This year’s Bermuda College Roche Science Week speaker has often found himself at the centre of some of Bermuda’s most contentious environmental debates.

As Bermuda National Trust head of natural heritage, Myles Darrell examines 300 to 500 planning applications a year looking for negative impacts on Bermuda’s green space, heritage and biodiversity.

He came to prominence after speaking out against a 2008 proposal to turn Southlands in Warwick into a hotel development.

“I didn’t really realise how that was going to take off,” he told The Royal Gazette. “I got a phone call from someone in the community who asked me to show up at Southlands to make a video. I said I’ve got 15 minutes.”

He came with coffee in hand and started talking about the things that get him excited: the environment, trees and biodiversity.

“We went for a walk in a place that is critically important,” Mr Darrell said.

Southlands was saved from development in an historic land swap with Morgan’s Point in Southampton.

Nine months ago, he made another reel for the BNT about the special development order for the Fairmont Southampton hotel.

“I’m concerned,” he said in the short film. “In my opinion it will have a negative impact on our tourism product, a negative impact on the environment and ultimately compromise our cultural heritage.”

Yet, he insists that he is not a political person.

“I do stand-up from time to time,” he said. “It is about giving voice to communities that don’t have a voice. I love trees and I love plants, and they can’t speak out.”

More often than not, his opinion is founded on existing legislation, or the Bermuda Plan 2018, which addresses climate change and emphasises the need to incorporate sustainable design principles into new developments.

Sometimes there is negative fallout. Not everyone likes him getting in the way of whatever project they have on the table.

“If we are not caring for plants and trees then we are not caring for ourselves,” Mr Darrell said.

In tomorrow’s Bermuda College public forum, he will talk about the need to preserve and protect Bermuda’s native and endemic flora.

“Plants and trees are the unsung heroes on the planet,” he said. “They are standing in place, doing the hardest work. They are providing for our community and making sure that we have good clean air to breathe and resources to build, eat and just have fun.”

He is a self-confessed tree-hugger. He believes there is value in touching plants and trees, and being near them.

“We have evolved right alongside these species,” he said.

One of his topics at tomorrow’s lecture will be the Rebecca Middleton Nature Reserve off the Railway Trail in Paget, one of the island’s newest parks. It opened last September.

Some of the young cedar trees planted there came out of a Christmas tree rental fund-raising scheme the BNT launched two years ago. Mr Darrell planted most of them himself and knows exactly who donated each tree.

“These trees are like my babies,” he said.

For Mr Darrell, an environmental science teacher by training, the hardest thing is watching the environment degrade. He believes that climate change is not a future possibility but something happening now.

“Trying to get people to recognise that we are in the midst of this serious crisis is quite difficult,” he said. “I am also trying to address an even bigger issue which is biodiversity collapse.”

One of his inspirations is the late Stuart Hayward, founder of watchdog organisation the Bermuda Environmental and Sustainability Taskforce.

“When my grandmother saw the joy I found in nature, she put me right on to him,” Mr Darrell said. “She said, ‘this is someone you should look towards’.”

Mr Darrell said the advocacy and planting work Mr Hayward did was special.

His love for the outdoors stems from his childhood.

“I grew up in the 1970s and 1980s,” he said. “We didn’t have personal devices then. Most of my entertainment came from being outside in nature.”

As an adult, there is not much he does not enjoy doing outside.

“I like actively engaging in the environment,” he said. “I go for a walk when I need to talk, work some energy out, or get through something. Often, I will be walking down the Railway Trail, and spot a Mexican pepper seedling growing.”

He cannot help but stop and pluck it. Invasive species such as this one can rapidly take over green space, pushing out natives and endemics.

“I get stuck into this work wherever I am,” he said.

However, he is quick to say there are no “bad” trees.

He said: “Although some trees have traits and characteristics that have a negative impact on our human experiences, all the species of invasive trees that we have were brought here for a reason.”

Surinam cherry, for example, is a “phenomenally” invasive species that has become part of our cultural heritage.

“There are places where we can preserve and protect native and endemic culture,” he said. “There are also appropriate spaces to celebrate introductions of exotic species that have provided for our culture in different ways.”

One of his projects for this year is reimagining and developing Paget Marsh on Lovers Lane in Paget.

“We have also just completed a new conservation management plan for Spittal Pond,” he said. “That is going to transform that space. Of course, these projects take years.”

A big part of what he does is finding grant money to facilitate this work.

“Everything costs money,” he said. “We are also hoping to get a grant to move forward with an invertebrate study.”

Mr Darrell will speak tomorrow at 6.30pm in the Athene Lecture Theatre (H100) at the Bermuda College. The event is free. There will also be a livestream of the public forum on the Bermuda College YouTube and Facebook platforms.

• For more information on the Roche Science Public Forum, visit the Bermuda College News & Events page atwww.college.bm