Michael Goulding is a senior aquatic scientist at The Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) and a world-renowned expert on the Amazon river basin. WCS has been a key partner for the Moore Foundation’s Andes-Amazon Initiative, through their work to conserve important ecosystems in the Amazon biome and study shifting resource dynamics within those ecosystems.
Recently, Michael received the prestigious Parker/Gentry Award from the Field Museum during an online award ceremony. This annual award recognizes conservationists “whose efforts have had a significant impact on preserving the world’s natural heritage and whose actions and approach can serve as a model to others.”
In this installment of Beyond the Lab, Michael discusses his deep dedication to studying the Amazon and his holistic approach that has transformed the way we think about conservation biology, and in particular, freshwater ecosystems.
What made you want to become a research scientist?
I grew up in a very rural area of northeast California. As kids, we were always out in nature, hunting, fishing, and exploring. As I got older, though, I wanted to look beyond my own backyard to distant places with different cultures and different nature. I read works by 19th century “voyager naturalists” like Charles Darwin, Henry Walter Bates, Alfred Russell Wallace, and Richard Spruce, and I was deeply inspired. Eventually, my interests led to a focus on rainforests, specifically the Amazon. And this was during the height of the environmentalist movement in the 1960’s, so I became particularly interested in issues of conservation.
What problems in science are you most interested in solving?
I like thinking about ecosystems and how things are connected. There’s a tendency in research to focus on just one small area. But look at the voyageur naturalists – they travelled and studied large areas, and their work completely changed our perception of the world. I’ve deliberately tried to keep a similar largescale perspective in my own research. The scale is particularly massive for the Amazon. The river itself runs more than 4,000 miles from the Andes in the west all the way to the Atlantic Ocean, and ecologically, a lot of different things happen along this route.
How have you and your colleagues helped change our largely terrestrial view of conservation to one that puts rivers at the center?
Our work demonstrated the connection between the river and the rainforest. For some reason, most people just focus on the rainforest, but this perspective is too limited. In the Amazon, the rivers rise and flood the forest six months out of the year. Fifteen percent of the Amazon is mostly a wetland with trees in it, and there are many complex interactions that take place. And, of course, rivers move, so you also have to consider the interplay between areas up and downriver. Some scientists thought it wouldn’t even be possible to study ecosystems like this at such a large scale. However, we kept working at it and eventually made discoveries that could never have been achieved at a smaller scale. For example, we tracked the longest fish migration in the world and found remarkable variations in biodiversity across regions.
What limitations or challenges do you see for researchers in your field?
I think it’s become increasingly difficult for researchers in this field to take risks and make their mark. When I was a young scientist back in the 1970’s and 80’s, we had so much freedom to do our own thing and buck convention. But today, most funding pushes the field into consensus and continuity. There’s also a preference for safe projects with quick returns – but it’s impossible to solve complex problems in just one or two years. To make the really big discoveries, we need to support bold individuals with ambitious ideas. I believe in what I call the “80/20 rule,” where 80 percent of funding goes to research in the current paradigm, but 20 percent is reserved for riskier, unconventional work. There needs to be room for audacity!
What do you think the public should understand about your research, particularly as it relates to environmental conservation?
First and foremost, it’s important for people to understand the role of the Amazon in earth’s ecosystem. I think there’s a general awareness that the Amazon is significant, but there’s still a lot more work to be done. Educating the public about complex scientific topics is always a challenge, and it’s also difficult to convince people to care about problems that are outside of their immediate environment. But it’s not impossible. That’s why I’ve worked with National Geographic, IMAX, the BBC, and others to help communicate our science to a broad international audience. And beyond that, we also need to consider how we communicate with and educate local populations in the Amazon basin. Ultimately, the link between all these populations will be critical for any conservation effort.
Where do you see yourself in five years?
I love what I do. But I also know you can’t sell what you once did for the rest of your life. Things are always changing, and the future is all about technology. Looking ahead, I see myself helping direct how that technology is used. For example, what if we can build cellular networks that reach the extremely remote areas where field work takes place? Imagine, instead of sending a person to manually take measurements once a week, we could use connected devices to gather data continuously and autonomously. Technology could be the key to finally tackling tough scientific problems that no one has yet figured out how to handle.
Main image: (From left to right) Junior Chuctayo, Dario R. Faustino Fuster, Bruce Forsberg, Michael Goulding, Ronaldo Barthem and Mariana Montoya. The group was formed to investigate the Madre de Dios Basin and specifically the Inambari, one of the sub-basins that was under consideration by the Peruvian government for what was planned to be the largest dam in the Andes. With financing from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, the team developed the first Andes-Amazon integrated river basin framework for addressing infrastructure development at adequate scale.
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