Note: This content originated on our online community inspiring conservation, RarePlanet.Org.

Below is a video montage introducing the people, biodiversity, and sheer beauty of the Lamandau River Wildlife Reserve, in Central Kalimantan, Borneo, Indonesia — one of Rare’s Pride campaign sites.

Below is an interview with Togu Simorangkir, Director of  Yayasan Orangutan Indonesia (Yayorin), Rare Pride’s local campaign partner. Togu speaks about the partnership between Rare and Yayorin that aims to develop solutions that benefit both the people and nature in the Lamandau Wildlife Reserve in Indonesia.

And finally we have an interview with Hari Kushardanto, Director of the Rare Pride training program in Indonesia. Hari discusses Rare’s approach to working with partners and the future of conservation in Indonesia.

This photo of a mountain gorilla in Rwanda comes courtesy of Flickr user puddlepuff.

How Biomass Briquettes Could Save the Endangered Mountain Gorilla

• “Illegal charcoal production in the Congo is threatening mountain gorilla habitat, but an elegant solution in the form of hand-operated biomass briquette presses may help gorilla populations rebound.”
• “According to WWF, 400-600 gorillas are killed each year in the northern Democratic Republic of Congo. And without adequate cover, the illegal poaching of mountain gorillas is also intensifying in Virunga National Park, where somewhere between one-quarter and one-half of the world’s 700 remaining mountain gorillas live. “
• “Without a suitable–and affordable–alternative to charcoal, mountain gorilla habitat will continue to shrink. That’s where the simple solution of biomass briquettes made in the Congo, and in places as far away as Boulder, Colorado, could be the saving grace for the people and mountain gorillas of the Congo.”

Size matters when it comes to lobster tails (and how social marketing can help create sustainable fisheries)

• “This poster wonderfully depicts the characteristics of a great social marketing poster.  It portrays the ‘pride’ of Abaco… its beautiful beaches and lobster dinners; it has a clear and targeted message… ‘Do you measure up?’; it has a clear call to action… ‘Insist that the lobsters are at least the legal size of 5.5 inches”;  and it reinforces the main slogan… that ‘Size Matters!”
• “This poster already symbolizes change for Abaco.  Fishermen have directly approached d’Shan (by phone and office visits) to become certified (the campaign’s barrier removal strategy), fishermen have requested posters to distribute amongst other fishermen, and even previously-skeptical wholesalers are getting involved in the campaign and are REQUESTING posters to hang in their businesses.”

Top 20 countries with amount of endangered species (U.S. is No. 2)

• The U.S. has 1,203 endangered species and has a lot of endangered fish and mollusks.
• Ecuador is No. 1 with 2,211 endangered species.
• Indonesia has the most endangered mammals.
• There are only about 3,200 tigers left in the world. Their global population has fallen almost 97 percent in the last century.

Simply stunning depths of humanity: Tiger cubs poisoned in Indian national park

• “The reserve—one of several in India helping to contend with the shocking decline in tiger populations earlier in the decade—is located in the north-western province of Rajasthan. Investigators believe that the cubs were poisoned as part of a revenge killing. A goat that the tigers had poached was found nearby.”

California sushi bar caught selling whale meat

• “In a covert operation, the team behind the Academy Award-winning documentary film “The Cove” has captured video footage that they say proves a popular California sushi bar illegally sold whale meat, according to a New York Times report.“
• “Word got out that the Hump was serving whale, so Psihoyos and his colleagues sent in two vegan animal activists wearing small hidden cameras. The resulting video, not yet released to the public, captured a waitress serving what she called “whale,” which looked like thick pink slices. The vegans took bites, looked revolted, and then placed the meat into a plastic bag that was then tucked away into a purse. Scott Baker, associate director of Oregon State University’s Marine Mammal Institute, later analyzed the meat and determined it belonged to a Sei whale, which is endangered, but still hunted by the Japanese.”
• “Thom Mrozek, a spokesman for the United States attorney for the Central District of California, told the NYT that the restaurant was being investigated and charges against it could be filed this week.”
• “Baker told the Times that he was “pretty shocked” by the discovery. Although Japanese fish markets sell whale meat, he said he didn’t believe, until now, that it was being served in American restaurants.”

