You wonder how money motivates academia and the research community. Check this out.
A small school gets 5 million bucks to study climate change–what’ll you bet they find that climate change is real and dangerous too.
http://www.sfgate.com/news/science/article/UH-Hilo-wins-5M-grant-to-study-climate-change-5337482.php
After all studying the terrifying effects of warming is a pleasant exercise in Hawaii.
You’re as bad at economics as you are at biology. Where in Africa do you think you’re talking about? You do realize it’s an entire continent, right? That’s 56 nations you’re marginalizing (I count Somaliland). It’s surprising how often all of Africa is referenced when attempting an emotional appeal to an illogical argument. Did you know that 9% of the 200 richest cities in the world are in Africa? If memory serves, what you’re trying to convey is a misunderstanding of a poor defense of Keynesian social economics, not a discussion of a real town.
In your hypothetical African town, the charming little shops all offering essentially the same product are dooming themselves to failure. For one, to whom are they selling? If they’re all offering the same products then they must strive to undercut each other’s prices in order to get any business. On the other side of the supply chain, they’re all in competition for the same wholesale goods driving their own costs higher. I’m sure this phenomenon exists in some impoverished and poorly educated towns around the world, but you can’t honestly claim their economy is better off for it. Eventually some will go out of business unless they can find a better way to do business.
Which ever shop learns to improve their efficiency and diversify their products first, will soon gain the advantage. That’s where big, centralized businesses come from. Wal-Mart, for example, started as a single privately owned general store. It is now the biggest private employer in the world with over 2 million directly receiving pay from them. Do a bit of research into the cities in Africa that are thriving and compare them to the impoverished towns. Which ones have international fast food chains like McDonalds and KFC and general stores like Wal-Mart and Carrefour’s.
McDonald’s, by the way, offers a variety of salads on their menu. Besides, if you’re not in the mood for McDonalds, then there is a large variety of other restaurants that have yet to be pushed out of business because they adopted similar successful business practices and sought out an alternative niche to side-step direct competition. The fact is, larger successful business employ more people at higher wages than several small, inefficient companies that damage their own bottom lines by failing to adapt to a changing business environment.
You’re not the only person I’ve spoken to from the UK, but you are the only one that’s told me you’d like your country to be more like France in some way. If you want to spend your money at a small shop because you’ve deemed it arbitrarily better for some reason, again, it’s your money. If, on the other hand, you want the government to intervene to keep out larger business to protect the shops you’ve decided you like better, then you’re forcing other citizens to shop at a more expensive, less efficient stores with no real competition, and a limited range of products just to satisfy your own preferences. You’re basically saying that you’re willing to sacrifice the economic strength of your country just to protect your personal favorite business.
That being said, the analogy to invasive species holds fairly well. You’re saying you support government interference to halt the natural course of events at great expense to taxpayers just because you personally like the less suitable plants or animals better then the ones that are successfully adapting to their current environment, and in order to garner support for your cause you gin up alarm about invasive species completely eradicating all other species. That’s pure alarmist imagination with regards to species and business.
Gho5t
Mcdonalds is a great company but you do not want it eat it all the time, it is boring- diversity is the key for good health and i would support the little shop down the road that should have gone out of business years ago that sells me little salad.
In Africa in small towns/villages you will find lots of little shops all selling the same things, a comment was made how come someone does not set up a bigger shop and sell things possibly at a cheaper price, the conclusion was that in this environment it gave more families a chance to thrive and live in harmony. Of course this will change in time as Africa prospers but it will do it in its own time and a balance will evolve. To suddenly plonk down a supermarket will have two outcomes, one the food is cheaper and some get jobs, but the rest of the shops will die and possibly the heart of the town/ village will die We have seen this in the UK, In france this does happen in certain areas but across France they remain loyal to the local little shops and what joy it brings in its diversity and the little towns and villages are a delight, sometimes you have to fight to keep this little things.
That is the cry in the UK, why cannot we be like the French, most people do not have the time or inclination to live like the French but we all want it, we want the little shops back.
I personally like to keep a balance and would spend my money on protecting the smallest flower from being dominated.
There is a lot that government does that is intrusive in our lives, but dominant species control is not one that I would be calling for them to stop.
We seem to get a lot of encouragement and support from the government here in the UK for planting native species, anything to overturn previous mistakes that have been made.
You suspect there will be “knock on” effects. You do not know what they will be or whether they will be net positive or negative. This is the same as the “positive feedbacks” arguments that climate change alarmists use to make their pet cause sound more important than they appear. Your goal seems to be preserving sameness in a system of constant natural change. What is it you are afraid will happen if these efforts ceased?
So again, it’s just because you don’t want it. I’m not sure what you think you mean by “McDonald’s of flora and fauna”. Is there supposed to be a negative connotation to McDonald’s? Why do you not want it? What is the ultimate downside for humanity of letting nature take its course?
