Conservation Medicine

Every spring for the majority of my childhood I pranced down Main Street in my hometown of Olympia, Washington sporting outfits ranging from frog to jelly-fish to E. coli as a participant in the Procession of the Species, an annual artistic pageant parade that seeks to enhance cultural exchange through our mutual appreciation and respect for the natural world. I bounced down the streets of my hometown alongside children of all ages, learning something about the remarkable diversity of our planet. Unfortunately, the diversity that the Procession of the Species celebrates is critically threatened.