Here is a nice little video of Bison on the plains in North America. A plan is underway to restore their populations.

Note: This content originated on our online community inspiring conservation, RarePlanet.Org.

February was a busy month for the Loreto Pride team, and one in which the campaign embarked on a series of public outreach activities that will be repeated for the remaining five months of their community-led conservation campaign.

With help from many of her colleagues at the park and from her ever-growing group of volunteers, Perla Lozano Angulo and her team began painting murals in key locations around town to raise awareness about the plight of the chocolate clams. Perla’s campaign works with local fishers to build local support for and to effectively manage no-take zones in order to reduce overfishing.

The murals help to elevate the profile of the campaign, using the logo and the chocolate clam mascot, while delivering messages to promote sustainable fisheries.  Three murals have been painted, the first on one of the main streets in Loreto, the malecón (or boardwalk), where most Loretanos pass frequently.  The mural is strategically located in front of the pier, where fishers keep their boats.

Other murals have also been painted in the soccer and baseball stadiums, allowing the campaign to reach a larger audience of Loretanos, who might not otherwise attend one of the public events.  And soon to come are murals in the community of Ligüi, with an enormous block-long mural to be painted along the main street in town.

Painting these murals also helped to form a strong bond between the park staff, the campaign and the volunteers.  Everyone had a blast, many park staff turned out to help, and the results are something the group can all feel proud of.  Apolinar made sure there were enough snacks and beverages on hand to keep the group fueled up for the late-night painting sessions.

At the same time, Perla and the team kicked off the monthly visits to each of the neighborhoods in Loreto and the two fishing communities just south. The road show consists of participatory activities that teach the general public about specific actions they can take to support sustainable fisheries, by using the campaign songs, the chocolate clam mascot, activities, prizes and more. Next week the second round of visits will start, this time with the puppet theater as an added attraction.

We had the good fortune to have conservation photographer, Ralph Lee Hopkins, join us to document both of these activities.  Here are some more photos to enjoy:

Ever wonder what happens to a Pride campaign manager after they complete their two-year conservation campaigns?

95%  percent of Pride campaign manager alumni surveyed report that they are still involved in conservation – many of whom continue their Pride campaigns, start new ones and/or mentor other Pride campaign managers. Such is the case in Lao, where Rare alumnus Soulisak “Sak” Vannalath mentors current campaign manager Santi “Joy” Saypanya in a Rare Pride campaign with the Wildlife Conservation Society’s Lao (WCS-Lao) Program to reduce the poaching of tiger prey in the Nam Et-Phou Louey National Protected Area. In the photo, Sak, Joy and Troy Hansel, Deputy Director for the WCS-Lao office recently met up to discuss Joy’s final drafted campaign slogan and messaging. Sak shared insights from his own experience running a 2007 Pride campaign focused on illegal hunting of bushmeat and habitat loss.

It was in fact Sak’s training of other WCS-Lao staff and partners in the Pride methodology during his own Pride campaign that contributed to WCS-Lao applying for a second Pride campaign, which would then be managed by Joy. The team at WCS-Lao is a great example of the Rare Alumni Network in action.

A lemur in Madagascar, courtesy of luc legay on Flickr.

Nicholas Kristof’s Advice for Saving the World

• On putting a face on philanthropy and humanitarian work: “As we all vaguely know, one death is a tragedy, a million deaths is a statistic.”
• “What would happen if aid organizations and other philanthropists embraced the dark arts of marketing spin and psychological persuasion used on Madison Avenue? We’d save millions more lives.”
• “If one lesson is the need to emphasize hopefulness, the second is that storytelling needs to focus on an individual, not a group.”
• “The recent research in social psychology offers a couple of central lessons. The first is a bit surprising: We intervene not because of stories of desperate circumstances but when we can be cheered up with positive stories of success and transformation. For example, one experiment found that people are quite willing to pay for a water-treatment facility to save 4,500 lives in a refugee camp with 11,000 people in it, but they are much less willing to pay for the same facility to save 4,500 lives when the refugee camp is said to have 250,000 inhabitants. In effect, what matters is saving a high proportion of people, not just a large number of lives.”

