CLAREMONT — The Claremont Conservation Commission is hosting a series of programs aimed at educating the public about the impact of climate change in the region.
“The climate crisis is critical to us as humans but we do not live in a vacuum,” said Jim Contois, a Claremont city councilor who also sits on the city’s Conservation Commission. “We are all part, as indigenous communities would say, we are all part of one community.”
The four virtual programs are collectively titled “New Hampshire Wildlife Meets Climate Change” and are set to begin next Thursday (April 1), at 7 p.m., when Franklin Pierce University Institute for Climate Action’s professors Fred Rogers, Catherine Koning and Gerald Burns discuss “Climate Change: Evidence, Impacts and Action.” The following Saturday, from 11 a.m.-noon, Brett Amy Thelen, science director for the Harris Center for Conservation Education, will teach a workshop over Zoom about documenting vernal pools.
The links for all programs can be found at claremontnh.com/environmental-education and people do not need to register ahead of time. On May 8, avian conservation biologist Pamela Hunt of New Hampshire Audubon will discuss “The Effects of Climate Change on NH Birds,”; in June, on a date to be decided, Lisa Wise, of the UNH Cooperative Extension Climate Adaptation Program, and Heidi Holman, a biologist with the state’s Fish and Game Department, will discuss “Pollinators in a Changing Climate”; and in a two-part program on Oct. 9 and 16, Colin Lawson, New England culvert coordinator, John Magee, Fish Habitat Program coordinator for the state’s Fish and Game Department, Lisa Loosigian, SOAK coordinator for the N.H. Department of Environmental Services, and Jeremy Clay, assistant director of Claremont’s Department of Public Works, will discuss “River Restoration and Resilience.”
Each program will include actionable steps that people can take to address climate change. For example, in the program about birds, participants will learn about Cornell University’s eBird program and how to contribute data to assist scientists studying migration patterns, Contois said.
“What we want to do is, you can’t scare everybody all at once, and the climate crisis, our education program, is set up to teach people how it’s affecting birds, how it’s affecting pollinators, how it’s affecting amphibians and fish, and how it’s affecting us all, that interconnectedness,” he said. “This is a wildlife education program. It’s called Taking Action for Wildlife, and it’s with an emphasis on the climate crisis: What can we do?”
Liz Sauchelli can be reached at esauchelli@vnews.com or 603-727-3221.
