Karlyn Langjahr

NOAA Coral Reef Management Fellow - St. Croix East End Marine Park

Jul 23, 2009

1. What interaction with an animal and/or nature in your life has had the biggest impact on you?

So many... but the have all occurred in the marine environment, often with marine organisms. Some of my most humbling: snorkeling next to whalesharks in Baja, working with nesting sea turtles in various places, watching humpback whales and their babies in Hawaii, diving in SE Asia and Palau's jellyfish lake!

2. Did you have a favorite place in the great outdoors during your childhood? How about now??

As a child the back yard and nearby suburban "forests" served as our playground- mostly ponds and climbing trees, etc. I grew up in a land-locked USA, but had access to tons of bodies of water (ponds, lakes, streams/rivers). When I was in 4th grade I discovered "oceanography" and have been an ocean person since I was old enough to go out on my own. Snorkeling here in the Caribbean every weekend keeps me sane!

3. As a former zookeeper, I would love to know what your favorite animal is, and why?

This is so hard! It changes all of the time, but I would say right now... sharks.

4. What do you think is the greatest environmental challenge facing us now, and what do you think will be the greatest challenge in the future?

Lack of political will and systematic prioritization of the current economic system, instead of developing an economy based on the goods and serviced provided by nature. Collapse is an excellent book showing how human cultures repeatedly "choose" society self-destruction in the name of their cultural "rites" which is essentially what we seem to be doing now.

5. If you could give everyone one piece of advice regarding the environment and our natural resources, what would it be?

We may all view ourselves as "separate" or even independent from nature (increasingly as we depend on technology and recreate indoors with computers, etc. instead of in natural environments), but we should view our environment as an organism surrounding us and recognize that its very health affects our own health (both individually and collectively).