People and Nature in Mountains
Changing land-use and
landscape dynamics
A conference report
H. John B. Birks
University of Bergen
University College London
University of Oxford
16 December 2011
Introduction
Aims
Background
Conference
Highlights
What did I learn?
Never forget the lemon!
Conclusions
People and Nature in Mountains
Changing land-use and landscape dynamics
International conference in Trondheim 21-23
September 2011
About 220 participants
from 12 countries
Only 5 from Bergen – missed an excellent
conference!
Aims
People have influenced mountain landscapes in
northern Europe (and elsewhere in the world) for
several thousand years. Land-use has affected
• habitats
• biodiversity
• cultural heritage
• sense of place and identity and ‘wildness’
Changes in land-use mean we are at a critical point
in determining future management strategies
Conference considered how
archaeology and cultural history can
be integrated with long-term and
contemporary ecology to understand
landscape dynamics and underpin
sustainable management and
conservation of both cultural
landscapes and biodiversity in
mountain landscapes.
EECRG mainstream interests and
logical up-date to the 1988 The
Cultural Landscape – Past, Present,
and Future book edited by Hilary
Birks et al.
Background
Conference was an impressive close to an exciting
project (DYLAN) led by Gunnar Austrheim (NTNU)
on conservation and land-use in dynamic
landscapes. Involved Museum faculties from Oslo,
Bergen, Trondheim, and Tromsø.
My role (and Des Thompson’s) was to be on the
Steering Committee with Bent Odgaard and others.
As usually happens with Des and I, we became full
research members of the DYLAN project.
Conference organisers: Gunnar Austrheim, James
Speed, Vibekke Vange, Per Sjögren, and Brigitte
Skar.
Conference
Several sections, each with a keynote speaker
1. Long-term land-use practice and landscape
dynamics
John Birks; Svein Indrelid; 5
talks about Nordic countries
including Kari Hjelle’s; 5 about
other areas (USA, Pakistan,
Alps, Turkey, Iceland).
Evening lecture by Urban
Emanuelsson on The rural
landscapes of Europe. How man
has shaped nature.
2. Managing conflict: working with stakeholders
Roger Sidaway, economist and lawyer, active
in Scottish conservation conflicts; 2 other
talks
3. Long-term land-use practice and landscape
dynamics – the DYLAN studies
4 case studies – Sami perspective, Budalen,
Dividalen
4. Mountain landscapes: What is natural, what
is traditional?
Alison Hester; 2 other talks
5. Integrating research and management
Des Thompson
6. Cultural heritage and land-use
7. The resilience of ecosystem services
in dynamic landscapes
Jon Moen; Gunhild Setten
8. Using spatial and temporal data-sets to
monitor change
Nigel Yoccoz; 4 other talks including one
about the GLORIA slope approach –
certainly on a slippery slope statistically!
9. Future scenarios: policies and models
John Linnell – reconciling development and
conservation on Norwegian islands; 3 other
talks with an excellent mix of natural and
social sciences
10. Reconciling natural and cultural heritage
conservation goals
Marie Stenseke; James Speed et al.
Towards an integrated valuation of
mountain landscapes
Summing up – Gunnar Austrheim with inputs from
John Birks and Des Thompson
Highlights
1. Roger Sidaway – Resolving
environmental disputes. From conflict
to consensus
2. Nigel Yoccoz – a statistician who
started life as a biologist and ecologist
3. Jon Moen – dismantling the ‘ecosystem service
concept’, ‘paradigm’, or ‘advertising tool’
4. Kari Hjelle – Jostedal and Bergen integrated
palaeoecological, ecological, and archaeological
work. Discovery of pollen-bearing soils under
‘shelter’ rocks. Local picture of vegetation change
5. James Speed et al. – integrated valuation of
mountain landscapes: cultural heritage,
biodiversity, recent land-use, in a European
context
Must be good as it has been rejected by two
journals to date because it is not pure natural
science nor pure social science, nor pure
humanities. Excellent sign we have prepared a
good and important paper!
6. Conference dinner at Lian Restaurant. Went
by old tram from St Olav’s Gate. Des
volunteered me to do the ‘thank-you’ speech
and we had an overdose of Bob Dylan music (70
this year).
Some of the lectures can be found at
www.ntnu.no/vitenskapsmuseet/peopleandnature
(including mine and Des Thompson’s)
Proceedings will be in the International Journal of
Biodiversity Science, Ecosystem Services, and
Management
What Did I Learn?