The securing of borders by Customs is to prevent the transport of illegal, dangerous, or diseased plants and animals. It’s not arbitrarily keeping out anything considered foreign. They let in non-indigenous species all the time provided the proper taxes have been paid. Perhaps, things are different in your country, but customs here is predominantly a tax collection and enforcement agency. A quick google search just got me HMRC’s website. It doesn’t seem to me that the effort being put into this cause is as great as you make it out to be.
Ghos5t the reason so much effort goes into protection is because we know there is a knock on effect, in some cases beneficial and others not. We have the ability to control or try to control borders to stop this happening..
After all we do not want to see a Mcdonalds of Flora and Fauna in one place.
Crops are selectively bred to provide the exact features farmers want. As a result of this millennia-long symbiotic relationship, the natural defense of a food crop is mankind. The same is true of livestock and pets. Cultivated and domesticated species are not the same thing as wild species. It’s a red herring. If we are going to put the same kind of effort into protecting some other species, there should be a similar tangible benefit to doing so.
You seem to be arguing from a gut feeling, or faith-based belief that biodiversity is important for its own sake. I don’t believe the “delicate balance”/ “fragile web of life” mythos. This may be the point where we simply agree to disagree. You say “biodiversity is key”, but key to what?
Conservationist and ecologist activists are fond of claiming that thousands of species go extinct each year (almost all our fault, of course). If that is true, supports my point that the world keeps right on spinning without them. Of course these alarming numbers are based on estimates based on assumptions. Any honest biologist would tell you that we don’t even know how many species there are, much less how many go extinct. This is confounded by the fact that the word “species” has no solid definition. Activists like to use the strictest definition possible so that they can claim an animal is endangered in one specific locale despite being relatively common in other parts of the world.
Honestly, if you really want to protect a species from extinction, show the world it tastes good. There used to be ranches in Texas that, for a hefty fee, would let you hunt rare, African ungulates. As a result, world population of these animals increased with no need for government subsidies or academic grants. Unfortunately, several of the less reasonable activists showed their stripes and declared they’d rather see the animal go extinct then be exploited by man.
http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/local_news/article/Hunting-ban-could-see-last-of-unicorns-3453819.php
No i think bio -diversity is key and we should we should try and keep the balance as best as we can. Weak does not mean we should allow it do die out.
After all farms spend fortunes on keeping weeds at bay in fields of any crop.
It would be natural for the species that is best suited to become dominant. There is no particular advantage to biodiversity if it means the costly protection of animals and plants that are no longer suited to their natural environment. The Diversity for diversity’s sake mentality leads to expending vast resources to protect weaker species in an endless fight against nature.
It doesn’t matter whether you blame climate change, introduced species, habitat loss, or any other panic du jour. In the end, you’re blaming humans for a natural process. Misanthropic activist do this to capitalize on guilt. They combine this guilt with the fear they gin up over the “fragile web of life” to convince common people that their pet project is important to humanity when they’re actual goal is to get people to go against humanity’s best interests for the sake of some local variant sub species of no particular benefit to mankind.
actually i probably don’t care that much, though it is good to have diversity rather then one dominant species and as long as supposed climate change is not blamed on species loss.
but we should be celebrating,
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/07/130708103521.htm
Increased levels of carbon dioxide (CO2) have helped boost green foliage across the world’s arid regions over the past 30 years through a process called CO2 fertilisation, according to CSIRO research.
In findings based on satellite observations, CSIRO, in collaboration with the Australian National University (ANU), found that this CO2 fertilisation correlated with an 11 per cent increase in foliage cover from 1982-2010 across parts of the arid areas studied in Australia, North America, the Middle East and Africa, according to CSIRO research scientist, Dr Randall Donohue.
“In Australia, our native vegetation is superbly adapted to surviving in arid environments and it consequently uses water very efficiently,” Dr Donohue said. “Australian vegetation seems quite sensitive to CO2 fertilisation.
This, along with the vast extents of arid landscapes, means Australia featured prominently in our results.”
You keep missing the point, decreased biodiversity is not inherently bad. It is a part of the continuously ongoing process of natural selection.
You’re falling for the “Noble Effort” fallacy, “The contemporary fallacy that something must be right, true, valuable, or worthy of credit simply because someone has put so much sincere good-faith, effort, or even sacrifice and bloodshed into it.”
I imagine the fact that you don’t spend money on something you don’t think is a problem is influenced by the fact that it’s your money. The National Park Authority and the National Trust are spending taxpayers’ money.
In the case of invasive species, too often the people who claim that it is a problem are the people being paid to deal with it. The situation is no different from the climate change alarmist, or the anti-fat activist, or any other savvy marketer who profits from the public concern they themselves generate.
Here’s what some quick research turns up about rhododendron ponticum,
“Fossil evidence shows it had a much wider range across most of southern and western Europe before the Late Glacial Maximum, or until about 20,000 years ago…It was introduced to Britain as an ornamental shrub in 1763, where it is now considered by some to be an invasive species.” Alice M. Coats, Garden Shrubs and Their Histories (1964) 1992, s.v. “Rhododendron”.
It seems possible that natural climate change is the only reason the species didn’t reach Wales thousands of years ago. Perhaps that’s why it’s so well suited to the area now that the temperatures are returning to pre-glaciation levels. It’s been in Britain for 250 years.