NASA Says Chile Earthquake Shortened Earth’s Day

• “Gross said that even though the Chilean earthquake is much smaller than the Sumatran quake, it is predicted to have changed the position of the figure axis by a bit more for two reasons. First, unlike the 2004 Sumatran earthquake, which was located near the equator, the 2010 Chilean earthquake was located in Earth’s mid-latitudes, which makes it more effective in shifting Earth’s figure axis.”
• “Second, the fault responsible for the 2010 Chilean earthquake dips into Earth at a slightly steeper angle than does the fault responsible for the 2004 Sumatran earthquake. This makes the Chile fault more effective in moving Earth’s mass vertically and hence more effective in shifting Earth’s figure axis.”

Forests are growing faster, ecologists discover; Climate change appears to be driving accelerated growth

• “Speed is not a word typically associated with trees; they can take centuries to grow. However, a new study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences has found evidence that forests in the Eastern United States are growing faster than they have in the past 225 years. The study offers a rare look at how an ecosystem is responding to climate change.”

French company prepares to ship illegally logged rainforest wood from Madagascar

• “Delmas, a French shipping company that has been under pressure for facilitating the destruction of Madagascar’s rainforest parks, has been cleared to begin picking up contraband rosewood as soon as Monday, report local sources in the Indian Ocean island nation. Leaders behind last year’s military coup — which displaced the autocratic, but democratically elected President Marc Ravalomanana — have signed off on the shipment.”
• “Madagascar’s most biodiverse rainforest parks have been ravaged by the logging. Tens of thousands of hectares of protected forests have invaded by loggers hired a smuggling syndicate linked with local vanilla barons. The trade has been associated with a rise in commercial bushmeat trafficking of lemurs and other endangered wildlife. Traders and loggers have threatened conservation workers, including breaking the feet of a park ranger in an August attack.”

Rare and Paul Butler were mentioned in a WaPo op-ed about the power of emotional appeals to spur great change

• “In “Switch,” the authors tell a story about the St. Lucia parrot — a magnificent, colorful creature that lives only on that Caribbean island. Biologists were writing the species’ eulogy when conservation activist Paul Butler found himself charged with figuring out how to save the parrot. Butler had ideas: create a bird sanctuary, license eco-tourism and muscle up the punishments for harming the parrot. But he also had a problem. Most people on St. Lucia didn’t know about the parrot, let alone care, and some people even ate the poor bird. What to do?”
• “Instead of making an analytical case, Butler went for the emotional. He appealed to St. Lucians’ national character. The message: We are the kind of people who take care of our own. This bird is ours alone, and we must protect it. He built popular support for new laws, and today, there are seven times as many parrots happily squawking on the island.”

“This spectacular “blue marble” image is the most detailed true-color image of the entire Earth to date. Using a collection of satellite-based observations, scientists and visualizers stitched together months of observations of the land surface, oceans, sea ice, and clouds into a seamless, true-color mosaic of every square kilometer (.386 square mile) of our planet. These images are freely available to educators, scientists, museums, and the public. This record includes preview images and links to full resolution versions up to 21,600 pixels across.”

For more pictures of “blue marble,” check out NASA Goddard’s Flickr stream.

And now on with today’s notes from a rare planet.

Still more evidence — warming to bring stronger hurricanes

• “Overall strength of storms as measured in wind speed would rise by 2 to 11 percent, but there would be between 6 and 34 percent fewer storms in number, a new report from a World Meteorological Organization panel of 10 experts indicates. There would be fewer weak and moderate storms and more of the big damaging ones.”
• “An 11 percent increase in wind speed translates to roughly a 60 percent increase in damage, said study co-author Kerry Emanuel, a professor of meteorology at MIT.”

Marine Protected Areas aid coral reefs

• “Research has shown that marine protected areas (MPAs)-areas where fishing and other potentially destructive activities are regulated-are benefiting, not just the fish habitats they are known to aid, but nearby coral reefs as well.”
• “That is, while coral cover initially continued to decrease in the MPA’s first few years, decline slowed and then eventually stabilized after several years of MPA establishment.”

