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CONSERVING THROUGH RESEARCH AND EDUCATION

April 17, 2020

Looking out my window, the snow is falling. This seems to be a recurring theme when we go to publish the News Brief each spring! If you are itching to garden and start fieldwork, that is certainly frustrating. But I guess I will have to accept that snow is not unusual in March (and April?).

That said, this spring has certainly been unusual with COVID-19. The campus and the world closed down many activities and we all quarantined. Most of our field research is on hold. ERC staff are working from home. Events are being postponed. April is a big month for us in terms of events. Our biggest event of the year, the Conservation Conversation, was supposed to have been tomorrow. :( 

But we are adjusting. Faculty are still teaching all of their classes, albeit online. Students are still working towards their degrees, and they are still signing up for fall courses. Life is going on. 

We do plan on holding many of our events later, in many cases in September. More on that below. Also below is an ask for your support. April, linked forever to Earth Day, is an important fundraising period for us. Please consider giving. We are largely dependent on donations for operations.

As always, my gratitude for your interest and support. Directing the ERC is one of the great joys in my life. 

Best wishes,
Bruce Kingsbury, Director
 

Spring Events Updates

Lots has changed. Here are the Cliffs Notes.

In accordance with decisions by the University and CDC recommendations regarding Coronavirus (COVID-19), the ERC's annual Earth Day celebration - Conservation Conversation unfortunately, will be postponed until further notice. As are many of the spring events we were planning and looking forward to: More info to come. Stay tuned for updates at our website. We appreciate everyone's patience and hope you all stay healthy!

April: Our Most Important Fundraising Month

Earth Month 

April is traditionally an important fundraising month for us. Don't forget us!

What do we do with your support? Good question. Most recently, we:
  • Made excellent progress outfitting the ERC building we occupied last year. All of the furnishings were paid for with donations.
  • Continue to refurbish the ERC. A focus now is the kitchen/breakroom, where we are enhancing the space to better allow us to support tenants and events, and host catering services in a sustainable way.
  • Got a good start on funds for sustainable landscaping around the building. 
Ultimately, adding projects, student activities and community engagement all cost money. When it comes to the environment and sustainability, the greatest sponsor is YOU, the private citizen.

Thanks!
DONATE NOW

Fort Wayne Area City Nature Challenge

What better celebration of Earth Month than a full weekend dedicated to citizen science!?

Good News! The Fort Wayne City Nature Challenge is still on! Although, the nature of the event has been tweaked. Rather than competition style, we are embracing the collaborative aspect of the event: sharing observations online with the digital community by encouraging people to document their local biodiversity (even the biodiversity of their own backyard) in any safe way possible. 
City Nature Challenge 2020 logo
In our first year participating, Team Fort Wayne will include 7 counties; Adams, Allen, DeKalb, Huntington, Noble, Wells, and Whitley. This means any observations made in these counties April 24 -April 27th, 2020 can be included in the project! The goal is to document as much wildlife as possible and to encourage residents to engage with nature in the cities.

Participation is easy:
  1. Get outside and find evidence of wildlife. Anything wild counts, from birds to mold. Tracks and scat. Insects gathering around your porch light, crawling across the sidewalk, or under patio rocks. Weeds are also wild!
  2. Take a picture and the location of your observation (turning on your phone's location makes it easy to document coordinates).
  3. Upload your findings to iNaturalist.
As a reminder, you don't need to be deep in the wilderness to find wildlife all around you. Spending an hour exploring biodiversity in the backyard may be eye-opening! Or perhaps going outside is too risky and you'd rather enjoy some birding from your living room couch. Guess what! That counts too!

You can learn more and stay up to date on the Fort Wayne City Nature Challenge here.

If you plan to participate this year, we encourage you to carefully follow public health guidelines. For more information on how you can do that, click here.

Highlight on Student Research: Nutraceuticals and Aquaculture

Dr. Ahmed Mustafa is a professor of biology at Purdue University Fort Wayne, where his research is focused on animal physiology and aquaculture. In February, Dr. Mustafa and six biology students attended the Aquaculture America 2020 Conference in Honolulu, Hawaii. The conference brought together students, researchers, and industry professionals.

Aparna Biswas and Asif Mortuza, graduate students in Dr. Mustafa’s lab, presented their research on nutraceuticals. In the simplest terms, nutraceuaticals are medicinal foods. Aparna and Asif examined the effects of different types of basil on fish. Aparna found that Holy basil, a plant known to have medicinal properties, can enhance immunocompetence in one species of fish. This means that the fish treated with holy basil presented positive physiological responses. Asif examined the effect of Holy basil at the cellular level by treating immune cells and measuring their response.

Lindee Mason, also a graduate student in Dr. Mustafa’s lab, presented research on alternative food sources for sea urchins. High demand for sea urchins as food and medicine has been detrimental to wild populations in recent years. This has led to an increase in commercial production. Because kelp, their main food source, is expensive and difficult to acquire, Lindee looked at less expensive food options, like crumb sponge and romaine lettuce. Because her findings indicated that the cheaper alternative was not as effective for urchin health, she recommends further research on the subject.

To learn more about research taking place in Dr. Mustafa's  lab, check out his website.

Celebrating Earth Day for 50 Years

And looking forward 50 more

The first Earth Day celebrations made front page headlines on April 22, 1970. Source: The New York Times Photo Archive. 

The first Earth Day was April 22, 1970 and founded by a Wisconsin environmentalist and  politician, Gaylord Nelson. The inaugural teach-in event was hugely popular, with 20,000 demonstrators turning out in cities across the US.

The impact of the first event was significant, leading to the foundation of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in December 1970 and the passage of the Clean Air, Clean Water, and Endangered Species Act soon after. According to the EPA, public opinion about the environment shifted too, with 25% of US citizens polling that environmental protection is important.

In 1990, the movement reached a global scale. And in the 50 years since the inaugural event, global awareness and participation has grown, with more than 190 countries and 1 billion individuals taking part.

To this day, Earth Day is regarded as one of the biggest environmental celebrations of the year. It is a day full of history, education, controversy, and appreciation for something that unites us all. We'll be going in depth of the history and the future of this holiday at our annual Conservation Conversation this fall if you'd like to learn more!

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Bruce Kingsbury
Environmental Resources Center
Purdue University Fort Wayne (PFW)
2101 East Coliseum Blvd.
Fort Wayne, IN 46805-1499

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