Example of Operation Pollination in Action

Admin01 — Sat, 18 Jul 2020 15:36:33 +0000

In August 2015, the first Operation Pollination project was launched in the St. Croix Valley of Minnesota/Wisconsin when three federal land management agencies signed a simple Pollinator Resolution and invited local partners to commit to pollinators by signing a simple Pollinator Pledge form. These three federal agencies were the National Park Service, US Forest Service, and US Fish and Wildlife Service. The local partners they invited to participate in the project included other government agencies, NGOs, for-profits, not for profits, both large and small. When these federal agencies launched the Operation Pollination project in 2015, 70 local partners, including Rotary District 5960, had signed pledges to take positive pollinator habitat/education actions. Today, there are approximately 120 local partner names that support the St. Croix Valley’s Operation Pollination project.

In 2018, three National Heritage Areas in the Midwest adopted and copied the Operation Pollination model for their respective areas. These areas are: Northern Plains National Heritage Area (ND), Abraham Lincoln National Heritage Area (IL), and MotorCities National Heritage Area (MI). National Heritage Areas are large, lived-in landscapes with nationally important stories to tell. Most land within the boundaries of National Heritage Areas is privately owned. There is no federal ownership of land associated with this federal designation. Perhaps there is a National Heritage Area where you live?

To start, each of these three National Heritage Areas announced their involvement in the Operation Pollination project by issuing a Pollinator Resolution (see sample here). Next, each area recruited local partners to engage in pollinator habitat restoration or education activities by signing a Pollinator Pledge form (see sample here). That first year, more than 60 local partners signed on to these National Heritage Area Operation Pollination projects, including: Ford Motor Company, Marathon Oil, DTE Electric, Bs in the D, the IL governor’s office, IL communities, Basin Electric, a brewery, a bank, an architectural firm, state parks of ND, and many more. Each of these local partners has done something positive to improve pollinator habitat or education within their National Heritage Area.

If your Rotary district or club is located within the boundaries of a National Heritage Area (see map above), please consider becoming a pollinator partner by joining your National Heritage Area’s Operation Pollination project. Simply sign a Pollinator Pledge form stating what your organization will do to improve pollinator habitat or education, and you immediately become an Operation Pollination partner. There is no cost in becoming a partner, aside from your district’s or club’s investment in pollinator habitat restoration or education. If your district or club is not located in a National Heritage Area, please consider issuing your own Pollinator Resolution as an Operation Pollination project leader. Leaders then recruit local partners to join the effort.

After your district or club becomes an Operation Pollination project leader or partner, it is highly likely that your local media outlets will want to promote your great efforts. Issue news releases. Ask television and radio stations for interviews. Promote your great work on social media platforms. Every positive pollinator activity that you or a partner organization achieves, large or small, is important to improving pollinators across the land.

The post Example of Operation Pollination in Action first appeared on Operation Pollination.

The Importance of Conservation Partnerships

Admin01 — Sat, 18 Jul 2020 14:51:56 +0000

In 2012 Rotary District 5960 signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the St. Croix Wild and Scenic Riverway. The reason was to identify efforts that lend themselves to collaborative efforts and partnerships. Rotary International has emphasized partnerships in the past, of course, and several are well known – think about the efforts to eradicate polio.

Partnerships have taken a front and center stage in the upcoming year – Rotarians, people of action, coming together with like-minded organizations that have a mission to better the livers of people all over the world. In this new era of pandemics that carries the potential to disrupt lives in unsettling ways, nature is all the more important.

As businesses shutter, churches close, and schools go online, we are told we need to be at home. Recall the heartfelt scene of Italian residents standing on their balconies and connect with their neighbors by creating joyful music.

Nature, in both built environments and wild spaces, works the same joyful magic. When we think about moments we feel the presence angels, every one of these involved a miracle of nature – the spontaneous applause that erupted when viewers watched the sunrise over a mountain; walking through Yosemite’s Mariposa Grove looking up and out in silent awe at this marvelous act of Creation; listen to nothing more than the silence filled by the dawn chorus of songbirds; or recall the return of butterflies whose sheer numbers are a reminder of the earth’s abundance. In gardens, both urban and rural, life cycle itself before our eyes and remember that we are connected to this miracle of nature.

All this feels reminiscent of the moment Sam, in Lord of the Rings, looks out over a dark landscape and sees a twinkling from above. The beauty “smote his heart.” A “clear shaft” pierced him, “in the end the Shadow was only a small and passing thing: there was light and high beauty forever beyond its reach.”

The natural environment can and does provide a “clear shaft”. Edgar Mitchel – the 6^th astronaut to walk on the moon – felt this returning to earth in the Apollo capsule. As Mitchel gazed on our planet he realized that we needed a new, grander language to speak of our connectedness, and to describe our potential as humans. Gaylord Nelson felt this as well when he conceived Earth Day 50 years ago. The list goes on.

We are Rotarians who understand, like Edgar Mitchel, that we are ready for a new language of potential. When we encourage children and their parents, or their grandparents, neighbors or friends, to take a walk in a city park or on a remote hillside; to behold the most marvelous of nature’s glory or the most common of occurrences; we know that instant provides a comforting reminder that life is bigger than any one moment in time.

Wherever you or any of us are, we are home; a home that we share with the natural world; a world we are deemed stewards of.

Judy Freund Ed.D. DG 2011-2012, Rotary District 5960 jannfreund@sbcglobal.netSupport International Educationwww.globalwisconsin.org

The post The Importance of Conservation Partnerships first appeared on Operation Pollination.