The Atlantic gets its own great plastic garbage patch

• “More than half of them picked up floating plastic on the water surface, mostly pieces of plastic from consumer products and plastic bags. Most of the pieces were no more than one centimeter across. The maximum density of plastic was found to be 200,000 pieces of plastic per square kilometer–which is similar to the Great Pacific Garbage Patch.”
• More than 80 percent of the plastic pieces were found between 22° and 38° north latitude.

Rare bumblebee species rediscovered in Scotland after 50 years

• The Southern Cuckoo bumblebee has been absent from hives in Scotland for 50 years.
• “At a time when bumblebees up and down the UK are struggling due to a lack of flower-rich habitat, it is heartening to see that at least one species is expanding its range…sadly many other species are threatened with national extinction, with Scotland’s Great Yellow Bumblebee Bombus distinguendus in particular trouble. We very much hope it’s not a case of ‘One in, one out.’”

Life in the valley of death, how Burma came to create a huge area for tiger conservation (podcast)

• Executive Director for Science and Exploration at the Wildlife Conservation Society based at the Bronx Zoo discusses his new book which details his efforts to create the world’s largest tiger reserve in Myanmar’s Hukaung Valley.

Every day we’re reading articles and blog posts from sources all over the world about conservation and environmentalism. We’re also viewing infographics and videos and listening to podcasts. Here we share the best of what we’ve found:

Today’s photo is of a Ecuadorian Red-lored Amazon. It comes courtesy of Flickr user Pokerbrit

And now for the stories that we’ve been reading:

Saving the planet through its trees

Negotiators at the COP15 conference in Copenhagen didn’t see eye to eye on much last month, but almost everyone agreed on one thing: To protect the planet we need to save its forests.

“Healthy, well-managed forests are essential to the survival of our societies: They are home to millions of species of plants, animals and insects, and protect soils and watersheds from erosion. They act as carbon stores, absorbing greenhouse gases and preventing their release into the atmosphere. Maintaining forest ecosystems can help to increase our resilience to climate change,” explains the U.N.-REDD Programme Secretariat.

A primary attraction of REDD is that it offers developed nations an inexpensive way to offset domestic emissions. For example, if nation X wants to reduce carbon emissions but finds domestic reductions difficult, it could pay nation Y to conserve forests that might otherwise be cut or cleared for agriculture. That way, nation Y would supposedly reduce its deforestation emissions by an amount equal to the needs of nation X.One U.N. estimate suggests that, under a REDD initiative, Indonesia could be compensated as much as $1 billion a year to reduce its deforestation rate.

Engineers find significant environmental impacts with algae-based biofuel

The U.Va. research, just published in the journal Environmental Science & Technology, demonstrates that algae production consumes more energy, has higher greenhouse gas emissions and uses more water than other biofuel sources, such as switchgrass, canola and corn.

As an environmentally sustainable alternative to current algae production methods, the researchers propose situating algae production ponds behind wastewater treatment facilities to capture phosphorous and nitrogen — essential nutrients for growing algae that would otherwise need to be produced from petroleum. Those same nutrients are discharged to local waterways, damaging the Chesapeake Bay and other water bodies, and current technology to remove them is prohibitively expensive.

While the researchers found algae production to have a greater environmental impact than other sources, it remains an attractive source for energy. Algae, which are grown in water, don’t compete with food crops grown on land and also tend to have higher energy yields than sources such as corn or switchgrass. Additionally, algae’s high lipid content makes for efficient refinement to liquid fuels that could be used to power vehicles, according to the research.

Risky expedition planned to clean up Everest

A group of top Nepalese climbers is planning a high-risk expedition to clean up Everest, concerned at the toll that decades of mountaineering has taken on the world’s highest peak.The 20 climbers, led by seven-time Everest summiteer Namgyal Sherpa, will brave thin oxygen and temperatures well below freezing to clear more than two tons of rubbish discarded by mountaineers.

Environmental activists say Everest is littered with the detritus of past expeditions, including human waste and mountaineers’ corpses, which do not decompose because of the extreme cold.

