Post by Sharon Faulkner on Sept 10, 2006 20:00:03 GMT -5
This office can be like living in Paradise - again
September 10, 2006
"Fifty years ago," Doug Fears says, sweeping his hand across a broad stretch of the Paint Rock Valley, "this place was Paradise." But Fears, who grew up there, doesn't dwell on Paradise Lost. In fact, Fears works with The Nature Conservancy to bring Paradise back again.
In what he calls his "big office," made up of 270,000 acres and 70 miles of river, Fears works with the Conservancy to urge people to be good stewards of the land they all live on, the land the Conservancy wants to protect from over-development and land-use practices that encourage extinction of some of the rarest forms of plant and animal life that happen to live right here.
The Nature Conservancy, with offices near the Whitaker Preserve in Jackson County's Paint Rock Valley, has one tall mission: It is determined to "preserve plants, animals, and natural communities that represent the diversity of life on Earth."
Alabama is home to much of this diversity, Fears explains, including freshwater snails, mussels, turtles and crayfish. He speaks with pride about our part of the Cumberland Plateau, the rolling hills that tumble down from the Southern Appalachians.
Full Article
September 10, 2006
"Fifty years ago," Doug Fears says, sweeping his hand across a broad stretch of the Paint Rock Valley, "this place was Paradise." But Fears, who grew up there, doesn't dwell on Paradise Lost. In fact, Fears works with The Nature Conservancy to bring Paradise back again.
In what he calls his "big office," made up of 270,000 acres and 70 miles of river, Fears works with the Conservancy to urge people to be good stewards of the land they all live on, the land the Conservancy wants to protect from over-development and land-use practices that encourage extinction of some of the rarest forms of plant and animal life that happen to live right here.
The Nature Conservancy, with offices near the Whitaker Preserve in Jackson County's Paint Rock Valley, has one tall mission: It is determined to "preserve plants, animals, and natural communities that represent the diversity of life on Earth."
Alabama is home to much of this diversity, Fears explains, including freshwater snails, mussels, turtles and crayfish. He speaks with pride about our part of the Cumberland Plateau, the rolling hills that tumble down from the Southern Appalachians.
Full Article