9. Darkening the night

Join us – Holly Easton, Angie Wang, Saranka Yogendren – and special guest Mike Lavin for an honest and personal discussion about light pollution and our disappearing darkness. Mike Lavin is a park naturalist and teacher living in Southern Ontario who has garnered a deep connection with the night sky through his experiences stargazing, watching the aurora borealis when he lived in the North, and walking home in total darkness when he worked in Costa Rica. When entrenched in darkness, noise becomes sharper, nocturnal animals awaken, and galaxies become visible to the naked eye. In urban centres, this connection with the night has dwindled over time as LEDs light up our cities, covering what was previously pitch black in flooding brightness. In this episode, this loss is examined candidly as to how lack of darkness impacts not just humans and our connection to the night sky, but the circadian rhythms of nocturnal animals, the natural instincts of animals who rely on stars to navigate, and the animals who follow moonlight for directions. The darkness is, in essence, a habitat that is rapidly vanishing, and we should be passionate about protecting it, much like we protect other valuable habitats. References Burt, C. S., Kelly, J. F., Trankina, G. E., Silva, C. L., Khalighifar, A., Jenkins-Smith, H. C., Fox, A. S., Fristrup, K. M., & Horton, K. G. (2023). The effects of light pollution on migratory animal behavior. Trends in Ecology & Evolution, 38(4), 355–368. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tree.2022.12.006 Carson, R. (2002). Silent Spring. HarperCollins. Colman, L. P., Lara, P. H., Bennie, J., Broderick, A. C., de Freitas, J. R., Marcondes, A., Witt, M. J., & Godley, B. J. (2020). Assessing coastal artificial light and potential exposure of wildlife at a national scale: The case of marine turtles in Brazil. Biodiversity and Conservation, 29(4), 1135–1152. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10531-019-01928-z Eklöf, J. (2023). The Darkness Manifesto: On Light Pollution, Night Ecology, and the Ancient Rhythms that Sustain Life. Simon and Schuster. Graur, O. (2023, February 9). Light pollution has cut humanity’s ancient connection with the stars – but we can restore it. The Conversation. http://theconversation.com/light-pollution-has-cut-humanitys-ancient-connection-with-the-stars-but-we-can-restore-it-198035 Hoffmann, J., Schirmer, A., & Eccard, J. A. (2019). Light pollution affects space use and interaction of two small mammal species irrespective of personality. BMC Ecology, 19(1), 26. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12898-019-0241-0 Yen, C.-H., Chan, Y.-T., Peng, Y.-C., Chang, K.-H., & Cheng, I.-J. (2023). The Effect of Light Pollution on the Sea Finding Behavior of Green Turtle Hatchlings on Lanyu Island, Taiwan. Zoological Studies, 62, e47. https://doi.org/10.6620/ZS.2023.62-47