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117-447: A bioregion is a geographical area, on land or at sea, defined not by administrative boundaries but by distinct characteristics such as plant and animal species, ecological systems, soils and landforms, human settlements and cultures those attributes give rise to, and topographic features such as watersheds. The idea of bioregions were adopted and popularized in the mid-1970s by a school of philosophy called Bioregionalism , which includes

234-481: A freelance journalist . He spent time in Ghana and wrote his first book about it. His second book, SDS , was about the radical 1960s group Students for a Democratic Society . The book "is still considered one of the best sources on the youth activist organization that helped define 1960s radicalism ." In 1968, he signed the " Writers and Editors War Tax Protest " pledge, vowing to refuse tax payments in protest against

351-484: A bioregion, and help the people within that place define that bioregion. Each envelope would contain many different pieces of poetry, art, writing, science documents, and place-specific technology booklets, articles, maps, posters, photographs, directories, and calendars. From 1973 to 1985 Planet Drum published nine Bundles, on topics ranging as far as North America, South America, the Arctic Circle, West Africa, Morocco,

468-407: A bioregional identity, something most North Americans have lost or have never possessed. We define bioregion in a sense different from the biotic provinces of Raymond Dasmann (1973) or the biogeographical province of Miklos Udvardy. The term refers both to geographical terrain and a terrain of consciousness—to a place and the ideas that have developed about how to live in that place. Within a bioregion,

585-829: A broad coalition of poets, artists, writers, community leaders, and back-to-the-landers, and from the Digger movement which had grown in the late 1960s Beat Scene in San Francisco, and as a counter to the mainstream environmental movement, which many felt was reactionary and negative. They envisioned a positive, place-based alternative to mainstream efforts within a capitalist framework, or those of nation-states or other international bodies. This included many different individuals, including "Peter Berg, Judy Goldhaft, Raymond Dasmann, Kirkpatrick Sale, Judith Plant, Eleanor Wright, Doug Aberley, Stephanie Mills, Jim Dodge, Freeman House, Van Andruss, David Haenke, and Gary Snyder", working together through

702-428: A broader set of definitions to encompass a range of macroecological phenomena. The term bioregion as it relates to bioregionalism is credited to Allen Van Newkirk, a Canadian poet and biogeographer. In this field, the idea of "bioregion" probably goes back much earlier than published material suggests, being floated in early published small press zines by Newkirk, and in conversational dialogue. This can be exemplified by

819-422: A community. Mapping a bioregion is considered a specific type of bioregional map, in which many layers are brought together to map a "whole life place", and is considered an 'optimal zone of interconnection for a species to thrive', i.e. for humans, or a specific species such as salmon, and uses many different layers to see what boundaries "emerge" and make sense as frameworks of stewardship. A good example of this

936-445: A definition of a bioregion. Helping refine this definition, Author Kirkpatrick Sale wrote in 1974 that "A bioregion is a part of the earth's surface whose rough boundaries are determined by natural rather than human dictates, distinguishable from other areas by attributes of flora, fauna, water, climate, soils and landforms, and human settlements and cultures those attributes give rise to. Several other marine biology papers picked up

1053-497: A focus on completely preserving and segregating the wilderness from the world of humanity. In this way the sentiments of Bioregionalism echo those of Classical Environmentalism, and early environmentalists such as Henry David Thoreau are sometimes viewed as predecessors of the Bioregionalist movement. Bioregionalism emerged in the 1970s, developing primarily along the western coast of North America, and specifically from

1170-433: A history of 13 biogeographical concepts in "On Biotas and their names". A recent review of scholarly literature finds 20 unique biotic methods to define bioregions -- based on populations of specific plant and animals species or species assemblages. These range from global and continental scales to sub-continental and regional scales to sub-regional and local scales. In addition, 5 abiotic methods have been utilized to inform

1287-490: A homogeneous economy and consumer culture with its lack of stewardship towards the environment. This perspective seeks to: Bioregions are a foundational concept within the philosophical system called Bioregionalism. A bioregion is defined along watershed and hydrological boundaries, and uses a combination of bioregional layers, beginning with the oldest "hard" lines; geology , topography , tectonics , wind , fracture zones and continental divides , working its way through

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1404-535: A hope that maps reframing names from "North America" to "Turtle Island" would help bioregions become frameworks for decolonization, as well as more accurate cultural representation and recognition of Indigenous sovereignty. It also grew from civil rights movement, anti-war movement, anti-nuclear movement, the Diggers, as well as an increasing awareness of pervasive ecological pollution, especially in areas like Los Angeles. The term bioregion as it relates to bioregionalism

1521-533: A human and cultural lens to the strictly ecological idea. A year later, in 1975 A. Van Newkirk published a paper entitled "Bioregions: Towards Bioregional Strategy for Human Cultures" in which he advocates for the incorporation of human activity ("occupying populations of the culture-bearing animal") within bioregional definitions. Bioregion as a term comes from the Greek bios (life), and the French region (region), itself from

1638-405: A key role for how a bioregion is defined. A bioregion is defined along watershed and hydrological boundaries, and uses a combination of bioregional layers, beginning with the oldest "hard" lines; geology , topography , tectonics , wind , fracture zones and continental divides , working its way through the "soft" lines: living systems such as soil , ecosystems , climate , marine life, and

