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Hi Fred & All, Nov 7, 2010
I would not wish to be branded as one who cheers on any and all species
new to the region,
START OF DIGRESSION: e.g. some years ago when Gypsy Moth was reaching
alarming numbers locally I put considerable time into learning how to kill
GM eggs and getting the Town & School involved in a program to kill egg
masses by swabbing them with dilute Pinesol. We covered a lot of ground but
ran out of time before we ran out of eggs and there was extensive Oak
defoliation in some areas. By good fortune, natural (?) forces did the job
in full. Some disease moved in shortly before pupation would have started
and clobbered Gypsy Moth in the Kentville area. I never did learn what
disease this was and/or if some human agency had a hand in getting it
started.
END OF DIGRESSION
but even if all introduced/adventive species were allowed to slug it out
with the locals, one would never reach this "...single cosmopolitan biota
..." to which you refer.
Following Jenny (1980), an ecosystem is a function of initial state
[parent material, topography], influx [ climate, biotic...] and time. A
single biota might eventually be reached for each unique combination of
initial state, influx and time element perhaps, provided climate were
relatively stable but we are warned that it will not be stable.
I suspect that biotic changes due to rapid climatic change will far
exceed any disruption that will be caused entirely by alien species.
Yt, Dave Webster, Kentville
----- Original Message -----
From: "Frederick W. Schueler" <bckcdb@istar.ca>
To: <naturens@chebucto.ns.ca>
Sent: Monday, November 01, 2010 8:26 PM
Subject: Re: [NatureNS]Invasive aliens: was re unauthorized vs. OK plants
lists
> On 11/1/2010 7:18 PM, Lois Codling wrote:
>> Hey all you evolutionists out there, why are you trying to prevent
>> 'natural selection' and 'survival of the fittest'?
>
> * one of the goals of invasive species biology is to give evolution the
> time and opportunity to act - both by native species adapting to the
> invaders, and herbivores (or "natural enemies") adapting to exploiting
> the invaders. Of course, if one doesn't believe in promoting the
> preservation of biogeographic integrity, one could also cheer on the
> adaptation of the invaders to their new environment, and the progress
> towards a single cosmopolitan biota that they represent.
>
> fred.
> ===================================================
>>
>> Lois & Don Codling
>>
>> On 31/10/2010 11:49 PM, Frederick W. Schueler wrote:
>>> David & Alison Webster wrote:
>>>
>>>> Executive summary:
>>>> I can not think of one non-native plant that has caused a serious
>>>> problem in Eastern Canada. Some, for a few years, may locally
>>>> overwhelm native plants. But sometimes native plants overwhelm other
>>>> native plants.
>>>
>>> * there's a lot of good points here, but I think the questions
>>> relevant to the executive summary are "how far west does eastern
>>> Canada extend," and "what constitutes a problem."
>>>
>>> If Toronto is allowed to be part of "eastern Canada," then between
>>> European Phragmites, Norway Maple, Goutweed, Dog-strangling vine,
>>> Flowering Rush, Pink Jewelweed, Buckthorns, Narrowleaf Cattail, Garlic
>>> Mustard, and a host of other alien plants, there's not much doubt that
>>> even forests and other "natural" habitats have had their native
>>> species considerably diluted, and one can't say how much truer this
>>> would be if Purple Loosestrife and Saint Johnswort hadn't been knocked
>>> out by biological controls. I described the alienness of the Toronto
>>> area in
>>> http://groups.google.com/group/naturelist/msg/661b4fcb53862d34?hl=en.
>>>
>>> When I commented to Bev Wigney this summer about the relatively native
>>> vegetation in Nova Scotia, she promptly reminded me of a lot of alien
>>> species that were all over the place, but that weren't on my Ontario
>>> alarm list (her homesite is equally divided among two alien species of
>>> Cherries and Black Locust, with wide patches of Goutweed, Dame's
>>> Rocket in the woods, and Celandine scarce only because she'd been
>>> pulling it all summer)
>>> http://karstaddailypaintings.blogspot.com/2010/09/old-black-locust.html#more
>>>
>>> There's three kinds of problem that alien plants can cause, first is
>>> the direct squeezing out of native species of plants by competition.
>>> The second is the redirection of the photosynthate they produce into
>>> their own growth and away from Insect herbivores, and direct
>>> attributes of the native species that might otherwise feed or benefit
>>> native animals.
>>>
>>> The third is more abstract: the dilution of the biogeographic
>>> integrity of the biota. If one accepts maintaining as much as possible
>>> of the biogeographic differences among places as a proper goal of
>>> People who live on the Earth, then the dilution of native species is
>>> an absolute harm that's done by all alien species, including
>>> ourselves, against which any human action that may introduce new
>>> species must be balanced. But of course biogeographic integrity is not
>>> a widely endorsed as a motivation, and its maintenance is derided as
>>> an overt motivation even by some invasive species biologists.
>>>
>>> The thing about invasive species is that they're such magnificent
>>> Plants that struggling against them in an open-minded way teaches the
>>> clear lesson of the importance of loving your enemies.
>>>
>>> fred schueler.
>>> ============================================================
>
> --
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> Frederick W. Schueler & Aleta Karstad
> Bishops Mills Natural History Centre - http://pinicola.ca/bmnhc.htm
> now in the field on the Thirty Years Later Expedition -
> http://fragileinheritance.org/projects/thirty/thirtyintro.htm
> Daily Paintings - http://karstaddailypaintings.blogspot.com/
> RR#2 Bishops Mills, Ontario, Canada K0G 1T0
> on the Smiths Falls Limestone Plain 44* 52'N 75* 42'W
> (613)258-3107 <bckcdb at istar.ca> http://pinicola.ca/
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> ------------------------------------------------------------
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