According to a BBC article rhododendrons were introduced to the Beddgelert area in the 1800s. It only seems to have become an important issue in the last thirty years because governments and academia began pumping money into organizations that push misanthropic agendas and place arbitrary value on the way things would be if humans hadn’t existed. If people weren’t being barraged with propoganda about how bad the rhododendron is, how many would even know that it isn’t indigenous? They’ve been a part of life in the area for nearly 200 years. No one alive remembers a time before rhododendrons. Do you honestly believe that if humans don’t intervene the rhododendrons will take over and all else will die? Why didn’t that happen for the last 100 years? Life finds its own balance and limitations without interference.
You say the rhododendron has negative impacts to wildlife, but the rhododendron is wildlife. Are you telling me that there is not one single animal or plant that has benefited from rhododendron? If that’s not what you’re saying, then why prioritize the species that rhododendron threatens over the species it benefits? If the plant is so toxic and dangerous, why are gardeners concerned about deer eating their shrubs? Why do they have to spray for insects? Look up any basic care manual and you’ll find a long list on invertebrates that have no trouble eating parts of the plant. Gardeners who grow rhododendrons spend their own money to prevent the plant from being attacked by invertebrates based on their own empirical observation. You also claim “Very few plants can survive under the dense shade.” So some plants can. Thus the rhododendron creates an environment favorable to the plants that prefer indirect sunlight and natural selection takes its course.
Even if everything claimed about rhododendron is true, it’s still the same argumentum ad nauseum that it’s bad because some other species is arbitrarily judged to be good. The real drain on the economy is the tax money being funneled to activist biologists who want to recreate the environment of the 1500s. It always starts with emotional talk of the poor endangered species, and ends with reduction of civil liberty and damage to industry. If it were really a high priority problem for everyone, the activists wouldn’t need to lobby for legislation that would force their opinions on everyone else.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/gardening/10686311/Gardeners-with-Rhododendrons-could-be-criminalised-by-new-EU-law.html
If you’re not supporting the eradication of every introduced species until you’ve recreated a pre-sailing environment, then whether or not a plant is nonindigenous is irrelevant. You’re just picking and choosing the ones you don’t like.
You still haven’t made an argument that doesn’t resort to the logical fallacies of Argumentum ad Miserecordiam (appeal to pity) and argumentum ad antiquitatem (appeal to antiquity). There is no reason to believe that the way things used to be hundreds of years ago is somehow automatically better. The emotional impact of the threat to some local subspecies is not a sound reason to expend resources to prevent its extinction at the cost of some other species with worse press. Honestly, if a species in Snowdonia went extinct, and no one told you, would you notice? At the end of the day, importance is a matter of opinion. If the eradication of some unfavored species is important to you, by all means, spend your time and money on it.
Invasive species can cause havoc.
Unfortunately, like always, government agencies use this as an excuse to grow bigger and to exert more control over the land and populace – which also causes havoc.
For example, a few years ago in my state, the government enviros dumped thousands of pounds of defoliants into a major river system to prevent “invasive” grasses from replacing the grasses the enviros liked.
First, the invasive grasses were from another part of the same state (not from Asia, etc) and secondly, imagine if you dumped a few ounces of defoliant into a stream, the feds and state EPA would ruin you for life.
Government enviros try to play God to control the environment. They aren’t and they can’t.
‘I merely object to the disingenuous assertion that it’s because you care more about nature rather than the fact that you just don’t want it in your back yard’
Everyone cares about their surroundings, my beef would be that climate change will be blamed for every species problem in Hawaii,
I think its more about ridding an area of a non native species that wipes out the native species, you have to weigh up what is beneficial and what is not.
as mentioned,
Rhododendron
In Snowdonia and other parts of the western British Isles, Rhododendron is a spectacularly invasive plant. From the bushes planted around a century ago in large gardens and as pheasant cover, it has spread to occupy over two thousand hectares in Snowdonia alone. This has very negative consequences for wildlife. The bushes which can grow to grow to 3m or more have dense evergreen foliage. Very few plants can survive under the dense shade and the existing native vegetation is largely eliminated. Rhododendron itself is a poor substitute. The foliage is poisonous to most invertebrates and mammals and so it does not support an extensive food chain.
In the last thirty years, a considerable amount of effort has gone into trying to get rid of Rhododendron. The National Park Authority, the National Trust and other conservation organisations and private landowners have all been involved.
I come from a farming family – land owner, though do not farm myself, farm is too small, we do not spend money or bother with what we perceive as a non problem.
Richard, there seems to be some confusion with the definition of your terms. You are blending invasive species, non-indigenous species, cultivated species, and domesticated species. If you would like to rein the conversation back in to the original points, my original point was simply that it’s not a massive problem. My objection is to the alarmist, even propagandist nature of the article you originally referenced.