1755-538: A place, rather than human borders. This method highlights the interconnectedness of the region's natural systems and human communities, offering a holistic view of the landscape that integrates ecological data with cultural and historical insights. A good bioregional map shows layers of geology, flora, fauna, and inhabitation over time. This approach empowers individuals to contribute to the documentation of local knowledge, history, and cultural significance, thereby creating maps that are more inclusive and representative of

1872-478: A place’s life. Peter Berg defined a bioregion at the Symposium on Biodiversity of Northwestern California, October 28–30, 1991: A bioregion can be determined initially by the use of climatology, physiography, animal and plant geography, natural history and other descriptive natural sciences. The final boundaries of a bioregion are best described by the people who have lived within it, through human recognition of

1989-482: A place’s life. This idea of bioregionalism is also rooted in an important concept called bioregional mapping , a powerful tool to increase understanding, change the story and influence policy. Bioregional Mapping is a participatory approach to cartography that focuses on mapping the natural, ecological and human realities of that have emerged in a place within a bioregion—an area defined by its natural boundaries, such as watersheds, ecosystems, and cultures that arise form

2106-500: A public bet with Kevin Kelly that by the year 2020, there would be a convergence of three disasters: global currency collapse, significant warfare between rich and poor, and environmental disasters of some significant size. The bet was turned into a claim on the FX prediction market , where the probability has hovered around 25%. Sale and Kelly agreed that William Patrick would be the judge of

2223-545: A sense different from the biotic provinces of Raymond Dasmann (1973) or the biogeographical province of Miklos Udvardy. The term refers both to geographical terrain and a terrain of consciousness—to a place and the ideas that have developed about how to live in that place. Within a bioregion, the conditions that influence life are similar, and these, in turn, have influenced human occupancy." This article defined bioregions as distinct from biogeographical and biotic provinces that ecologists and geographers had been developing by adding

2340-563: A series of publications looking at place, poetry, cultural expression, politics, art and many other subjects. From this group, other early bioregional groups started, such as the Frisco Bay Mussel Group, Raise the Stakes newsletters, and Bioregional Bundles that would carry the bioregional movement forward for the next several decades. This started by creating bioregional “Bundles” that they would publish each year, that would be distinct to

2457-476: A social and political element. In this way bioregionalism is simply political localism with an ecological foundation. The term was coined by Allen Van Newkirk, founder of the Institute for Bioregional Research, in 1975, given currency by Peter Berg and Raymond F. Dasmann in the early 1970s, and has been advocated by writers such as David Haenke and Kirkpatrick Sale . The bioregionalist perspective opposes

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2574-489: A survey of damaged lands and unsolved social ills? What underutilized potentials can be put to work to help achieve sustainability? The atlas can become a focus for discussions setting a proactive plan for positive change.” Mapping a Bioregion consists of: Your final map will generally help demarcate a bioregion, or life place. While references to bioregions (or biogeographical regions) have become increasingly common in scholarly literature related to life sciences, "...there

2691-631: A third congress in Lillooet in British Columbia in 1989. This was also timed for the third North American Bioregional Congress which took place in Samish in 1988. The idea of bioregions, and their uses was again expanded by Donella Meadows , author of The Limits to Growth in 1972, and was the primary premise for her to launch the Balaton Group in 1982. A big part of this for her, was using bioregions as

2808-411: A total ecosystem. Furthermore, Bookchin felt that humans were a part of an earth society: We might also conceive of this role as an expression of a kind of citizenship — if we think of ourselves not only as citizens of a town, city or neighborhood, but also as citizens of our ecosystem, of our bioregion, of our georegion, and of the earth itself. Peter Berg, writing about his experience helping to write

2925-722: Is the Ozarks , a bioregion also referred to as the Ozarks Plateau, which consists of southern Missouri , northwest Arkansas , the northeast corner of Oklahoma , southeast corner of Kansas . Bioregion are not synonymous with ecoregions as defined by organizations such as the World Wildlife Fund or the Commission for Environmental Cooperation ; the latter are scientifically based and focused on wildlife and vegetation. Bioregions, by contrast are human regions, informed by nature but with

3042-551: Is a concept that goes beyond national boundaries —an example is the concept of Cascadia , a region that is sometimes considered to consist of most of Oregon and Washington , the Alaska Panhandle , the far north of California and the West Coast of Canada , sometimes also including some or all of Idaho and western Montana . Another example of a bioregion, which does not cross national boundaries, but does overlap state lines,

3159-402: Is a cultural idea, the description of a specific bioregion is drawn using information from not only the natural sciences but also many other sources. It is a geographic terrain and a terrain of consciousness. Anthropological studies, historical accounts, social developments, customs, traditions, and arts can all play a part. Bioregionalism utilizes them to accomplish three main goals: The latter

3276-412: Is a part of the earth's surface whose rough boundaries are determined by natural and human dictates, distinguishable from other areas by attributes of flora, fauna, water, climate, soils and land-forms, and human settlements and cultures those attributes give rise to. The borders between such areas are usually not rigid – nature works with more flexibility and fluidity than that – but the general contours of

3393-486: Is accomplished through proactive projects, employment and education, as well as by engaging in protests against the destruction of natural elements in a life-place. Bioregional goals play out in a spectrum of different ways for different places. In North America, for example, restoring native prairie grasses is a basic ecosystem-rebuilding activity for reinhabitants of the Kansas Area Watershed Bioregion in

