Kelly and Forum:
(Please forgive me for changing the lead on the subject line--this will get
lost in the thousands of archived ecologs if I don't)
The crucial pivot-point in conservation and restoration ecology policy
decisions probably should be somewhere around the causal factors of the
potential extinction in question. If, for example, the Chinese turtles in your
example, were "driven" to the brink of extinction by "apes gone wild," er,
"civilized," there is, I submit, a moral imperative to pull it back, to atone
for our sin against Nature, by God. Much better this than wasting the resources
needed for such atonement on species which have declined because they are
adapted to an age, habitat conditions, tolerance limits, and needs gone by as
the earth changes due to forces far beyond the anthropomorphic.
"Preservation" does not, it seems to me, to apply to individual species, and
certainly not their "enzooment." Adjusting our habits to habitat requirements
of whole ecosystems and ecosystem subsets, however, is a much more efficient
way of clawing our way back up the slippery slope muddied by excess, onto more
and more solid ground. Still, there are instances, even with "enzooment," where
mere captivity of curiosities morphs into compensatory restoration, as in, so
far, at least, the encouraging case of the California condor. Whoop, whoop,
HOORAY! Ladies and gentlemen, start your ultra-light engines, and soar, soar,
SOAR!
So what if they are charismatic--they serve as surrogates for my favorite
organisms, should they ever be in need of our protection (thank the God of it
all they don't NEED it), the cyanobacteria. Or DO they need it? Naw, I think we
need THEIR protection.
I remember when I tried to save a big patch of cryptobiotic soil crust from a
parking lot and "lawn." I was laughed out of the office. But that didn't stop
me.
And, at long last, but not least, there are the lessons to be learned about
ecosystems, even--especially--from our errers.
WT
- Original Message -
From: "Kelly Stettner"
To:
Sent: Monday, June 15, 2009 11:24 AM
Subject: [ECOLOG-L] Nonequilibrium ecology book suggestions & ecology outside
the conservation paradigm
Dear fellow ECOLOGgers,
I've gotten one book suggestion and one dialogue response to my query about
nonequilibrium ecology and the conservation/preservation topic. Perhaps it
would help if I jump-started the conversation with some "cut-and-paste" magic.
Here is some of the interesting dialogue I've enjoyed with someone from this
list:
Me: Conserving a species for its own sake flies in the face of what we've come
to understand about ecology, that populations emerge, rise, fall, affect other
species and populations, move, emigrate, adapt, and sometimes become extinct.
But others develop, hybridize, adapt, and become part of this enormous living
soup we call Earth. It's not that we humans should just go ahead and do
whatever we wish to the planet. To me, the issue is that we should understand
that the way the world works and respect that, as nature changes, so will our
comprehension of its relationships and dynamics.
Response: “Unfortunately, we don't have perfect knowledge of how all individual
species fit into the whole, or of how much of a species' fall might be due to
humans, so we tend to assume that we have significantly impacted a species &
that it's important in the ecosystem & therefore figure that we better try to
save it.”
Me: Another question, about the importance of a species: If there are very few
of a particular species, say a type of Chinese turtle, for example, at what
point does that species no longer have a significant or even relevant impact on
its environment? There was a news article some weeks (months?) ago about some
zoo in China (I think it was China!) that housed two aging male turtles of some
sort. A female of the same species was discovered at another zoo, and the trio
was reunited. There was all this talk about "bringing the species back from the
brink of extinction..." but I have to ask: to what purpose? With only 3
individuals left in the world, are we preserving them out of nostalgia or
guilt? Being in captivity, they obviously no longer hold any sort of "niche" in
any ecosystem, and would reviving the species and releasing them into the wild
disturb, perturb or damage said ecosystem? Do we do more harm than good when we
take on this role
of "savior?"
Response: “I think nostalgia & guilt are big motivators. I also wonder about
brink of extinction restorations, especially when they involve employing other
species (like whooping & sandhill cranes), and restoring individuals of mixed
or different genetics (like peregrine falcons - this one is even more complex -
"