BOGLAND

In praise of the “underdog ecosystems.”

Ecologist Turetsky, who has been studying boglands for more than 30 years, tells a complex story of their role in our past and our potential existence in the future. Her book is an amalgam of detailed stories from her research activities, the history of boglands, and some dire predictions for the future. Bogs act as enormous air filters, trapping carbon from the atmosphere. They cover only about 3 percent of Earth’s land surface but store about 30 percent of the world’s carbon, helping to hold climate change at bay, the author says. But increasing global temperatures are threatening the permafrost, and, as it thaws, the resulting release of greenhouse gases could rival the annual emissions of a giant industrial country, adding another profound source of emissions to the atmosphere over the next 50 to 100 years, she warns. The preservation of boglands is now under threat, Turetsky explains, in large part by the industrial use of peat for gardens and landscaping, as companies drain bogs to harvest the peat and sphagnum moss with industrial extractors, destroying millions of years of accumulated organic material. Peat is not a renewable resource, the author asserts, growing only millimeters each year over millions of years, while “we can burn centuries of it in a few moments.” She calls for a consumer campaign against the commercial use of peat as a start to saving boglands. “When we mine peat, we destroy a natural carbon sink and emit greenhouse gases to get the product to your home. As for the carbon in peat itself, once it’s worked into garden soil, the peat starts to decompose, and its carbon will be released to the atmosphere too. It is up to consumers to make it clear to governments and industry that boglands are too valuable and need to be protected at all costs.”

A heartfelt plea for the protection of ancient, complex systems that help protect the world’s ecology and climate.