3510-530: Is bioregional mapping. Instructions for how to map a bioregion were first laid out in a book Mapping for Local Empowerment, written by University of British Columbia by Douglas Aberley in 1993, followed by the mapping handbook Giving the Land a Voice in 1994. This grew from the Tsleil-Waututh First Nation , Nisga'a , Tsilhqotʼin , Wetʼsuwetʼen first nations who used Bioregional Mapping to create some of

3627-445: Is credited to Allen Van Newkirk, a Canadian poet and biogeographer. In this field, the idea of "bioregion" probably goes back much earlier than published material suggests, being floated in early published small press zines by Newkirk, and in conversational dialogue. He would go on to found the Institute for Bioregional Research and issued a series of short papers using the term bioregion as early as 1970, which would start to circulate

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3744-546: Is little agreement on how to best classify and name such regions, with several conceptually related terms being used, often interchangeably." Bioregions can take many forms and operate at many scales – from very small ecosystems or 'biotopes' to ecoregions (which can be nested at different scales) to continent-scale distributions of plants and animals, like biomes or realms. All of them, technically, can be considered types of bioregions sensu lato and are often referred to as such in academic literature. In 2014, J. Marrone documented

3861-451: Is no bioregional map of North America or the world, but the closest base maps are things like World Biogeographical Provinces Map by Miklos Udvardy and Ted Oberlander. But these provinces are huge, containing a number of bioregions that are not yet delineated. Many people use watersheds as ultimate definers, and if your group identifies strongly with a particular watershed, hydrologic survey maps may help you determine borders. From 1984 through

3978-577: Is otherwise difficult to present is clearly depicted. The community learns about itself in the process of making decisions about its future." Sheila Harrington, in the introduction to Islands of the Salish Sea: A Community Atlas goes one step further, noting that: “The atlas should be used as a jumping off place for decision making about the future. From the holistic image of place that the maps collectively communicate, what actions could be adopted to achieve sustainable prosperity? What priorities emerge from

4095-507: Is perceived to result in elected representatives voting in accordance with their constituents, some of whom may live outside a defined bioregion, and may run counter to the well-being of the bioregion. At the local level, several bioregions have congresses that meet regularly. For instance, the Ozark Plateau bioregion hosts a yearly Ozark Area Community Congress, better known as OACC, which has been meeting every year since 1980, most often on

4212-410: Is presented as a technical process of identifying “biogeographically interpreted culture areas…called bioregions”. Within these territories, resident human populations would “restore plant and animal diversity,” “aid in the conservation and restoration of wild eco-systems,” and “discover regional models for new and relatively non-arbitrary scales of human activity in relation to the biological realities of

4329-413: Is that the mistakes are small as well." He went on to say, "If you want to leave a nation you think is corrupt, inefficient, militaristic, oppressive, repressive, but you don't want to move to Canada or France, what do you do? Well, the way is through secession, where you could stay home and be where you want to be." The convention received worldwide media attention. The convention's other co-sponsor,

4446-705: Is the Cascadia Bioregion , located along the Northwestern rim of North America. The Cascadia bioregion contains 75 distinct ecoregions, and extends for more than 2,500 miles (4,000 km) from the Copper River in Southern Alaska, to Cape Mendocino , approximately 200 miles north of San Francisco , and east as far as the Yellowstone Caldera and continental divide. Bioregionalism Bioregionalism

4563-685: Is the Salmon Nation bioregion, which is the Pacific Northwest and northwest rim of the Pacific ocean as defined through the historic and current range of the salmon, as well as the people and ecosystem which have evolved over millennia to depend on them. This style of bioregional mapping can also be found in the works of Henry David Thoreau who when hired to make maps by the United States government, chose instead to create maps "that charts and delineates

4680-687: Is the breakup of great empires. Some on both left and right call for smaller, less powerful government. In 2004, Sale and members of the Second Vermont Republic formed the Middlebury Institute which is dedicated to the study of separatism , secession , and self-determination . Sale is director of the institute. In 2006, Middlebury sponsored the First North American Secessionist Convention, which attracted 40 participants from 16 secessionist organizations and

4797-491: The Beaver Hills Initiative to preserve an ecoregion which encompasses Elk Island National Park and the surrounding area. Kirkpatrick Sale Kirkpatrick Sale (born June 27, 1937) is an American author who has written prolifically about political decentralism , environmentalism , luddism and technology . He has been described as having a "philosophy unified by decentralism" and as being "a leader of

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4914-923: The Conservation Foundation in Washington, D.C., as Director of International Programs and was also a consultant on the development of the 1972 Stockholm Conference on the Human Environment . In the 1970s he worked with UNESCO where he initiated the Man and the Biosphere Programme (MAB), an international research and conservation program. During the same period he was Senior Ecologist for the International Union for Conservation of Nature in Switzerland, initiating global conservation programs which earned him

5031-487: The Institute for Social Ecology , and was deeply involved in influencing and helping define the early bioregional movement. Drawing on earlier traditions beginning with Ecology and Revolutionary Thought in 1964 Bookchin argued for the reorganization of American society based upon a decentralized regional model which would each encompass a single bioregion or ecosystem. His organization, the Institute for Social Ecology worked with

5148-650: The League of the South , has been designated a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center since 2000. According to Sale, "They call everybody racists. There are, no doubt, racists in the League of the South, and there are, no doubt, racists everywhere." The Southern Poverty Law Center later criticized The New York Times ' October 2007 Peter Applebome interview of Sale for not covering its allegations. Sale wrote

