Book cover for “Our Once and Future Planet” by Paddy Woodworth.
By Pamela Todd
Join us on November 10, 2015, 7 PM to 9 PM at the First United Church of Oak Park, 848 Lake Street, Woodworth will be offering a tour of exciting restoration projects he has visited all over the globe, ranging from prairies in the Chicago region to the South African bush; and from ultralight pilots teaching whooping cranes how to migrate the length of a continent to the restoration of bogs in his native Ireland.
If you want to understand the promise, politics, issues, and controversies behind ecological restoration, there is no better guide than Paddy Woodworth. In his encouraging book, Our Once and Future Planet, Restoring the World in the Climate Change Century, he introduces the relatively new science of restoration ecology, devoted to rejuvenating the natural – and human - environments we call home.
Woodworth will be offering a tour of exciting restoration projects he has visited all over the globe, ranging from prairies in the Chicago region to the South African bush; and from ultralight pilots teaching whooping cranes how to migrate the length of a continent to the restoration of bogs in his native Ireland. The program will be presented in the Veterans Room of the main library, 834 Lake Street in Oak Park.
Along the way, he will help us grapple with some of the difficult questions that confront us as we attempt to heal the wounds that we have inflicted on our planet. Is there a downside to restoration? What about the impact of climate change? How do we call a halt to the assault on nature that created the need for restoration in the first place? And most importantly, what can we do as individuals and communities to make a difference – in our public lands and even in our own backyards?
Woodworth’s presentation is sure to spark important discussions for our community and provide grounds for hope as we move forward together. The program is co-sponsored by West Cook Wild Ones, Green Community Connections, PlanItGreen, Du Page Wild Ones and the Oak Park Public Library.
Learn more about West Cook Wild Ones at www.facebook.com/wildoneswestcook and http://westcook.wildones.org/
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Paddy Woodworth (Ireland, 1951): author, journalist, lecturer, tour guide; has reported for the Irish Times, and international media, including the International Herald Tribune, Vanity Fair and the BBC. Wrote two acclaimed books on the Basque Country. Science described his recent study of ecological restoration projects worldwide, Our Once and Future Planet: Restoring the World in the Climate Change Century (U of Chicago Press 2013) as “highly readable…valuable access to the central topics, key developments, and contentious issues bound up in the young and evolving field of ecological restoration”. Research Associate at Missouri Botanical Garden, Adjunct Senior Lecturer at UCD, founder member of the Irish Forum on Natural Capital.