Cause and Effect

I spend a lot of time reading articles on conservation {environment and wildlife wise) and I have discovered something. Our Conservation efforts have a giant flaw to them.

As a "species" able to change our environment to fit our needs, we still haven't been able to do so without affecting everything around us. If you know anything about wildlife... it is balanced. Every living thing helps to keep every other living thing in check. The ratio of prey to predators is balanced, disease among species is balanced... even the distribution of resources is balanced. We over-fish, over-farm, destroy habitat, pollute our environment and take out species like they will always be around or "our impact doesn't affect as much as some people think it does".

Our rain-forests provide the earth with an abundant amount of rain/oxygen to breathe. With the destruction of this ever so important habitat, there will be world-wide droughts and a lower amount of oxygen.

The coral-reefs filtered out carbon basically cleaning out air. With pollution and the depletion of the organisms and animals needed to sustain this ecosystem, it has no chance of surviving.

Most of the big fish populations has decreased about 80% in just 20 years. Some shark species are threaten which help keep fish (as well as seal) populations strong and in check eliminating the weak. Several species such as the swordfish have shrank in size due to fishing them so often not even giving them a chance to reach full adulthood.

With more and more species discovered each day, it makes one wonder how many go extinct and we don't even know about them.

To show just how important every species of plant and animal is important here's an example.

In Yellowstone national park... there is a tree that produces pine nuts. They are about 50% fat so packing on weight for the winter would be easily done. A tree squirrel spends the day collecting seeds which fall to the ground. A family of bear comes along and eats the seeds already taken from the pine cones. In turn the bear and her young can survive the winter months. The birds that also feast on them help spread them around so more trees can grow. Also with the wolves population back there, the moose population is controlled leaving more food for beavers that help change the water ways which create marshlands and create new habitat.

Everything is connected so when one plant or animal gets eliminated, a whole ecosystem could collapse.

The change we need to make need to ensure that we not only make life better for us but also protect the ecosystems around us. We have a habit to deplete a species almost to extinction and then make efforts to bring back the population only to deplete their numbers again. This way of doing things only makes thing unstable.

When we brought back bald eagle populations... there is question as to populations on the California coast could prove to do more harm than good. Their food sources had been decreased greatly which could lead to them feasting on remains of fish which may still be laced with the chemical DDT which almost eradicated them in the first place.

So if we don't change some of our habits soon, the very species we try to protect and save time and time again could be gone forever... just like the many species that have already succumb to this.