5265-507: The Neo-Luddites ," an " anti-globalization leftist ," and "the theoretician for a new secessionist movement." Sale grew up in Ithaca, New York , where he later said he "spent most of my first twenty years there, and that has made an imprint on me—on my philosophy, social attitudes, certainly on my politics—that has lasted powerfully for the rest of my life." Sale's brother, Roger Sale ,

5382-490: The Smithsonian Institution . Working with Peter Berg , and also contemporary with Allen Van Newkirk, Dasmann was one of the pioneers in developing the definition for the term "Bioregion", as well as conservation concepts of " Eco-development " and " biological diversity ," and identified the crucial importance of recognizing indigenous peoples and their cultures in efforts to conserve natural landscapes. Because it

5499-510: The Vietnam War . Subsequent books explored radical decentralism , bioregionalism , environmentalism , the Luddites and similar themes. He "has been a regular contributor to progressive magazines like Mother Jones and The Nation for the better part of his writing career". Sale donated 16 boxes of materials—typescripts, galley proofs, correspondence, etc.—for each one of his books to

5616-528: The flora and fauna , and lastly the "human" lines: human geography , energy , transportation , agriculture , food , music , language , history , indigenous cultures , and ways of living within the context set into a place, and it's limits to determine the final edges and boundaries. This is summed up well by David McCloskey, author of the Cascadia Bioregion map: "An bioregion may be analyzed on physical, biological, and cultural levels. First, we map

5733-401: The "Bioregions" issue of Coevolution Quarterly in the late 70's worked with Bookchin' to use his Ecology of Freedom, which Berg claimed to be an "invaluable help to set the autonomous and self-governing tone of bioregional discourse." A major evolution in how bioregions were defined also occurred alongside this work in the mid-1980s, and can be attributed to David Haenke (b. 1945), Inspired by

5850-435: The "soft" lines: living systems such as soil , ecosystems , climate , marine life, and the flora and fauna , and lastly the "human" lines: human geography , energy , transportation , agriculture , food , music , language , history , indigenous cultures , and ways of living within the context set into a place, and it's limits to determine the final edges and boundaries. Peter Berg and Judy Goldhaft who founded

5967-546: The 2010s, many regional groups, such as the Great Lakes, Kansas, Cascadia, would hold regional "Bioregional Congresses" for specific bioregions, and then every two years would gather as part of a North American bioregional congress. Cascadia for example held its first Cascadia Bioregional Congress at The Evergreen State College in 1986, an Ish River confluence in 1987, another Bioregional Congress in 1988 at Breitenbush in Oregon, and

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6084-639: The Biodiversity of the Klamath-Siskiyou Ecoregion, researchers found that North America contains 116 ecoregions nested within 10 major habitat types. The TEOW framework originally delineated 867 terrestrial ecoregions nested into 14 major biomes, contained with the world's 8 major biogeographical realms. Subsequent regional papers by the co-authors covering Africa, Indo-Pacific, and Latin America differentiate between ecoregions and bioregions, referring to

6201-546: The Christopher Columbus Quincentenary Jubilee Committee William Hardy McNeill wrote about Sale: "he has set out to destroy the heroic image that earlier writers have transmitted to us. Mr. Sale makes Columbus out to be cruel, greedy and incompetent (even as a sailor), and a man who was perversely intent on abusing the natural paradise on which he intruded." However, McNeill also declared Sale's work to be "unhistorical, in

6318-410: The Human Environment . In the 1970s he worked with UNESCO where he initiated the Man and the Biosphere Programme (MAB), an international research and conservation program. During the same period he was Senior Ecologist for the International Union for Conservation of Nature in Switzerland, initiating global conservation programs which earned him the highest honors awarded by The Wildlife Society , and

6435-486: The Latin regia (territory) and earlier regere (to rule or govern). Etymologically, bioregion means life territory or place-of-life. Bioregions became a foundational concept within the philosophical system called Bioregionalism . A key difference between an ecoregions and biogeography and the term bioregion, is that while ecoregions are based on general biophysical and ecosystem data, human settlement and cultural patterns play

6552-669: The Midwest, whereas bringing back salmon runs has a high priority for Shasta Bioregion in northern California. Using geothermal and wind as a renewable energy source fits Cascadia Bioregion in the rainy Pacific Northwest. Less cloudy skies in the Southwest's sparsely vegetated Sonoran Desert Bioregion make direct solar energy a more plentiful alternative there. Education about local natural characteristics and conditions varies diversely from place to place, along with bioregionally significant social and political issues. An important part of bioregionalism

6669-783: The Pacific Rim, Japan, and China. From 1979-2000, Planet Drum began publishing Raise The Stakes , the Planet Drum Review , a bi-annual international publication which became an important central voice for the bioregional movement, bioregional organizers around North America and world, and for defining the term bioregion among those using it. By 1990, Planet Drum served as node for more than 250 bioregionally oriented groups in North America, including Canada and Mexico, with emerging movements in Australia, Latin America, Italy and Spain. One of

6786-467: The Planet Drum Foundation for the increased implementation of alternative forms of energy, reduction and restriction of carbon dioxide emissions, anti-globalism, and the implementation of a bioregional approach to economic development. For Bookchin, a bioregional approach to economic development accepted one of the basic assertions of Social Ecology that a human community is fundamentally a part of

6903-508: The Planet Drum foundation in 1973 and helped to popularize the concept of bioregions and bioregionalism, located in San Francisco and which just celebrated its 50th anniversary in 2023 defines a bioregion as the following: : A bioregion is a geographical area with coherent and interconnected plant and animal communities, and other natural characteristics (often defined by a watershed) plus

