A Parsimonious way to avoid falling on our own sword

I am lucky to part of habitat restoration in the prairie state with less than .01% of prairie remaining and so little natural habitat left to maintain and I am proud to be a part of a team creating new wildlife land on private lands. That means I must work between private landowners and government, two entities that often are at odds and generally have opposing views. I am mediator in shining armor, with a sword of knowledge at my side that can help or hurt my cause.

I need to find ways to look at the human dimensions of private lands, not just the wildlife and habitat. I can’t just go in as the zoologist all the time, I also must be people person and know my audience.

Using the New Environmental Paradigm (NEP) and the Likert 7-point scale to assess landowners views we can give a quantitative unbiased look at why private landowners are signing up for habitat management programs. There may be some landowners that are purely monetarily incentivized, but I would like to believe that most of the people signing up stewardship, conservation and habitat restoration programs are doing it for the land, the wildlife and for their future generations to come. There must be enough environmentally conscious landowners that are farming, hunting and buying up large tracts of land for reasons other than pure profits.

The ability to use a simple scale to collect the date then process using another model such as a Parsimonious model, that can simplify the information for decimation, will help all involved. If the governments, the landowners, and the environmental groups can see that everyone has similar end goals, even if by different means, then we are all in this rat race together. We all want to make the land more productive, healthier and keep the diversity of wildlife that we currently have while protecting it for our future generations.

Sometimes simple is better when dealing with so many kinds of people. The private landowners may not have the same educational background as the scientist working for the government or environmental agencies, but everyone wants the same habitat maintained.

The scientist may not see eye to eye with the politicians that are writing the laws that dictate what parameters they must work within, but there still must be a way to mediate between the government and the landowner when looking at collecting and analyzing the data.

Finding ways to collect as much data as possible but keep it as simple as possible is a double-edged sword, that as a scientist, I must try to not stab myself with, every day! I am that mediator between the politicians, the lawmakers, the government, and the landowners. I work with a great group of people constantly trying to find ways to look at the human element when trying to save the environment, from within the lines of the government drawn parameters, while giving the landowners the information they want and the pat on the back they need. I can’t change the world, but I can often change the small views of a single landowner’s mind on a few items when I work side by side with them on a property, not as a scientist or a government worker, but as a fellow human wanting what is best for the habitat for future generations. Sometimes giving the information in the simplest forms with the straightest line to the end game, is what we all really want and need. We all want to the same thing in the end, not to fall on the sword, but sometimes use it to bushwhack the invasives back in a habitat restoration.