U of A Research Chronicles Natural History of the Central Appalachians

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FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. – Man-made environmental disasters such as toxic waste spills in the Central Appalachians region have attracted the attention of the general public, but scientists have identified more subtle increases in the levels of industrial and domestic pollutants across the region, writes Steve Stephenson in his new book, A Natural History of the Central Appalachians.

Chemical and petrochemical plants, coal-burning power plants, incinerators and waste disposal facilities all have contributed to contamination, according to Stephenson, a research professor of biological sciences at the University of Arkansas.

Nonetheless, the overall biodiversity and natural beauty of the Central Appalachians remains the same, Stephenson concludes.

A Natural History of the Central Appalachians features more than 120 color images, examines the biology and ecology of the plants, animals and other organisms of the region. It also touches on the history of humans in the region, beginning with the arrival of the first native peoples.

Stephenson describes the Central Appalachians as a system of linear ridges, intervening valleys and deeply dissected plateaus that make up the rugged terrain found in western and southwestern Virginia, eastern and central West Virginia, western Maryland, and a portion of south central and southwestern Pennsylvania. Much of the area was rich in coal.

 Surface mining of coal — known as strip mining — has been going on for more than a century in the Central Appalachians, leaving scars and blotches on the landscape. And the method of mountaintop removal “is pretty much as the name suggests,” Stephenson writes.

“Critics of this practice object strongly to the physical alteration of the landscape, which is unquestionably drastic, and the considerable ecological impacts, including some on human health,” he writes.

In the 27 years that he spent on the faculty of Fairmont State College (now university) in West Virginia, Stephenson carried out numerous research projects in the woods of the Appalachian Plateau. Stephenson, one of the world’s leading experts in the field of slime mold research, has been at the U of A since 2003 but he still returns regularly to the Central Appalachians to conduct field research. For his book, Stephenson rewrote and expanded Vegetation of West Virginia, by Earl L. Core, a longtime botanist at West Virginia University.

A native of south central Virginia, Stephenson writes about his life-long fondness for the Central Appalachians, which he refers to as “this special place.”

“Standing on a mountain ridge and looking down at a fog-filled valley in early morning,” he writes, “observing the breathtaking beauty of the springtime profusion of wild flowers and flowering shrubs, being surrounded on all sides by the brilliant fall colors in a deciduous forest or discovering a fresh fruiting of an intriguing fungus on a log — these were often things done in the context of some research project in which I was involved, and which I invariably took a moment to enjoy for their own sake.”

This is Stephenson’s seventh book. He has also written Myxomycetes: A Handbook of Slime Molds and The Kingdom Fungi: The Biology of Mushrooms, Molds, and Lichens.

A Natural History of the Central Appalachians is published by West Virginia University Press.