7020-484: The Planet Drum foundation, and become a leading proponent of "bioregions" learned of the term in 1971 while Judy Goldhaft and Peter Berg were staying with Allen Van Newkirk, before Berg attended the first United Nations Conference on the Human Environment in Stockholm during June 1972. Berg would go on to found the Planet Drum Foundation in 1973, and they published their first Bioregional Bundle in that year, that also included

7137-420: The Planet Drum foundation, and similar groups to create a new place-based philosophy they called bioregionalism. Bioregionalism also directly grew from a relationship with the civil rights and American Indian Movement , and efforts to reclaim their languages, territories and maps, and what bioregionalists saw as the global collapse of traditional ecological knowledge, language suppression and revitalization, and

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7254-528: The United nations World Charter for Nature, and historian of the Hudson River Valley was also deeply rooted in the bioregional movement, and helping bioregionalism spread to the east coast of North America. He defined a Bioregion as: A bioregion is simply an indenfidable geographic area whose life systems are self-contained, self- sustaining and self renewing. A bioregion you might say, is a basic unit within

7371-458: The archives at Cornell University, where they are available for public inspection. In 2020, Sale moved to another village outside Ithaca. In his 1990 book, The Conquest of Paradise: Christopher Columbus and the Columbian Legacy , Sale argued that Christopher Columbus was an imperialist bent on conquest from his first voyage. In a New York Times book review, historian and member of

7488-489: The basis for "bioregional learning centers", each of which would be responsible for a discrete bioregion. In her words, the purpose of a bioregion was to: Help people and cultures all over the world develop and express their own capacity to solve their own problems, consistent with their own needs and with the ecosystems around them. And doing that through enhancing the power within all cultures and peoples to combine intellectual knowing and intuitive knowing, reasoning about

7605-455: The basis for understanding the place of human history within a clearly delineated environmental context". A bioregion can also have a distinct cultural identity defined, for example, by Indigenous Peoples whose historical, mythological and biocultural connections to their lands and waters shape an understanding of place and territorial extent. Within the context of bioregionalism, bioregions can be socially constructed by modern-day communities for

7722-406: The best examples of a richly communicative bioregional map is David McClosky's new map of Cascadia . Bioregionalism, while akin to modern environmentalism in certain aspects, such as a desire to live in harmony with nature , differs in certain ways from the 20th century movement. According to Peter Berg, bioregionalism is proactive , and is based on forming a harmony between human culture and

7839-629: The call of Peter Berg, who released "Amble towards a Continental Congress" in 1976 for the bicentennial of the United States founding, Haenke conceptualized the Ozark Area Community Congress in 1977, started the Bioregional Project in 1982, launched the Ozarks Bioregional Congress in 1980, and then launched the first ever North American Bioregional Congress (NABC) in 1984. David Haenke would also go on to be one of

7956-457: The concept that human culture, in practice, can influence bioregional definitions. Bioregions are part of a nested series of ecological scales, generally starting with local watersheds, growing into larger river systems, then Level III or IV Ecoregions (or regional ecosystems), bioregions, then biogeographical Realm , followed by the continental-scale and ultimately the biosphere. Within the life sciences, there are numerous methods used to define

8073-399: The conditions that influence life are similar, and these, in turn, have influenced human occupancy." This article defined bioregions as distinct from biogeographical and biotic provinces that ecologists and geographers had been developing by adding a human and cultural lens to the strictly ecological idea. This new movement grew strongly also on earlier work from Murray Bookchin , who ran

8190-411: The cultural values that humans have developed for living in harmony with these natural systems. Because it is a cultural idea, the description of a specific bioregion uses information from both the natural sciences and other sources. Each bioregion is a whole “life-place” with unique requirements for human inhabitation so that it will not be disrupted and injured. People are counted as an integral aspect of

8307-411: The cultural values that humans have developed for living in harmony with these natural systems. Because it is a cultural idea, the description of a specific bioregion uses information from both the natural sciences and other sources. Each bioregion is a whole “life-place” with unique requirements for human inhabitation so that it will not be disrupted and injured. People are counted as an integral aspect of

8424-404: The culture-bearing animal (aka humans)....Towards this end a group of projects relating to bioregions or themes of applied human biogeography is envisaged. . For Newkirk, the term Bioregion was a way to combine human culture with earlier work done on Biotic Provinces, and were seen "to be distinguished from biotic provinces", and instead he called this new field "regional human biogeography" and

8541-419: The definition for the term "Bioregion", as well as conservation concepts of " Eco-development " and " biological diversity ," and identified the crucial importance of recognizing indigenous peoples and their cultures in efforts to conserve natural landscapes. He began his academic career at Humboldt State University, where he was a professor of natural resources from 1954 until 1965. During the 1960s, he worked at

8658-414: The definition of bioregion., Peter Berg and Judy Goldhaft founded the Planet Drum foundation in 1973, located in San Francisco and which just celebrated its 50th anniversary in 2023. Planet Drum, from their website, defines a bioregion as: A bioregion is a geographical area with coherent and interconnected plant and animal communities, and other natural characteristics (often defined by a watershed) plus

