ENV S 190: Spring, 2008

Lecture Schedule

All lectures are on:  Mondays, 3:30-4:45pm in CHEM 1171

OPTIONAL FIELD TRIPS:

1)  UCSB Adventure Program’s Santa Cruz Island Kayak Day Tour.  Two trips: Friday, April 18 & May 9   ($99)
To sign up or view more info, visit: www.recreation.ucsb.edu/leisure/leisure.php#adventure
These two trips are open to anyone and are on a first come basis, so if you want to go, sign up ASAP!

2) ES 190 one day trip out to Santa Cruz Island.  ($45)  Friday, May 16th, 2008. Includes landing on and doing a 2.5 mile hike and whale watching. Sign ups begin on Tuesday, April 8th, in the ES Program Main office.  Priority will go to students enrolled in this course, but a number of additional spots would be open to any current UCSB student interested in going.  To view details on this trip visit: www.es.ucsb.edu/curriculum_info/scitrip

Speaker Biographies:

Dr. John Johnson has served as Curator of Anthropology at the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History since 1986. He obtained his Ph.D. in anthropology at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Johnson’s career has been devoted to understanding the culture and history of the Chumash Indians and their neighbors in south central California through the study of archaeology, archival records, and interviews with contemporary Native Americans.

Johnson has published more than 40 studies about Southern California Indians, particularly the Chumash. His work to preserve important archaeological sites and collections has been recognized formally by the Society for California Archaeology, which awarded him their Mark Harrington Award for Conservation Archaeology in 2002. Dr. Johnson heads a team that has been investigating the earliest evidence for people in our region at the Arlington Springs Site on Santa Rosa Island.

Dr. James Kennett is Professor Emeritus in Earth Sciences at UCSB and Research Professor with the Marine Science Institute, of which he was Director from 1987 to 1997. A native of New Zealand, Kennett’s work in marine geology and paleoceanography over the last 45 years has assisted with a more comprehensive understanding of major paleoenvironmental and biotic changes that shaped the Cenozoic Era and its stratigraphic record, and of processes involved in this development. He has numerous honors.

His most recent project is the discovery of a widespread geological and archaeological evidence for a major extraterrestrial collision over North America 12,900 years ago. Massive energy release from this impact caused continental-wide wildfires and other severe environmental changes. The YDB ET impact hypothesis appears to be consistent in explaining at least three major events that have long puzzled the scientific community: 1) the massive, abrupt extinction over North America of many large mammal (e.g. mammoths, camels, sloths, saber tooth cats) and bird taxa; 2) the abrupt disappearance of the Clovis Culture, the first widely distributed peoples of North America; and 3) the triggering of abrupt cooling over broad areas of Earth and associated major change in ocean circulation.

Marla Daily, President of the Santa Cruz Island Foundation (SCIF), is a Cultural Anthropology graduate of the University of California, Santa Barbara. In 1973 she began working at the university’s Santa Cruz Island Reserve, and shortly thereafter was hired as personal assistant to Dr. Carey Stanton, who at the time owned 9/10ths of Santa Cruz Island. In 1985, Stanton founded SCIF, a non-profit organization dedicated to the preservation of the cultural histories of all eight California Channel Islands. Ms. Daily has been President of the Foundation since 1987.

Marla Daily and SCIF have published dozens of articles and books about the California Channel Islands, including California’s California Channel Islands, 1001 Questions Answered (1987); Cowboy Island: Farewell to a Ranching Legacy, Santa Rosa Island (2000), and Richard Diebenkorn and Carey Stanton: A Private Collection (2005). In 1994, the California Historical Society bestowed upon Ms. Daily their Distinguished Service Award “for her extraordinary leadership and service to the people of California and the nation for her dedicated efforts to preserve and promote the history of the California Channel Islands.” Ms. Daily has served on the advisory councils of the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History, Santa Barbara Botanic Garden, Channel Islands National Marine Sanctuary, and board of the Santa Barbara Maritime Museum. She has been studying and writing about the cultural histories of all eight Channel Islands for more than 30 years, and is currently writing a California Channel Islands encyclopedia.

Dr. Tanya Atwater is a distinguished professor (emeritus status now) in marine geophysics here at U.C.S.B.’s  Earth Science department.  She was educated at M.I.T., U.C. Berkeley and Scripps Institute of Oceanography, earning her PhD in 1972. She was a professor of marine geophysics at the M.I.T.  - Woods Hole Institute before joining the U.C.S.B. faculty in 1980.    Today, Dr. Atwater serves on numerous national and international committees and panels and is a fellow of various professional societies.  She is co-winner of the A.A.A.S. Newcomb Cleveland Prize, and was elected to the prestigious National Academy of Sciences in 1997.

