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WHEN ASKED WHAT OTHER TOOL has delivered a comparable advance to the field, biologist John Anderson's answer is succinct and telling-binoculars.
John Anderson is stretched out on his side, his right arm plunged to the shoulder in a narrow hole in the ground. He's grubby, his unwashed hair stuck to his forehead and sandaled feet in dire need of a scrub. His belly sags sideways in the brush. With a hard stare and deep concentration, he manages a few groping words: "Uh...there...nope." The accent is laced with high Brit. As he lifts himself up, pulling his arm—now caked with dirt—out of the stiff foliage, he laments, "If we could just understand why here, why this place, it would be invaluable."
This place is Great Duck Island, a 89-hectare arc of land off the coast of Maine with no year-round inhabitants and a summer population numbering in the single digits. It's served by solar panels that light up a handful of buildings, crude roads navigable only by tractor, and a boat that floats you to Bar Harbor in an hour and a half. There's no running water. On a clear day, you can see Mount Desert Rock, the most remote lighthouse on the East Coast.
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Conservation magazine is published by the Society for Conservation Biology
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