Biodiversity: Beautiful Differences
“Biodiversity is the greatest treasure we have. Its diminishment is to be prevented at all cost" -Thomas Eisner
LENA Earth Warriors learned about biodiversity–the wide variety of plants and animals on Planet Earth. Biodiversity is vital in creating and sustaining Earth’s healthy ecosystems that give us clean air, water, and food. All plants and animals are interconnected, depend on each other, and have a role to play. LENA Earth Warriors explored our own native area in search of a variety of plants and animals. True scientists that they are, they collected, documented, and recorded their data. In just a small area of Iowa land, they found a large variety of plants. They noticed the different shapes of leaves, the varying sizes of trees, and the multiple flowers in the prairies. We were fortunate to have volunteers from Green Iowa Americorps lead us on a plant identification hike. On this hike, the Earth Warriors not only learned the names of many plants, but were again reminded of the great variety in our native area. They came to understand that each plant is unique with identifiers, each has its own name, and all contribute.
While animal life was somewhat limited on our usual paths, we were still able to spot a variety of insects, birds, and animals. We realized that we see these creatures more on our hikes throughout the woods than in open spaces and playgrounds. We came to understand that these creatures rely on the variety of plants in their habitats to survive and thrive.
We noticed, compared, and understood that variety and difference is a good and healthy thing for Planet Earth. This lesson extends to all life forms. It takes all of us in our great variety of color, shape, size, species, gender, love to make a healthy planet. We rely on each other and are connected to all. I hope that the lessons learned in LENA Earth Warriors will not only support Mother Earth, but her people as well. We are different, we are interconnected, we all have a part to play.