“Everest is losing her beauty,” Sherpa, 30, said. “The top of the mountain is now littered with oxygen bottles, old prayer flags, ropes and old tents. At least two dead bodies have been lying there for years now.”

U.S. Green Building Council, Habitat for Humanity plan to help rebuild Haiti

The U.S. Green Building Council plans to work with other private groups, including the Habitat for Humanity, to help rebuild Haiti. They’re starting by raising money and, in Habitat’s case, clearing debris and handing out shelter kits.

You can find more great conservation, environmental and green stories by following our Twitter feed, our Facebook page or our Diigo group.

It was a big week for Rare in Latin America.

On Thursday Jan. 28, in Puerta Vallarta, Mexico, Rare opened its board meeting by celebrating the launch of its first thematic cohort,  12 Pride conservation campaigns implemented simultaneously across South America that will seek to save cloud forest and endemic species by inspiring communities and incentivizing farmers to protect local watersheds.  Rare’s Board of Directors personally met each of the campaign managers from Colombia, Ecuador, Bolivia and Peru.

These are important campaigns on several levels. Each of the sites at which we’re working is considered globally critical for the preservation of at least one and often more than one limited range endemic species. Some are so rare that they get press coverage just for a sighting.

Few projects address the global extinction crisis more directly than this one.

Humans also directly benefit. These endangered endemics happen to all reside in Andean cloud forests — the “water towers” of South America. Water for millions of farmers, rural villages and even small cities originates in these forests.

I like to think of this cohort as a two-for-one deal.

Running parallel campaigns to achieve the same goal is a big switch for Rare. Rare’s partners are all committed to building public support for Andean cloud forest protection (and of course the species and water conservation that comes with it). Each will be striking deals with upstream farmers to set aside forest in exchange for technical assistance and alternative incomes that compensate them for any associated loss of income.

Rare calls these “reciprocal agreements,” and with financing from the Global Environment Facility (GEF), Rare is even going to implement the approach. At twelve sites, Rare and its partners will run Pride conservation campaigns to build general support for site conservation and the concept of reciprocal agreements.

Over time, Rare aims to see the added value of the awareness-raising campaigns. Using an experimental design including control sites is relatively unprecedented in the conservation field. GEF spends $1 billion a year on conservation projects, and this will be one of the first experimental projects they’ve ever seen.

These new campaigns represent an exciting new construct for Rare: a thematic cohort focusing on endangered endemics with an experimental design.

On Friday, our board meeting offered an opportunity to explore next year’s potential Latin America cohort theme: overfishing in the Gulf of California, with at least two potential solutions being considered. Rare has a long history working with local conservation partners in Mexico.  This potential 2011 cohort is based in part off of the learning of Rare’s Fisheries Fellows program, a collaborative pilot project implemented by Rare from 2005 to 2009 with multiple partners in the region.

Due to the island bio-geography, the abundance of endemic species, and wealth of marine mammals, many liken the Gulf of California region to the Galapagos Islands. The question is: how can Rare best help local conservationists in their efforts to reduce overfishing? More to the point, what might a thematic cohort for the Gulf look like?

To help answer this question, we heard from several key practitioners, who joined the meeting to help Rare think through how it could best add value to broader efforts in the region to save threatened fisheries:

• Tegan Hoffman, a California-based consultant from T.C. Hoffmann & Associates, shared the results of her independent analysis of opportunities to merge the Fisheries Fellows program with Pride campaigns at multiple sites. This is one way to think about a cohort.
• Jorge Torre, Executive Director of COBI, a well-regarded local NGO that specializes in community managed marine protected areas (MPAs). He is interested in exploring ways of partnering with Rare, perhaps to create a series of community MPAs, much like our plan for the Philippines.
• Laura Rodriguez, who recently joined the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) participated in this discussion as well. EDF has developed a model for incentivizing fishermen to manage their own fisheries, CatchShares, and they believe Rare could play a role developing community support and capacity on the ground for these initiatives – sort of like “reciprocal agreements” but for fishermen.
• Ana Luisa Figueroa, Director, San Pedro Martir Island Biosphere Reserve
• Peggy Turk Boyer from CEDO
• Amy Hudson Weaver from Niparaja
• Lorenzo Rosenzweig, Executive Director of the Mexican Fund for the Conservation of Nature.