1. The ‘gap’ between cultural historians and natural
scientists is narrowing.
2. Natural scientists, especially those in conservation,
are widening their horizons and sympathies.
Resolving environmental disputes carefully rather
than head-on confrontation (cf. The Flow Country).
3. Do not like, appreciate, or understand the sculpture
of Kjell Erik Killi Olsen and his Salamandernatten.
In near-total darkness!
In basement of
Sparebank1 SMN – hope
they keep it there!
4. Humanity lecturers tend to read out their text
rather than to lecture and rarely use PowerPoint.
Not just here but also at music conferences.
5. Progress in conservation and
management needs
‘intelligent tinkering’ to bridge
the gap between science
(‘basic science’) and practice
(‘applied science’).
6. Much closer ‘conservation and management links’
between Norway and the UK than I had ever
realised. Mary Edwards had hinted at this in a
paper in 2000 in a SNH book, but the James
Speed et al. manuscript really seals the link.
Now clear that we are the extreme
oceanic mountain area in the global
Mountain Diversity Assessment
(GMBA) who published their
synthesis of sustainable use and
biodiversity of subtropical and
tropical highlands in 2006.
7. Never forget the lemon!
A major aspect of conservation biology today is
the phrase and metaphor ‘never forget the
lemon’ coined by Andrew Watkinson (UEA) and
popularised by Bill Sutherland (Cambridge) and
introduced into the Nordic world by Des
Thompson (SNH) at the Trondheim conference.
Conquering the disease of scurvy in the 18th and
19th centuries and measuring position were two of
the most significant improvements in naval life.
Scurvy – “large discoloured spots, swollen legs,
putrid gums, and above all an extraordinary
lassitude of the body, especially after any exercise.
This finally degenerates into a proneness to swoon
and death on the least exertion of strength. This
disease is likewise attended with a strange
degeneration of spirits, with shiverings, tremblings,
and a disposition to be seized with the most
dreadful terrors on the slightest accident.”
Lord Commodore George Anson 1740-44
Anson was a rich, well-connected, high-society
Englishman. Left Portsmouth with 7 ships and 1955
men to harass and plunder the Spanish off the west
coast of S America. Returned with 1 ship and 145
men and a mass of Spanish treasure. Needed 32
wagons to transport it. Anson kept half for his
family.
1051 sailors died, mostly of scurvy, the remainder
nearly all incapacitated by scurvy.
Ship’s medicines
• sulphuric acid mixed with herbs
• ‘Pill and Drop (dead)’ – a violent diuretic peddled by
Joshua Ward, a notorious high-society ‘quack’ who was
close to the Lords of the Admiralty. The Pill and Drop
was made from balsam, wine, and antimony and killed
more men that it cured, hence Pill and Drop dead.
Scurvy had major effects not only on sailors but on
economy of Britain and other maritime nations.
Killed more men than enemy action
1793-1813: 6% killed in action; 82% killed by scurvy
Major killer because it destroys our natural immune
system. Liable to lead to many other diseases and
complications.
Hippocrates (460-380 BC) recognised and
described it, as did Jacques Cartier, French
explorer of eastern Canada in 1535.
Scurvy remained major killer, especially
until John Harrison built his famous series
of marine chronometers, allowing the
accurate calculation of longitude. Before
this voyages were unnecessarily long as
ships went round in circles.
Sir Richard Hawkins, veteran Elizabethan
sailor, knew the benefits of eating oranges
and lemons but kept them for the ‘officers
and gentlemen’.
James Lind – son of an Edinburgh grocer
– born 1716, became a registered
medical apprentice.
Joined Navy in 1739 to be a surgeon’s
mate. Appalled by scurvy. In the Seven
Years War 1756-1763, 1512 men killed
in action, 133,708 died of scurvy.
While aboard ship in 1747, Lind conducted the firstever controlled medical trial: 12 men, 6 groups of
two, all showing symptoms of scurvy. Each man
given same food and drink but different treatments
each day
2 cider
2 sulphuric acid
2 sea-water
2 vinegar
2 garlic, mustard, horse-radish, other herbs
2 two oranges and one lemon
It was only the 2 with oranges and lemon that
recovered, but Lind was not allowed to use all the
supply of fruit – reserved for the officers!
Lind realised that it was the orange and lemon juice
that was important but should not be stored in Naval
lead-based jars.