If you ask the vague question “Can an invasive species cause problems?” then the answer is obviously yes, but the counter is the fact that indigenous species can cause the exact same problems so the species’ origins are irrelevant. The fact that so many of these species invaded over 100 years ago shows that it is not the change in species that has caused the problem, it is mankind’s changing preferences and needs. Whether or not we want to get rid of a species has nothing to do with how long it has been growing in the area. Claiming the species was “introduced” is just an excuse to do what we want anyway. I have no problem with exercising man’s dominion over the Earth, I merely object to the disingenuous assertion that it’s because you care more about nature rather than the fact that you just don’t want it in your back yard.
You ask whether I think non-native species affect native species. This is a tautological question. The statement is inherently true, but ultimately meaningless. That question is irrelevant because the word “affect” has no positive or negative connotation. All things affect all things. Native plants affect other native plants. In the complete absence of man, competing species will change ratios and ranges in response to weather, predation, or fires. Animals, water, and wind all can carry seeds for thousands of miles. For the majority of the maligned invasive species that mankind has spread, we were merely unwitting carriers, no more responsible than a dog with a bur in its fur. The process of spreading out into all available growing locations and competing for resources is natural. The fact that a newly arrived species can push out other species is proof that it is more suitable to that environment. If a species has existed without competition for a long time, then its suitability is untested. There is no reason to assume that an indigenous species is, for instance, more drought resistant merely because it is local. If a plant is highly drought resistant by virtue of having grown in an area prone to droughts, then wouldn’t it be beneficial to transplant that species to other areas where its resistance would help alleviate droughts?
Next you ask whether I think that climate change is blamed on endangering native species when in fact it is nonnative species that are to blame. This is the informal logical fallacy of the complex question. It is a false either/or constructed so that if I answer yes or no I have conceded one of your points. You are neglecting several other options with this construct. Even the use of the word blame implies that it is a bad thing that a species is endangered. If one species is less suited to survival for whatever reason, why should humans intervene? Again, there is no objective reason to value a “native” species over a “nonnative” species simply because of which one arrived first. Species endangerment or even loss is not inherently bad.
You then return to your red herring of cultivated species and drought resistance. Your insistence on comparing prairie grass to corn is the most confusing aspect of your argument. Prairie grass is not a food crop and corn is not an accidentally introduced pest species. In the Americas, corn is a native species. It was imported by other countries specifically because it grew better than the local crops they had available. You are comparing apples and oranges and using an imaginary apocalyptic drought scenario to add some value to prairie grasses while ignoring the real world droughts that have occurred in our country which prove you are wrong. Underground water supplies do not get “used up”. These are not isolated pockets of water that can be emptied, they are vast underground rivers. Annual variations in precipitation will affect the volume of flow over time, but when the rains or snows return the underground water is replenished. In fact, the biggest obstacle to constructing more robust water storage and delivery systems is the arbitrary value placed on biodiversity.
If your concern really is drought resistance, then, why not analyze the drought resistance, and environmental appropriateness of all species irrespective of their native status? If the native plants are better, then that is coincidence not cause. Placing a value on indigenous plants merely distracts from the real question of drought hardiness. Why do you think that prairie grass is obviously best? You never did get around to supporting that claim; you merely repeat it over and over again.
You close by expressing your opinion that a plant’s status as “native” is more important than its aesthetics. Why? You still cannot answer the first question I asked. Without an appeal to emotionalism, alarmism, or misanthropy, why is a more recently introduced species automatically bad compared to species which were introduced much earlier? Why is biodiversity important? Paleontology shows that millions of species have gone extinct over the millennia and the allegedly fragile web of life has not come undone yet. I can find no conclusive research which shows that a species has gone extinct as a direct result of another species going extinct. Extinction is merely an aspect of nature. It is neither good nor bad on its own. Whether or not a particular species has a positive or negative value to humans is independent of its origin.
so to keep us on track and i take the blame for wandering off after you posted this
“What’s the objective downside to introduced species displacing indigenous ones? ”
so two questions relating to my first comment before i answer yours –
1, Do you think non native species effects native species.
2. Do you think that climate change is blamed on endangering native species when in fact it is non native species that are to blame.
and now to answer your question.
“What’s the objective downside to introduced species displacing indigenous ones? ”
Short term maybe not much and regarding crops for food – beneficial, though in areas of potential droughts, after droughts, the soil erosion is something to consider and in the US as the underground water supplies are used up what is the future. I feel that can be answered by technology, after all the Romans were masters of movement of water 2000 years ago and If the Israel can green their desert and desalinate their sea water at a relatively cheap price i think anything is possible.
For plants that are bought in for aesthetic reasons that endanger native species, NO NO NO!!!!!!! don’t do it.
if you wish to talk about whether non native is better than native, this is a different argument.
I would say in Africa native is better as they withstand droughts and the plants are highly nutritious,
IN the US everything is fine until a drought where obviously prairie grass would be best, and if prairie grass then breeding bison would be best!!! Bison only grazer the top party of the plant, in fact cattle brought in from Europe was a problem as they grazed the whole plant.
I believe there is talk about putting vast swathes of land back to prairie grass.
In the US they have no alternative to growing corn etc to feed a massive population though use of corn for fuel is not such a good idea.
