A “Time”- Honored Hero

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Renowned conservationist Dr. George Schaller of the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) has been named one of 60 “Heroes of the Planet” by TIME Magazine. He joins Al Gore and Mikhail Gorbachev among the elite group of environmental champions.
 
TIME’s editors honored Dr. Schaller, Vice President of Science and Exploration for WCS, for his five decades of work to protect some of the world’s most beloved wildlife. He began his career in the mid 1950s in Alaska, where his wildlife surveys ultimately led to the creation of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. In Central Africa, he initiated the first-ever biological studies of mountain gorillas, paving the way for Dian Fossey’s crusade to protect these gentle giants. Dr. Schaller has also conducted seminal wildlife studies of tigers in India, lions in the Serengeti, pandas in China, and snow leopards in Tibet. He helped establish one of the world’s largest protected areas—the 115,000-square-mile Chang Tang Reserve in Tibet, created in 1993.
 
In recent years, Dr. Schaller has worked in the rugged transboundary region shared by Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Pakistan, and China. There, he hopes to establish a new protected area to safeguard the spectacular and highly endangered Marco Polo sheep.

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