LORDS OF NATURE: LIFE IN A LAND OF GREAT PREDATORS

LORDS OF NATURE: LIFE IN A LAND OF GREAT PREDATORS (USA, 2008, 60 min.)

Co-presented by Defenders of Wildlife

Washington, D.C. Premiere Can a wolf grow a forest, or a cougar save a butterfly? Only if we let them. Lords of Nature is the story of science rediscovering our topmost predators as revitalizing forces of nature and of a society learning tolerance for beasts they once banished. Wolves and cougars, once driven to the edge of existence, are finding their way back – from the Yellowstone plateau to the canyons of Zion, from the farm country of northern Minnesota to the rugged open range of the West. Lords of Nature traces the path of legendary naturalist and writer Aldo Leopold. What Leopold warned of seventy years ago, scientists from around the world now confirm: a land lacking its top predators is a land subject to decay. And vice versa, a land with the great beasts in sufficient numbers is a land far more diverse and resilient. But this has also raised the obvious question of whether and how to incorporate the big predators into societies facing conflicts and fears with their return (—Lordsofnature.org). Directed by Karen Meyer and Ralf Meyer. Produced by Green Fire Productions.

Introduced by Rodger Schlickeisen, President and CEO, Defenders of Wildlife. Discussion with filmmaker Karen Anspacher-Meyer and screenwriter Will Stolzenburg follows screening.

Ticket/Reservation Info:

FREE. RSVP www.regonline.com/Defenders_presents_LordsofNature.

Carnegie Institution for Science, Elihu Root Auditorium, 1530 P St., NW
(METRO: Dupont Circle)