So basically we are talking about areas of land for growing non native and apart from huge areas ploughed up these crops do not effect the flora and fauna of any country, they do not spread uncontrollably, they are harvested to feed.
you may find this interesting, sometimes its best to go back to basics, we can forget that our own home grown species is best – oh and survives droughts.
http://www.worldwatch.org/system/files/NtP-Africa's-Indigenous-Crops.pdf
Gho5t
my comment was
“the massive problem in the USA , HAwaii, Africa etc is invasion from non indigenous species, bit of course they will blame endangered species on climate change”
the thrust is “are endangered species effected by non native species”
and wether the blame will be put on climate change
yes or no?
it is not about whether you think non native is better or worse or what flowers you think are lovely.
get it!
“Do you support preventing people from having access to plentiful, cheap food that grows with no human intervention?
NO! as i said above in these two comments
-Of course some plants are beneficial in the US like corn
and
– In Africa they have their own drought resistant, nutritional plants , these were pushed aside with colonialism , once again everything is fine until a drought which will wipe out the non-indigenous plants but the african species AT LEAST have the chance to survive and feed the ever growing population of Africa.
as you can see Native can be better and cheaper.
I am not sure it is really about what you like as a preference, what flowers you like or don’t like or whether you think it is a problem, obviously others agree with me and non native species are now see as pests to be destroyed as they effect the native species,
“How can destroying that plant so that a weaker, often less useful plant can grow be more natural?
I said at the top the biggest problem in Hawaii was how non native species effects other species, this statement is true, please don’t bang on about how non native plants are fine etc, that was not the point i was making.
In the end this is what happens.
http://marinebio.org/oceans/alien-species.asp
The introduction of non-native species to an ecosystem is one of the major causes of decreased biodiversity
No, I think the money spent on non native species is largely wasted as I’ve already said. Besides, it’s really not that much in the grand scheme of things. The numbers you keep quoting are grossly exaggerated and include many costs that would have to be paid anyway. They are an investment into a business. Private businesses specifically. Why should the public be asked to kick in to stop the threat of invasive species, when the industries they affect are still profitable?
It really comes down to a matter of preference. I don’t have a problem with cutting down a plant just because you don’t like the look of it, or because you would prefer another plant. I really don’t have a problem with eliminating less useful plants so that you can grow useful ones. I simply object to using the amount of time a plant has been in the area as an excuse and then claiming it’s a public problem that needs to be supported with public funds.
Did you know that, in addition to being beautiful, Japanese knotweed is edible? It’s reportedly very tasty. It was introduced to GB before 1825. 150 years later the government suddenly wants to waste taxpayer pounds trying to eradicate it.
Another invasive species, dandelion, was an essential food source for many families here during the great depression. It seems a lot of so-called invasive species would be a great source of food if they weren’t being chopped down, or sprayed with dangerous chemicals by the state. The same is true of kudzu here in the south east USA. You complain about not using local plants for agriculture. Do you support preventing people from having access to plentiful, cheap food that grows with no human intervention? How can destroying that plant so that a weaker, often less useful plant can grow be more natural?
The invasive species excuse is also used to violate private property rights here in the states. This essay ( https://agrilife.org/texnatwildlife/feral-hogs/economics-and-human-interactions-of-the-wild-hog-in-texas/ ) for example, is decrying the fact that landowners can profit from feral hogs because Texas considers them livestock rather than pests. This prevents state agencies from exerting their authority to “manage” them. As a side note, the average feral hog has about 150 pounds off meat. That’s a good value for the price of a bullet. The easy availability of cheap food for people is rarely considered when figuring the economic impact of invasive species.
I just cannot understand your reasoning on the giant knotweed,
Do you know how fast it grows, you really do no want this on your property, a tree can be cut down , weeds can be sprayed , the knotweed is a rather large problem.
To be honest the fact that so much money and effort goes into destroying non native species and keeping non native species out of any country rather proves my point don’t you think.
Clearly any attempt to speak with you on a logical level are indeed meaningless if the best you can come up with is a poor excuse for why the UK should be spending vast amounts of money to exterminate the beautiful rhododendron. As for the Japanese Knotweed, it’s apparently dangerous because “The invasive root system and strong growth can damage concrete foundations, buildings, flood defenses, roads, paving, retaining walls and architectural sites.”, but isn’t that true of every tree?
The fact that you have agreed with something I’ve said does not mean that I now have to agree with anything you say until you say something accurate. you’re still laboring under the false impression that corn is an introduced species. I’d grant you domesticated, but even then your arguments are the same. You keep saying that some species are bad simply because they win out over other species that have been in the area longer. The fact that most of your examples have been “invasive” for over a hundred years proves my point. It’s not that big a problem.
“Transforming ecosystems” is not inherently a bad thing. Damage to crops is not unique to non native species and thus is meaningless; farmers would still be required to use herbicides and pesticides either way. Increasing trade is unlikely to dramatically increase the number of introduced species because there are few untouched areas left. The fact that modern customs acts to prevent further spread is supportive of my point. Mitigation is not particularly difficult or costly and nothing special or new needs to be done. The fact that you don’t want a particular species on your island doesn’t prove that that species is a net negative. The hazards of introduced species have been overblown and the benefits ignored.