8775-661: The delineation of biogeographical extents. Ecoregions are one of the primary building blocks of bioregions, which are made up of "clusters of biotically related ecoregions". An Ecoregion ( ecological region ) is an ecologically and geographically defined area that is smaller than a bioregion, which in turn is smaller than a biogeographic realm . Ecoregions cover relatively large areas of land or water, and contain characteristic, geographically distinct assemblages of natural communities and species . They can include geology physiography, vegetation, climate, hydrology, terrestrial and aquatic fanua, and soils, and may or may not include

8892-624: The earth and living in consonance with it, and of a number of centers where information and models about resources and the environment are housed. There would need to be many of these centers, all over the world, each one responsible for a discrete bioregion. North American Bioregional Assemblies have been meeting at bi-annual gatherings of bioregionalists throughout North America since 1984 and have given rise to national level Green Parties . The tenets of bioregionalism are often used by green movements, which oppose political organizations whose boundaries conform to existing electoral districts. This problem

9009-465: The fact that Newkirk had met Peter Berg (another early scholar on Bioregionalism) in San Francisco in 1969 and again in Nova Scotia in 1971 where he shared the idea with Berg. He would go on to found the Institute for Bioregional Research and issued a series of short papers using the term bioregion as early as 1970, which would start to circulate the idea of "bioregion". Peter Berg, who would go on to found

9126-670: The first United Nations Conference on the Human Environment in Stockholm during June 1972. Berg would go on to found the Planet Drum Foundation in 1973, and they published their first Bioregional Bundle in that year, that also included a definition of a bioregion. Helping refine this definition, Author Kirkpatrick Sale wrote in 1974 that "A bioregion is a part of the earth's surface whose rough boundaries are determined by natural rather than human dictates, distinguishable from other areas by attributes of flora, fauna, water, climate, soils and landforms, and human settlements and cultures those attributes give rise to. in 1975 A. Van Newkirk published

9243-465: The first article calling for bioregionalism in a paper entitled "Bioregions: Towards Bioregional Strategy for Human Cultures" in which he advocates for the incorporation of human activity ("occupying populations of the culture-bearing animal") within bioregional definitions. Starting in 1973, Planet Drum Foundation in San Franscisco became a leading institution promoting bioregionalism. They published

9360-617: The first bioregional atlases as part of court cases to defend their sovereignty in the 1980's and 1990's, one such example being the Tsilhqotʼin Nation v British Columbia . In these resources, there are two types of maps: Bioregional Maps and maps of Bioregions, which both include physical, ecological and human lines. A bioregional map can be any scale, and is a community and participatory process to map what people care about. Bioregional maps and atlases can be considered tools and jumping off points for helping guide regenerative activities of

9477-447: The first two levels." A bioregion is defined as the largest physical boundaries where connections based on that place will make sense. The basic units of a bioregion are watersheds and hydrological basins, and a bioregion will always maintain the natural continuity and full extent of a watershed. While a bioregion may stretch across many watersheds, it will never divide or separate a water basin. As conceived by Van Newkirk, bioregionalism

9594-505: The first weekend in October. The Kansas Area Watershed, "KAW" was founded in 1982 and has been meeting regularly since that time. KAW holds a yearly meeting, usually in the spring. The government of the Canadian province of Alberta created the " land-use framework regions " in 2007 roughly corresponding to each major river basin within the province. This is supported by local initiatives such as

9711-479: The founders of the United States Green Party, which he viewed as a political wing of the bioregional movement. David Haenke had two questions he asked while defining a bioregion: In defining a bioregion there are two main questions that you’ll need to ask: What is your effective organizing area? What and where are your resources and potential participants? Bioregional boundaries are never “hard.” There

9828-666: The goals of the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), in particular the goal of ecosystem representation in Protected Area networks, the most widely used bioregional delineations include the Resolve Ecoregions and the IUCN Global Ecosystem Typology. In bioregionalism, an ecoregion can also use geography, ecology, and culture as part of its definition. One example of a bioregion

9945-533: The highest honors awarded by The Wildlife Society , and the Smithsonian Institution . This idea was carried forward and developed by ecologist Raymond Dasmann and Peter Berg in article they co-authored called Reinhabiting California in 1977, which argued that bioregions were more than just biotic provinces and biogeography, and that humans are a critical part of the idea of bioregions. Peter Berg and ecologist Raymond Dasmann said in their 1977 article "Reinhabiting California": "Reinhabitation involves developing

10062-416: The idea of "bioregion". Newkirk met Peter Berg (another early scholar on Bioregionalism) in San Francisco in 1969 and again in Nova Scotia in 1971 where he shared the idea with Berg. Peter Berg, who would go on to found the Planet Drum foundation, and become a leading proponent of "bioregions" learned of the term in 1971 while Judy Goldhaft and Peter Berg were staying with Allen Van Newkirk, before Berg attended

10179-414: The impacts of human activity (e.g. land use patterns, vegetation changes etc). The biodiversity of flora , fauna and ecosystems that characterize an ecoregion tends to be distinct from that of other ecoregions. The phrase "ecological region" was widely used throughout the 20th century by biologists and zoologists to define specific geographic areas in research. In the early 1970s the term 'ecoregion'

10296-401: The landforms, geology, climate, and hydrology, and how these environmental factors work together to create a common template for life in that particular place. Second, we map the flora and fauna, especially the characteristic vegetative communities, and link them to their habitats. Third, we look at native peoples, western settlement, and current land-use patterns and problems, in interaction with