Dr. Atwater's research focuses on exploring the many aspects of the theory of plate tectonics:  specializing in tectonic evolution of western North America as well as working with various groups on ships and in the submersible Alvin, characterizing the details of sea floor spreading centers. She has been a participant or chief scientist of numerous oceanographic expeditions to the central north Atlantic, Gulf of California, Galapagos region, and south central Pacific. On land she has been a participant or leader for various field expeditions to Iceland, Cyprus, Spain, Italy, Afghanistan, Turkey, Nepal, Ecuador, Chile, Newfoundland, Antarctica, the former Soviet Union and many localities in the Western United States and in Southern California.

At UCSB Dr. Atwater has long been recognized not only for her cutting edge research, but also for her outstanding teaching at both the undergraduate and graduate levels.  She takes great pleasure that her job as a geoscience educator is to help as many students as possible to know, understand, and respect our planet.  She is also deeply involved in public education, working with the media, museums, and teachers to bring Earth Science information to all.

Because of Dr. Atwater’s work on the plate tectonic history of western North America and the San Andreas fault system she has developed a unique expertise on the geological evolution of our CA Channel Islands.  Please join me in welcoming Dr. Tanya Atwater who will talk to us about “How plate tectonic events and geological processes created, then mangled, the Southern Californian geography.”

Michelle Berman is the Assistant Curator within the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History’s Vertebrate Zoology Department.

The Vertebrate Zoology Department was first established in 1916 and is home to historic collections containing specimen’s fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds and eggs, and mammals from as early as 1849.  Today the regional collection of vertebrates includes over 40,000 specimens!

The Department is always active preparing, cataloging and archiving specimens within their collections, while simultaneously overseeing the animals in the exhibits within the museum.

In her position as Assistant Curator Michelle serves as the Museums specialist in marine mammals, where she collects, examines, and catalogs deceased species of whales and dolphins found along the tri-county coast.  She is also the designated official marine mammal stranding coordinator for our area.

Michelle is here to talk about her “Recent investigations and findings regarding the recent Blue whale deaths in the Santa Barbara Channel and Southern California waters."

Chris Still, professor of Geography at UCSB.

Professor Still's areas of research includes:  Biogeochemistry, biogeography, earth system science, sustainability science, ecological climatology, climate change, carbon cycling, plant ecophysiology, and stable isotopes.

Chris is a collaborative member of the Terrestrial Plant and Ecosystem Ecology group, which is an interactive coalition spanning the departments of Geography; Ecology, Evolution, and Marine Biology (EEMB); Environmental Studies; and the Bren School for Environmental Science and Management. He coauthored an article in Nature in 2006 on the relation of global warming to the extinction of amphibians, and he recently received a NASA New Investigator Program in Earth Sciences Award; his proposal being one of only 31 chosen nationally.

Professor Still’s courses include:
- Geography 3A, Oceans and Atmospheres
- Geography & Environmental Studies 167, Biogeography: The Study of Plant and Animal Distributions
and
- ES 111/Geog 149, The California Channel Islands

In this class he is going to talk to us about his ongoing research out on the islands.  Specifically: How Southern California's summer climate and fog and its effects on the unique ecosystems of the CA Channel Islands.

Russell Galipeau is a 27-year veteran of the National Park Service (NPS), and was appointed Superintendent of the Channel Islands National park in 2003. Prior to his current position Mr. Galipeau was the chief of resources management at Yosemite National Park, where he has coordinated a resources program rich in biological, botanical and cultural elements and was challenged with the natural resources rehabilitation of Yosemite Valley after the 1997 flood. He has also has worked as chief of resources at the largest national park in the system – Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve in Alaska and in the Service’s Southeast Regional Office. His fieldwork includes serving as a biology specialist at Everglades National Park and Canaveral National Seashore. Galipeau is a native of St. Augustine, Fla. and has a degree in wildlife ecology from the University of Florida. 

We are fortunate to have Superintendent Galipeau take time out of his busy schedule to join us to today to talk about the role the park plays in managing 5 of the eight CA Channel islands and give us some insight into future plans for the islands and the challenges he foresees with implementing such plans.

Make-up Assignments:

You will choose one of two fieldtrip options and complete the attached assignment. You must turn it in to Dr. Cremer's mailbox in the ES Main Office (Bren 4312) no later than the end of the last week of lecture, Friday, June 6th, 2008.

1. Santa Barbara Botanical Garden assignment (.pdf)
2. Santa Barbara Natural History Museum assignment (.pdf)