You ask what I would suggest. I suggest nothing other than eliminating the funding of the fear mongering, misanthropic organizations that call for the mass extermination of a species just because they like a different one better or they want us to return to the ecology of the 1500s. The majority of money spent of dealing with invasive species such as the rhododendron is wasted. If the point is to reduce the population of a species humans don’t like in favor of one we do, then by all means. I support that. I have no problems killing snakehead fish to help the spread of fish humans can eat, but don’t try to ameliorate the guilt associated with mass extermination by pretending its somehow more “natural”. The dangers of introduced species is nothing more than an attempt to get around the furor classic environmentalists and conservationists would express if you just announced that you wanted to curtail the spread of a species through mass extermination.
So what would you suggest? Spending even more money, time, and effort in a vain attempt to keep life from doing what it has been doing since life began? What date would you choose for considering a species to be indigenous? 1800, 1700? How long does an animal or plant have to have been in a location to be considered natural? The fact that international trade is what gets implicated (and therefor subjected to protectionist taxation) further raises my suspicions about the motivation behind ginning up fear concerning species migration.
Still Gho5t what would you suggest , is there a problem or not a problem.
do we need to keep a control on what species enters each country?
i would rather not see the Colarado beetle back in the UK, not a plant but part of the same problem – non native species.
HM Customs and Excise
Responsible for enforcing border controls on quarantine species and species restricted
under the EC Wildlife Trade Regulation.
Gho5t
I agreed on certain points
“Of course some plants are beneficial in the US like corn”
now you have to agree that they are also damaging.
you may want to read what DEFRA have to say,
http://archive.defra.gov.uk/wildlife-pets/wildlife/management/non-native/documents/review-report.pdf
The impacts of non-native species can be serious; they can transform ecosystems,
damage crops, alter natural habitats and threaten native biodiversity. Non-native
species also can bring considerable benefits in terms of both economic gains and
quality of life. Although current problems with non-native species are caused by a
relatively small percentage of those that have been introduced, the continued increase
of global trade and travel is likely to increase the threat posed by non-native species to
the UK’s economic and ecological interests.
oh Ghos5t
it was a great read but meaningless .
Let’s put it in a nutshell, we have one plant here in the Uk that should not be here and it is expensive to get rid of, this beautifully illustrates the problem of invasive species,
The japanese knotweed.
“Spare a thought for the Olympic site in East London, where the RHS (opens in a new window) reports the cost of removing and disposing of Japanese knotweed to be estimated at £70 million’
and the following,
your call, keep it or get rid of it,
http://www.eryri-npa.gov.uk/the-environment/invasive-species/rhododendron
You’re jumping around a lot so I’ll attempt to address all of your points in one place. I informed you that the link was broken because it did not occur to me that you would attempt to send the same link twice despite the fact that it clearly did not convince me the first time. I’ll address its shortcomings in a moment.
You keep committing the logical fallacy of argument ad nauseum. That is, you are saying the same thing over and over, even sending links to the same paper apparently. Let’s look at that paper for a moment. It’s certainly breathlessly alarming with loads of cites to other sources; however it mostly cites the conclusions and opinions rather than the data. This means I have to locate and judge each of these cited sources in addition to the article in question. It’s also full of soft terms such as “estimated” which appears 28 times, and “approximately” which appears 40 times. This gives me the impression that the author didn’t place much value on precision.
Throughout the article the authors admittedly selected the highest and most alarming estimates and included numerous species that other authorities clearly didn’t believe should be counted. This is expressly stated in the passage “Our study reveals that economic damages associated with non-indigenous species effects and their control amount to approximately $138 billion/yr. The Office of Technology Assessment (OTA 1993) reported average costs of $1.1 billion/yr ($97 billion over 85 years) for 79 species. The reason for our higher estimate is that we included more than 10 times the number of species in our assessment and found higher costs reported in the literature than OTA (1993) for some of the same species. For example, for the zebra mussel, OTA reported damages and control costs of slightly more that $300, 000 per year; we used an estimate of $5 billion/yr (Khalanski 1997).” That’s a more than 1,666,567% increase in the cost “estimate” of zebra mollusks alone. This doesn’t leave me with much confidence concerning their final total.
Let’s delve a bit deeper, the article claims “The problem of introduced plants is especially significant in Hawaii. Hawaii has a total of 2690 plant species, 946 of which are non-indigenous species (Eldredge and Miller 1997). About 800 native species are currently endangered.” The word “significant” here has no objective meaning. The two statements concerning the number of introduced species and the number of endangered species are placed side by side as though to give the impression of relation without actually showing a direct connection. There is no logical proof that those 800 native species would not be endangered were it not for the 946 introduced species. This is still ignoring my first question of how they determine that an animal was not introduced. This is a classic example of Post Hoc logical fallacy
Then there’s the aforementioned sage brush fires. This one took a while to track down. The source cited is not the original source for the numbers given. I found the original source 4 layers in with “Fire Ecology: United States and Southern Canada” (Wright and Bailey 1982). The article which led directly to this source used the much less certain phrasing “may have been as low as 100 years”. The original source is an entire book, so forgive me for merely skimming before passing cursory judgment. Suffice it to say that the author of the article in question passed up several much less dramatic numbers to choose the largest possible time between fires rather than the several more reasonable assumptions. Even then, the only express damage caused by the more frequent fires is the inability of older species to compete with newer ones.
