Celebrating — and preserving — the nature around us
April 22 is Earth Day. That is also the day International Dark Sky Week begins. Both are a way to celebrate nature around us, giving us an excuse to work toward preserving our surroundings.
Earth Day has been around since 1970, inspired by a senator from Wisconsin. It began with mass demonstrations that celebrated nature and protested environmental degradation. Earth Day has evolved in many ways: parades, community-wide celebrations, neighborhood cleanups. Celebrations are worldwide, from Malaysia to Argentina to Romania, with many events in the U.S., including Taos.
To celebrate Earth Day, people don’t have to participate in an organized event. Taoseños can join with family or neighbors to pick up trash, water trees or pull weeds in public areas. They can take elderly friends on a drive to see spring flowers (the apricot blossoms will probably have frozen by then, but crabapple trees might be blooming — at the very least, there will be fields of golden dandelions).
International Dark Sky Week is a more recent celebration, begun in 2003 by a Virginia high school student. It, too, is international, with events held as far away as Pakistan. In some places, college astronomy departments open their observatories to the public. Astronomy clubs host star parties. Federal and state parks arrange nighttime walks. Amateur astronomers invite their neighbors over for a peak through a telescope.
One goal of dark sky week is to help ordinary people appreciate a view of the night sky, something that is visible for half the hours of each year here in Taos, but is often overlooked in the glare of streetlights, security lights and advertising signs.
The International Dark Sky Association (IDA) says that 83 percent of all humans live under light-polluted skies, with that number increasing at twice the rate of global population growth.
Light pollution does much more than obliterate views of the stars. It disturbs people’s sleep. It disrupts the feeding and migration habits of birds, fish, insects and wild mammals. It can cause human health problems.
Outside of a handful of cities, New Mexico’s skies are relatively free of light pollution. Activists are working in many towns to promote well-designed and pollution-minimizing lighting. Taos has a dark-sky ordinance. For more than 20 years, New Mexico has had a law on the books designed to reduce light pollution.
Dark skies have become a visitor attraction in the state. The New Mexico Department of Tourism lists seven dark sky parks certified by the IDA. Four are in Northern New Mexico: Capulín Volcano National Monument; Clayton Lake State Park, Fort Union National Monument and Valles Caldera National Preserve.
Across the nation, astronomy clubs will be hosting outreach events to introduce people to the glories of the night sky. In Taos, fortunately, celebrating Dark Sky Week is easy — just walk out the back door after sunset and marvel at the night sky.
April is a month to appreciate and ponder the fragility of the natural world around us.
The Taos News would like to help our readers celebrate Earth Day and International Dark Sky Week, so if you are planning an event, please contact us at editor@taosnews.com, and we will publicize it. Deadline is Friday (April 15).