10413-488: The latter as "geographic clusters of ecoregions that may span several habitat types, but have strong biogeographic affinities, particularly at taxonomic levels higher than the species level (genus, family)". In 2007, a comparable set of Marine Ecoregions of the World (MEOW) was published, led by M. Spalding, and in 2008 a set of Freshwater Ecoregions of the World (FEOW) was published, led by R. Abell. In 2017, an updated version of

10530-418: The legendary wildlife biologist Aldo Leopold , and earned his Ph.D. in zoology in 1954. He began his academic career at Humboldt State University, where he was a professor of natural resources from 1954 until 1965. During the 1960s, he worked at the Conservation Foundation in Washington, D.C., as Director of International Programs and was also a consultant on the development of the 1972 Stockholm Conference on

10647-403: The lived experiences within the bioregion. Community mapping includes the identification of traditional pathways, local species, historical landmarks, stories, songs, how things change over time, and other culturally significant sites that might not appear on standard maps. Bioregional mapping also aligns with Indigenous mapping practices by recognizing the importance of natural boundaries and

10764-465: The local ecology and its natural history as well as its intersection with a human community". This type of mapping is consistent with, and aligns with an indigenous and western worldview. This is put well by Douglas Aberley and chief Michael George noting that: "Once the bioregional map atlas is completed it becomes the common foundation of knowledge from which planning scenarios can be prepared, and decisions ultimately made. Complex information that

10881-446: The natural environment, rather than being protest -based like the original environmental movement. Also, modern environmentalists saw human industry in and of itself an enemy of environmental stability, viewing nature as a victim needing to be saved; bioregionalists see humanity and its culture as a part of nature, focusing on building a positive, sustainable relationship with both the sociological and ecological environments, rather than

10998-667: The natural landscape”. His first published article in a mainstream magazine was in 1975 in his article Bioregions: Towards Bioregional Strategy in Environmental Conservation . In the article, Allen Van Newkirk defines a bioregion as: “Bioregions are tentatively defined as biologically significant areas of the Earth’s surface which can be mapped and discussed as distinct existing patterns of plant, animal, and habitat distributions as related to range patterns and… deformations, attributed to one or more successive occupying populations of

11115-455: The natural system of earth. Another way to define a bioregion is in terms of watersheds. Bioregions must develop human populations that accord with their natural context. The human is not exempt from being part of the basic inventory in a bioregion. Kirkpatrick Sale another early pioneer of the idea of bioregions, defined it in his book Dwellers in the Land: A bioregional vision that: A bioregion

11232-503: The old Northeast," but added "he attributes many of the nation's recent problems to the ascendance of the values and politicians of the region lying south of a line from San Francisco to the Virginia-North Carolina boundary." Sale "has written extensively and skeptically about technology," and has said he is "a great admirer" of anarchoprimitivist John Zerzan . He has described personal computers as "the devil's work" and in

11349-407: The other early proponents of bioregionalism, and who helped define what a bioregion is, was American biologist and environmental scientist Raymond F. Dasmann . Dasmann studied at UC Berkeley under the legendary wildlife biologist Aldo Leopold , and earned his Ph.D. in zoology in 1954. Working with Peter Berg , and also contemporary with Allen Van Newkirk, Dasmann was one of the pioneers in developing

11466-495: The outcome. Patrick stated that Kelly had won the bet. Sale then refused to acknowledge the loss, and did not pay the $ 1000 that had been previously agreed. Sale has been described as "one of the intellectual godfathers of the secessionist movement." He argues that the major theme of contemporary history, from the dissolution of the Soviet Union to the expansion of United Nations membership from 51 in 1945 to 193 nations today,

11583-696: The past opened personal appearances by smashing one. During promotion of his 1995 book Rebels Against the Future: The Luddites and Their War on the Industrial Revolution , Sale debated with Newsweek magazine senior editor and technology columnist Steven Levy "about the relative merits of the communications age". Sale has a comprehensive knowledge of what is called the American Songbook (Tin Pan Alley, Broadway, and movie tunes 1910–1960) and

11700-418: The physical limits of a bioregion based on the spatial extent of mapped ecological phenomena -- from Species Distributions and hydrological systems (i.e. Watersheds ) to topographic features (e.g. Landforms ) and climate zones (e.g. Köppen Classification ). Bioregions also provide an effective framework in the field of Environmental history , which seeks to use "river systems, ecozones, or mountain ranges as

11817-521: The purposes of better understanding a place "... with the aim to live in that place sustainably and respectfully." Bioregions have practical applications in the study of Biology , Biocultural Anthropology , Biogeography , Biodiversity , Bioeconomics , Bioregionalism , Bioregional Financing Facilities , Bioregional Mapping , Community Health , Ecology , Environmental history , Environmental science , Foodsheds , Geography , Natural Resource Management , Urban Ecology, Urban Planning . References to

11934-459: The realities of living-in-place. All life on the planet is interconnected in a few obvious ways, and in many more that remain barely explored. But there is a distinct resonance among living things and the factors which influence them that occurs specifically within each separate place on the planet. Discovering and describing that resonance is a way to describe a bioregion. Thomas Berry , an educator, environmentalist, activist and priest, who authored

12051-399: The regions themselves are not hard to identify, and indeed will probably be felt, understood, sensed or in some way known to many inhabitants, and particularly those still rooted in the land. One of the other early proponents of bioregionalism, and who helped define what a bioregion is, was American biologist and environmental scientist Raymond F. Dasmann . Dasmann studied at UC Berkeley under