We then move to the 138 (estimated) non-indigenous trees. The only real claim against them is that “it damages the natural vegetation and wildlife”, again arbitrarily siding with species that were established longer ago.
The topic of exotic aquatic plants is a bit better; they managed to find 2 lakes in Florida where management required “estimated (there’s that word again) $10 million in recreational losses in the lakes annually. But that isn’t really about introduced species vs. established species, that’s about species people like to fish for vs. species they don’t. Lake management and fish stocking for recreational purposes would be required whether these introduced species were around or not. That $10 million is meaningless without comparison to the costs that would have been incurred dealing with the species that the introduced species displaced. It also ignores the fact that fishing is a $5 billion dollar industry in Florida making that $10 million look rather small by comparison.
The article goes on to include agricultural damage done by mice and rats as though no species of rodent which was extant in North America prior to European settlement would have caused the exact same problems. It includes treatment for dog bites in its “estimated” cost of dealing with non-indigenous species. It claims feral cats are a danger to indigenous birds as though there were no predators of these birds prior to the introduction of domestic cats.
The article goes on making the same mistake over and over again. They calculate any cost however tangentially related to an introduced species and compare it to 0 as though there would be no equivalent cost dealing with the non-indigenous species they are claiming the introduced species have displaced. The majority of the costs they claim are merely the costs of saving a less suitable species simply because they have arbitrarily decided that older is better. In order to come up with a large, scary number they have gone back several hundreds of years to claim that a species was introduced while ignoring the fact that if they went back even longer then the victim species were also introduced from some other area. How long ago species were introduced is largely glossed over to give an overall impression that this is an ongoing problem despite the fact that most alien species introductions occurred when sailing ships were the most advanced form of transportation. Are the authors really advocating expending resources trying to return the word to the way it was 300 years ago?
Corn was already domesticated and used in agriculture across the great plains when it was introduced to Europeans by the indigenous people of North America. By lumping domesticated species in with introduced species they can claim any farm or pasture land as affected ecosystem, but they simultaneously claim the impact on the unnatural land and introduced species caused by other introduced species. This double counting greatly inflates their final tally.
I’m done critiquing your cited article. If you still think it has any validity, then I can’t convince you otherwise.
As far as drought and the causes of the dustbowl, you are ignoring the advances in drought hardy crops as well as advances in farming techniques and irrigation that have occurred since the 30s. You’re also comparing a food crop to a nonfood crop. What difference does drought hardiness make if you can’t feed 7 billion people with it? This is why the discussion of corn and other agricultural species is the most laughable aspect of the anti-introduced species argument. The article you cited claimed that “Introduced species, such as corn, wheat, rice, and other food crops, and cattle, poultry, and other livestock, now provide more than 98% of the U.S. food system at a value of approximately $800 billion per year”. That statement alone shows that the value of introduced species is greater than the cost by this article’s own admittedly overblown estimates. The reason many of these “invasive” species were cultivated was specifically their drought resistance. As a side note, the USA is the number one exporter of drought resistant seed. Other countries which suffer drought more frequently would benefit greatly from introducing these species.
In the end, even your best over estimate of 1.4 Trillion dollars globally does not qualify the alarmist assertion that introduced species are a “massive problem”. On balance, the benefits of introduced species through history have greatly outweighed the cost. The few species which do cost humanity more than their benefits are worth do not require mitigation costs that are significantly different from the mitigation costs of the species whose biological niche they have taken. All other claims of the cost of invasive species are based on the emotional premise that biodiversity is important in and of itself. The costs of invasive species would be greatly reduced if governments and individuals abandoned this philosophy and stopped wasting their money attempting to save species that are less suitable to their environment and granting large sums to activist research groups such as the one that produced the paper you linked to.
Natural flora and fauna change constantly over time. Cheatgrass is also natural. Why should more value be placed on plants that spread their seeds by birds or other animals than is put on plants that spread their seeds by man? The Whisenant study also places an arbitrary value on one set of species over another. The predominant danger the he claims of the more frequent fires is to the prevention of sagebrush repopulation. This is part of how cheatgrass ensures its own dominance in an ecosystem. The fact that cheat grass is more tolerant of grazing makes it more useful to the cattle ranchers of the area and it is argued that its proliferation is in part responsible for the areas continued suitability to that purpose http://www.icbemp.gov/science/pellant.pdf
GHO5T
with the way the word is with travel – species travel as well, but the cost is huge.
