Science’s curiosity about, study of, and understanding of environmental matters has grown prodigiously in recent years, as has its understanding of human effects on the natural world. We—scientists, policymakers, land managers, ordinary citizens— know better than ever that the actions we do and do not take can and will influence the globe on which we depend for life. This goes for natural resource managers on military installations as well as for homeowners who put chemicals on their lawns or people shopping for a new car.
Natural resource managers have a huge burden of responsibility, but they also have an enormous storehouse of useful knowledge that only recently has been assembled. Science has supplied them with information about ecosystems, species populations, habitat and communities, landscapes, monitoring, fragmentation, and hundreds of other ways to keep track of, and protect, the biodiversity in their care— and to do so while also serving the military mission.