It’s far too early to make a decision, but by the end of the morning, board members had a better understanding of how Rare staff develops thematic cohorts as well as getting an update on the progress of Rare’s other regional thematic cohorts in the Coral Triangle, the Philippines, and China.

Friday afternoon was the more perfunctory side of the board meeting: committee meetings, committee reports, the official launch of RarePlanet 2.0, and a special tribute to Rare’s Mexican trustee Barbara Hernandez who recently made a significant investment to Rare’s Latin America Pride Alumni Network.

Rare was present at a cooking contest conducted in the Gaoligong Mountain Nature Reserve, in Yunnan Providence, to encourage residents to cook using electric stoves instead of fuelwood, which contributes to habit loss and the endangerment of animals such as the Hoolock Gibbon.

For one contestant, this was her first time using an electric stove. It was only a matter of seconds before she had familiarized herself with the appliance at the start of the contest. The goal of Rare’s pride campaign at the Gaoligong National Nature Reserve is to reduce firewood consumption and stop the over harvesting of wood in this region. The campaign is designed to implement lifestyle changes by helping local villagers renovate their traditional earth stoves, purchase electric stoves, and train them to use the new appliances.

The cooking contest was held at the Nankang primary school playground. The event kicked off with a puppet show performed by enthusiastic school children, followed by a lovely traditional dance associated with the Dai Ethnicity. The festive mood was contagious, drawing more people to participate. The children screamed with excitement when the Hoolock Gibbon mascots appeared!

Four teams, a total of 12 participants, took part in the contest. Three teams originated from the campaign site, while the last team visited from a nearby community. The housewives competed by each cooking three local dishes within one hour: egg fried potatoes, fried pork with pickled vegetables and spareribs in sour bamboo. The dishes were judged based on aesthetics, taste of the food, and skill at operating an electric stove. At the conclusion of a busy and terrific morning, the judges made some tough decisions and finally awarded prizes.

Participants generally don’t like collecting fuelwood in the mountains. To gather just one bundle of fuelwood requires half a day. In addition, they are afraid of getting caught by forest rangers.

Some women said that while they like the electric stoves very much, they are afraid the electric fees are unaffordable. In an effort to reduce this cost, however, a nationwide project to more efficiently transmit electricity to rural areas will reach Gaoligong by the end of next month. Electric fees will be reduced by 50 percent.

The day after the cooking contest, campaign manager Duan Honglian led a training workshop about Rareplanet.org to teach her team members how to use the social networking site. She then updated the public with the status of this pride campaign, which can also be tracked on the campaign’s Rareplanet.org page Campaign for Sustainable Forest Use / Gaoligong Mountain Nature Reserve, Yunnan Province. Now one year since the beginning of her training, Honglian spoke with great confidence, whereas last year she was too nervous to utter a complete sentence. Honglian’s presentation is a reminder that Pride campaigns are not only inspiring conservation, but also developing campaign managers’ leadership skills.

After lunch, a reserve ranger lead an eventful walk where we discovered a gibbon sunbathing in a tree. The ranger told us the gibbon’s nickname is “lonely girl,” an appropriate name given her circumstances. She cannot find a husband due to habitat fragmentation and frequent disturbances such as over-logging, over-consumption of fuelwood, Tsaoko fruit harvesting, tourists, and scientific research, among other things.

We have faith in our efforts to restore and improve the environment for local biodiversity and hope that our “lonely girl” will marry as soon as possible.

Great news! During our inspiring trip to Yunnan Province, China late last year, several of us decided to chip in and help finance the reconstruction of the Tibetan Cultural Center in Yongzhi village. Thanks to Rare trustee Ruth Yeoh, Kenneth Khaw Jin Teck, Jin Ligang and Shen Lei, we succeed in raising $3500 just before the holidays. Here’s a video “thank you note” from Mr. Ma, Rare’s Senior Advisor in Yunnan.