park....Continue Reading
Our Place Summer School Scholarship Program 2019 Our Place Summer School is designed to “unplug” children by bringing them into direct contact with the creatures, geologies, hydrologies and infrastructures of the Nonotuck biome and the Westfield River watershed. (Click to read the Daily Gazette article about Our Place.) Thanks to the generosity of people who...Continue Reading
Salamanders, newts and wood frogs depend upon the vernal pools that appear during snow melt and vanish as the summer arrives. If you’ve wondered where these neighbors are born, and where they return to make babies, this video is a perfect introduction: Without these havens, our amphibian friends will disappear. In Massachusetts, we can certify...Continue Reading
What is the Biocitizen Corps? There is a moment when a student wants to do more than learn about their biome. They want to care for it. They want to act on what they’re learning, turn theory into practice, and bring health and vitality to the world. The Biocitizen Corps offers these students structured...Continue Reading
“In a real sense all life is inter-related. All men are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be, and you can never be what...Continue Reading
Below you’ll find texts and images that accompanied Kurt Heidinger’s lecture on “Re-Presenting Nonotuck: The Landscape Paintings of Hitchcock and Gloman” 1) The Hitchcock’s science was their religion: “geology and the Bible speak the same language” “The undevout geologist is mad” “it is in the facts of the natural world that most strikingly discover to...Continue Reading