12168-426: The relationship between people and their environment. The idea of bioregional mapping largely grew from the Tsleil-Waututh First Nation , Nisga'a , Tsilhqotʼin , Wetʼsuwetʼen first nations who used Bioregional Mapping to create some of the first bioregional atlases as part of court cases to defend their sovereignty in the 1980s and 1990s, one such example being the Tsilhqotʼin Nation v British Columbia . One of

12285-537: The sense that [it] selects from the often cloudy record of Columbus's actual motives and deeds what suits the researcher's 20th-century purposes." In McNeill's opinion, Columbus' advocates and detractors present a "sort of history [that] caricatures the complexity of human reality by turning Columbus into either a bloody ogre or a plaster saint, as the case may be." Gaddis Smith of the Council on Foreign Relations journal Foreign Affairs described Sale as "no apologist for

12402-401: The term "bioregion" in academic literature was by E. Jarowski in a 1971, a marine biologist studying the blue crab populations of Louisiana. The author used the term sensu stricto to refer to a "biological region" -- the area within which a crab can be provided with all the resources needed throughout its entire life cycle. The term was quickly adopted by other biologists, but eventually took on

12519-431: The term "bioregion" in scholarly literature have grown exponentially since the introduction of the term -- from a single research paper in 1971 to approximately 65,000 journal articles and books published to date. Governments and multilateral institutions have utilized bioregions in mapping Ecosystem Services and tracking progress towards conservation objectives, such as ecosystem representation. The first confirmed use of

12636-494: The term bioregion in a strictly ecological sense, which separated humans from the ecosystems they lived in, specifically naming that Biotic Provinces of the World Map, was not a map of bioregions. Peter Berg and ecologist Raymond Dasmann said in their 1977 article "Reinhabiting California": "Reinhabitation involves developing a bioregional identity, something most North Americans have lost or have never possessed. We define bioregion in

12753-608: The term, and in 1974 the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) published its first global-scale biogeogpraphical map entitled ‘Biotic Provinces of the World’. However, director of the IUCN and founder of the Man and Biosphere project Raymond Dasmann in an article in 1977 named "Reinhabiting California", with Peter Berg pushed back against these global bodies that were attempting to use

12870-532: The terrestrial ecoregions dataset was released in the paper "An Ecoregion-Based Approach to Protecting Half the Terrestrial Realm" led by E. Dinerstein with 48 co-authors. Using recent advances in satellite imagery the ecoregion perimeters were refined and the total number reduced to 846 (and later 844), which can be explored on a web application developed by Resolve and Google Earth Engine. For conservation practitioners and organizations monitoring progress towards

12987-710: The two approaches are related, the Bailey ecoregions (nested in four levels) give more importance to ecological criteria and climate zones, while the WWF ecoregions give more importance to biogeography, that is, the distribution of distinct species assemblages. Ecoregions can change gradually, and have soft transition areas known as ecotones. Because of this, there can be some variation in how ecoregions are defined. The US Environmental Protection Agency has four ranking systems they use, which lists there being 12 type one ecoregions, and 187 type III ecoregions in North America while another study on

13104-719: Was a literary critic and a professor of English at the University of Washington . He graduated from Cornell University , majoring in English and history, in 1958. He served as associate editor and editor-in-chief of the student-owned and managed newspaper, The Cornell Daily Sun . Sale was one of the leaders of the May 23, 1958, protest against university policies forbidding male and female students fraternizing and its in loco parentis policy. Sale and his friend and roommate Richard Fariña , and three others, were charged by Cornell. The protest

13221-529: Was active in the folk revival of the 1960s with Peter Yarrow, Pete Seeger, and the Clancy Brothers, but has said that he does not "care much for" pop music after that era. For example, "he once heard a 'racket' in a nightclub during his left activist days in the 1960s from some 'young man' everyone told him was a 'big deal.' That 'young man' turned out to be Bob Dylan ." Kirk recalls that "he'd never heard anything so awful in his life." In 1995, Sale agreed to

13338-621: Was described as the first gathering of secessionists since the American Civil War . Delegates issued a statement of principles of secession which they presented as the Burlington Declaration. In October 2007, The New York Times interviewed Sale about the Second North American Secessionist Convention, co-hosted by the Middlebury Institute. Sale told the interviewer, "The virtue of small government

13455-464: Was described in Fariña's 1966 novel, Been Down So Long It Looks Like Up to Me . In 1958 he collaborated with Thomas Pynchon on an unproduced futuristic musical called Minstrel Island . Sale worked initially in journalism for the leftist journal New Leader , "a magazine founded in 1924 in part by socialists Norman Thomas and Eugene Debs ," and The New York Times Magazine , before becoming

13572-456: Was introduced (short for ecological region), and R.G. Bailey published the first comprehensive map of U.S. ecoregions in 1976. The term was used widely in scholarly literature in the 1980s and 1990s, and in 2001 scientists at the U.S. conservation organization World Wildlife Fund (WWF) codified and published the first global-scale map of Terrestrial Ecoregions of the World (TEOW), led by D. Olsen, E. Dinerstein, E. Wikramanayake, and N. Burgess. While

13689-399: Was the first to use terms such as "bioregional strategies" and "bioregional framework" for adapting human cultures into a place. This idea was carried forward and developed by ecologist Raymond Dasmann and Peter Berg in article they co-authored called Reinhabiting California in 1977, which rebuked earlier ecologist efforts to only use biotic provinces, and biogeography which excluded humans from

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