FEATURED NATURALIST INTERVIEW: JACK GREENE

What is a Naturalist?

Someone who is curious about what goes on with pretty much all the living things outside of us as Humans, although we Humans are a huge part of that, obviously, our impact, our ambitions, our desire to make it better or our desire to make it worse. Someone who is curious about nature and wants to know more about it and connect with it in an exploratory manner, and learn that everything has a story from the tiniest microbe on up to us. Everything plays a role in these living systems. Everything is connected and everything plays vital parts for better or for worse along the way. As you get to know it you come to like it more and more to the point that you even fall in love with it. Even a bird, squirrel or a worm.

Do you have a time, a moment or a place that was pivotal to your relation with nature?

It probably started when I was a toddler living in the Northwoods of Wisconsin. My mother used to take us out into a patch of forest right across the road from the place where we lived and my little legs trying to keep from tripping or sinking in a puddle--and the odors that came with it! If you were to pass a bottle of elixir from a northern forest past my nose it would immediately elicit "Wisconsin forest!"  

And then along the way there were so many extraordinary individuals who changed me and touched me in ways that I consider to be for the better. They showed me new horizons and took me in. Certainly hunting and fishing in Michigan. Growing up there where hunting and fishing were part of the culture. On the first day of the deer hunt school was always dismissed. On the first day of the pheasant hunt school was dismissed. They knew that if they didn't they would lose half their students because we all hunted and fished back then. So I learned an awful lot. I fell in love with it. I fell in love with those things that I caught, captured and shot with my shotgun or rifle. I fell in love with them and got to know them rather intimately. 

Today I don't do those things. Not necessarily because I'm against it. I enjoy it through reveling and just knowing it is there, and in some cases seeing it or smelling it. So I get very excited just going out, absorbed in watching. Many individuals helped me connect with the local landscapes here. Individuals that noticed my interest in all things beautiful and wild. There have been so many moments that really changed my appreciation and perspective.

What are three things that you feel we most need to know about the world?

First and foremost that we are part of it, in part because of our technologies and our population that has exploded and gone beyond boundaries where perhaps it should go. We should know how we interrelate and impact everything that is around us and in us, since we are predominantly microorganisms, and we are more of what we aren't than what we are. Just knowingAnd then second would be how we come to know how these systems work so we can take a positive direction to restore what has been lost, to fix what has been broken. So we really need to dive into how these things work; maybe more than it is just beautiful, wonderful and I love it. How we function in a natural system is very relevant knowledge.And third how can we inspire others to really have that desire to explore, to learn, to appreciate and the desire to make a difference, to protect and restore what is here. 

Jack and students

What are the greatest gifts that the Human species brings to the planet?

We have this remarkable quality in our cranium that is useful to try to understand as best we can how these things work. Our curiosity, our deep desire to learn about things around us. So having this magnificent brain that is capable of so much wonder and good. But on the other side--and we have to be careful here--there is a dark side. It is a strange thing, but there it is. While you have Heaven, you have Hell. It is there. We are capable of immense destruction and negligence. 

The other part of us is all about wanting to save, restore and protect  Somewhere along the way, we have developed a language, which is not to say that other living things do not have a language, but most communicate through chemistry, odors and so on. We have developed words, this language that is so far beyond any other creature that we are aware of. I know that Dolphins and Elephants  have a language; even plants , through chemical processes and mycorrhizae that help them along through their senses. But Humans have, just think about it--words! My God, look at a dictionary or an encyclopedia; we go on forever. We never run out of words. And these words have meaning and expression that is so unique and allows us to express ourselves and communicate on a level that is just beyond imagination.

Again, for better or for worse, combined with these remarkable neurons we have our phalanges, our fingers. I've watched our little Red Squirrel out here a lot. Well they can use their fingers. They have five like us and are very good at manipulating, but we, combining our language with our thinking process, with our fingers--are able to create all these things. You can be a surgeon (well now robots have taken that over); you have ability to create. Look at our art forms. No other living thing can express itself in art as we can. Through photography, through dance, through song, voice and on and on, these beautiful tapestries and two dimensional art. Without our hands we wouldn't be there. The way our fingers can interact with this neurological system allows us to do so much with our sciences and the arts.

What are the foundational skills needed to be called a naturalist?

Well we already have curiosity but when I think of a naturalist, again I think of flora and fauna, mushrooms, whatever--but it is mostly that we have this very complex system of ecology in our bodies and all around us. A larger view of what a naturalist is is someone who is not only curious, but one who acts on their curiosity by being out and immersing themselves in it. So we can have an outdoors person obviously, but a naturalist's skill is immersion in these natural systems outside of our Human built structure and Human built environment. We, in a sense, extend our own artificialities out into the real; air, water, soil, other animals and entering into connection to and with those places and beings. 

Take a river. A river is a great place to hang out because in so many ways, even esthetic sense, knowing water is life! A stream where there is so much going on. So just knowing how a steam works. Another example is just watching Squirrels. They're such intelligent little animals and are so skilled at manipulating with their little fingers. I call them the primates of the northern forest because they are so primate-like. Just watching them move through the trees is like watching a Howler Monkey moving through the branches. Placing yourself in those surroundings that you are enamored with and wishing to learn more, you observe. You in a sense communicate with them by allowing them to communicate with you.

What one word that we use, what ephemeral tag are you most comfortable being known as?

Well I usually go by my own title Teacher/Naturalist. 

When somebody hears “Naturalist,” they think "Oh. Nature." Even though we are a big part of the natural world, they think of something “out there." And “Teacher” because I love to inspire. 

My international students now call me ‘Jack O'pedia” (laughter) because I share many years of knowledge with all these different countries and cultures. They want to know; they are all curious about these things and I happen to have enough understanding--and I think for the most part, accurate, understanding--about what's around us. Students like to reach these deeper parts of what's there.

Do you think that there is any moral or ethical obligation that comes along with the experience of understanding?

Well that's kind of my bottom line  not only hoping that I will inspire students to appreciate all that's there--not only the ecological intricacies but also the esthetic quality of it--but from there wanting to protect it, to restore it. So that's my bottom line, which for me is huge: That they will come to love it so much that they will want to take care of it. You know, Creation care, stewardship. Being good stewards, good restoration ecologists. That's all my hope in all that I have worked with. In all that I have taught in the sciences chemistry, physics, etc. I have been able to weave in environmental considerations first and foremost. I've taught thousands of teachers from Florida to Alaska on how they might better engage their students in environmental awareness and ethics. That has been my overriding purpose and I've just enjoyed the hell out of it.

Is a Naturalist Important to the modern world?

Naturalists are critical. Today, many have taken a slice of the world to study, and that is important, but again we need to see the big landscape if you will, the planetary, the biosphere and look at the entire system. It needs to be in there, it is very important. Because of this I think naturalists are damned important--but so is everybody else!