Tried to convince the Admiralty of his findings, but
widespread prejudice that fresh fruit and meat were
only for the officers, not for the men. Captain Cook
had two sailors flogged before he would allow them to
have a scrap of fresh meat or some fresh fruit.
Main Admiralty physician Sir William Cockburn
maintained that scurvy was a disease that only
attacked the idle, hence the men succumbed
and not the officers!
Admiralty instruction
“one must, when ships reach countries
abounding in oranges, lemons, pineapples, etc.
ensure that the crew eat very little of them,
since they are the commonest cause of fevers
and obstruction of the vital organs.”
1753: A Treatise of the Scurvy by James Lind
1758: James Lind physician at the Royal Naval
Hospital. Worked on the importance of fresh-water
and developed methods for distilling sea-water.
Made a wonderful machine, but the Admiralty Lords
were not interested – claimed it was the work of
others and that Lind was a plagiarist. Four years
later, a French naval doctor was richly awarded for
devising a suspiciously similar apparatus. The
Admiralty also praised another similar apparatus by
a Royal Naval surgeon and richly rewarded him.
Lind did not have either the patronage – that
corrosive 18th and 19th century social evil – or the
influence to promote his cause successfully. Lacked
‘friends in right places’ and ‘effective lobbyists’.
Never rewarded for his findings and Captain Cook
even colluded with the British Establishment to
condemn and discredit Lind’s proposals. Died in 1794,
a forgotten person.
Herbert Spencer described the Navy’s delay in
adopting Lind’s discoveries as “an example of the
most outrageous, pig-headed bureaucratic indolence.”
In the 40 years after Lind’s initial discovery, over
8000 sailors died of scurvy.
Gilbert Blane (later Sir Gilbert), born 1749, became
physician to George IV, President of the USA, etc.
Thanks to his royal connections and his being part
of the Establishment, as Chair of the Navy’s ‘Sick
and Hurt Board’ in 1795 he introduced limes and
lemons to treat scurvy.
Story did not end there – by 1850s Admiralty and
British government decided it was better to pay
English gentlemen growing limes in the West Indies
than to pay Italian or Spanish lemon-growers in the
Mediterranean.
Was a disaster as limes and lemons retain different
amounts of vitamin C. Crews on ships relying on
limes had scurvy again, and this was used to damn
further Lind’s recommendations. Went back to
sulphuric acid and other useless remedies.
With proper navigation and oranges and lemons,
scurvy eventually became in the late 1800s only a
problem in land armies, arctic whalers, and polar
explorers.
Two polar expeditions in 1850 and 1875 solved the
problem: 1850 had lemon juice and was successful;
1875 had lime juice and was disastrous.
Scott’s expedition to the South Pole (1903-1911)
had scurvy and lost the race without fruit and
manually handling the sledges. Some other nation’s
explorers had fruit and dog sledges!
Charles King (1932) finally demonstrated the
connection between scurvy and vitamin C deficiency
… only 185 years after Lind’s trial.
What has this to do with conservation and management?
1. Get one’s taxonomy right – limes, lemons, or
oranges?
2. Lind’s humble beginnings at the time of the
Scottish enlightenment (James Croll was another)
meant he had ‘no friends in high places’, no
‘patronage’, and hence no ‘supporters’.
3. In the time to communicate and convince key
leader, hundreds or thousands of sailors died.
Same thing today – erudite discussions of slope
values in species-area models, down-scaling of
climate models, obsession in each climate centre
having only its climate model, whilst climate
change continues and more species become
endangered as habitat is decreased or damaged.
4. In almost everything, people have vested
interests (the lime growers) and economic
matters quickly overshadow scientific matters.
5. Many hurdles in effective information
exchange, even today with vested and political
interests.
So when people pontificate about evidence-based
conservation and whose evidence is better, never
forget the lemon and James Lind and his life-long
war against ignorance and the Establishment.
Conclusions
A wonderfully stimulating conference, not too big
and not too long, but not too small that you were
just talking to your colleagues. People of many
different disciplines, cultures, and backgrounds.
Great success, as has been the whole of DYLAN.
Very exciting and challenging. Learnt a huge
amount and will never forget the lemon!
Acknowledgements
Des Thompson
James Speed
Alison Hester
Gunnar Austrheim
Jon Moen
Nigel Yoccoz
Eleanor Birks
Cathy Jenks