Globally, $1.4 trillion dollars is spent on invasive species each year: This is nearly 5 percent of the global economy.
http://www.prairiefirenewspaper.com/2010/05/invasive-species
i think you have to ask when did corn reach the US and when did it start replacing prairie grass on a massive scale, small scale would never be a problem but when you are talking about vast areas in a drought , well you reach dust bowl scenario.
I think use of Corn and other species is important, the problem comes with droughts.
In Africa they have their own drought resistant, nutritional plants , these were pushed aside with colonialism , once again everything is fine until a drought which will wipe out the non-indigenous plants but the african species at least have the chance to survive and feed the ever growing population of Africa.
In round numbers, U.S. farmers produce about $ 143 billion worth of crops
VS
“Still, until I actually read the report, I’ll reserve judgment on the“$138 billion a year” claim other than to say that’s not really a large number given annual US GDP, less than 1%. I still don’t see this being a “massive problem”.
I would say not insignificant.
GHO5t
the top link worked, the second dod not,
http://www.grida.no/geo/GEO/Geo-2-084.htm
which is a bit irritating as you commented without reading the report in your first comments!
.I get a 404 error when I click on your link, but I note that it is an activist NGO working “in collaboration with” the United Nations Environmental program, so my first instinct is to doubt their objectivity. Still, until I actually read the report, I’ll reserve judgment on the“$138 billion a year” claim other than to say that’s not really a large number given annual US GDP, less than 1%. I still don’t see this being a “massive problem”.
Again, the numbers are subjective. What good would prairie grass do us compared to corn? Erosion is an easily mitigated non-problem. We deliberately move more soil and sand around to make the environment what we want it to be then we lose to erosion. Also, I’m a bit confused about classifying corn as introduced as it was domesticated by indigenous Mesoamericans in prehistoric times.
There’s still no reason to classify one species objectively better than another. Why is the fact that rabbits have supplanted other species a problem for Australia? You say they cause species loss, but why is species loss assumed to be objectively bad? How are invasive species causing problems in water sources that demonstrably would not be caused by non-invasive species? All of Africa is a fairly large place. In most places water management by man is increasing availability. Is the loss of availability caused by invasive species greater?
blamed on climate change – increase in fires, but
“Similarly, European cheatgrass (Bromus tectorum) is dramatically changing the vegetation and fauna of many natural ecosystems. This annual grass has invaded and spread throughout the shrub-steppe habitat of the Great Basin in Idaho and Utah, predisposing the invaded habitat to fires (Kurdila 1995; Vitousek et al. 1996; Vitousek et al. 1997). Before the invasion of cheatgrass, fire burned once every 60 – 110 years, and shrubs had a chance to become well established. Now, fires occur about every 3 – 5 years; shrubs and other vegetation are diminished, and competitive monocultures of cheatgrass now exist on 5 million ha in Idaho and Utah (Whisenant 1990). The animals dependent on the shrubs and other original vegetation have been reduced or eliminated”
GHo5T
Environmental and Economic Costs Associated with Non-Indigenous
http://www.grida.no/geo/GEO/Geo-2-084.htm
by D Pimentel – Related articles
Invading non-indigenous species in the United States cause major environmental damages and losses adding up to more than $138 billion per year.
Of course some plants are beneficial in the US like corn, trouble is it has replaced prairie grass, the downside is once a drought happens, the Prairie grass is drought tolerant with deep roots that hold the soil together, the corn does not so you will get soil erosion. The US has been fairly lucky so far regarding droughts but what happens when the 100- 150 year droughts come back, which judging from the ones that have happened over the last 2000 years must surely happen again.
and if not plants then Animals, In Australia in the 19th century Rabbits were introduced they are reckoned to be the biggest cause of species loss.
In Africa non-indigenous species plays havoc with water supplies,
While I’m not questioning the numbers you’ve posted, I do question the phrase “massive problem”. What’s the objective downside to introduced species displacing indigenous ones? Without assigning an arbitrary, emotional value on the indigenous species or an arbitrary negative value on anthropogenic forces, how can we calculate a net-negative impact of letting darwinism take its course?
Besides, since Hawaii is an island chain, aren’t all species technically “introduced”? How long does a species have to stay around to earn its indigenous status?
the massive problem in the USA , HAwaii, Africa etc is invasion from non indigenous species, bit of course they will blame endangered species on climate change.
http://www.grida.no/geo/GEO/Geo-2-084.htm
“The problem of introduced plants is especially significant in Hawaii. Hawaii has a total of 2690 plant species, 946 of which are non-indigenous species (Eldredge and Miller 1997). About 800 native species are currently endangered (Vitousek 1988)”
That’s a hell of a lot of overhead, especially considering most actual research is performed by grad students that are paying the college $417 a credit hour for the privilege.
$5 or $10 million for one word: “may” Expensive word. Yet people keep paying for it.
Actually, they got the $5 million more, ralph. The original grant was for $5 million in 2009, this was a grant renewal, so, it’s $10 million. Typically, the school gets 40%-50% for overhead and the researchers get the rest.
Isn’t $10 million about half what the sceptics are supposed to have gotten in total from BIG OIL? This went to one school.
Give us $5 million more and we’ll tell you even more scary stuff.