Undercurrents

When Joe Engel’s office phone rings these days, chances are he is getting a call from someone looking to protect their land.

When spring arrives at Whitefish Point, a sandy headland on Lake Superior north of Paradise, a tsunami of birds typically follows.

Fred Sitkins isn’t your average school administrator. His students aboard the 61-foot schooner, Inland Seas, learn science and math and aquatic ecology, about quagga mussels, plastic pollution and maybe a sea shanty or two.

On winter days when birds flock to backyard feeders, it’s not uncommon for people to sit with a cup of coffee and enjoy the...

Maine has its honeybee. Massachusetts has its ladybug. Mississippi, the Magnolia state, has two state insects: the firefly and ladybug. Michigan has no state...

Big decisions require strength of character and the fortitude to see them through. Howard Tanner, Ph.D., can testify to that.

Sitting under a dark sky full of stars can be magical, a glimpse of the sublime and a sight to behold. Yet, many never really experience it.

Toiling daily in the urban industrial zone adjacent to the Detroit River, John Hartig’s work is never finished. There are wetlands to restore and invasive plants to control, remnant pollution issues to resolve, and fish and bird species to protect.

Invasive aquatic plants are the bane of lakefront property owners. They crowd out native plant species, often forming dense mats that hinder boating, fishing and other recreation and can cause dissolved oxygen levels to drop, which affects water quality.

The 65-year-old president and CEO of Crystal Mountain, a Thompsonville golf, ski and spa resort, values development strategies that emphasize people and the environment as well as profit: “the triple bottom line,” in the parlance of sustainable business practice.