From feral camels to ‘cocaine hippos’, large animals are rewilding the world

[Techno-Druid]

https://theconversation.com/from-fer...he-world-83301

Throughout history, humans have taken plants and animals with them as they travelled the world. Those that survived the journey to establish populations in the diaspora have found new opportunities as they integrate into new ecosystems.

These immigrant populations have come to be regarded as “invaders” and “aliens” that threaten pristine nature. But for many species, migration may just be a way to survive the global extinction crisis.

In our recently published study, we found that one of the Earth’s most imperilled group of species is hanging on in part thanks to introduced populations.

Megafauna - plant-eating terrestrial mammals weighing more than 100kg - have established in new and unexpected places. These “feral” populations are rewilding the world with unique and fascinating ecological functions that had been lost for thousands of years.

Today’s world of giants is only a shadow of its former glory. Around 50,000 years ago, giant kangaroos, rhino-like diprotodons, and other unimaginable animals were lost from Australia.

Later, around 12,000 years ago, the last of the mammoths, glyptodonts, several species of horses and camels, house-sized ground sloths and other great beasts vanished from North America.

In New Zealand, a mere 800 years ago, a riot of giant flightless birds still grazed and browsed the landscape.

The loss of Earth’s largest terrestrial animals at the end of the Pleistocene was most likely caused by humans.

Sadly, even those large beasts that survived that collapse are now being lost, with 60% of today’s megafauna threatened with extinction. This threat is leading to international calls for urgent intervention to save the last of Earth’s giants.

A wilder world than we think

Formal conservation distribution maps show that much of Earth is empty of megafauna. But this is only a part of the picture.

Many megafauna are now found outside their historic native ranges. In fact, thanks to introduced populations, regional megafauna species richness is substantially higher today than at any other time during the past 10,000 years

It's an interesting take on introduced and invasive species. I'm not entirely with the idea of introducing species that are potentially destructive to an ecosystem. I believe species introductions should be reserved for species that were once present or a rough ecological proxy like bringing beavers and lynxes back to the British Isles.

If a non-native species does establish itself and isn't really negatively impacting the environment though, I don't think it would be right to focus on exterminating it when there are invasive species that do actively threaten the environment.
@Connal @Theodarzna @Yvaelle

[Thoughtful Trolli]

It's an interesting take on introduced and invasive species. I'm not entirely with the idea of introducing species that are potentially destructive to an ecosystem. I believe species introductions should be reserved for species that were once present or a rough ecological proxy like bringing beavers and lynxes back to the British Isles.

If a non-native species does establish itself and isn't really negatively impacting the environment though, I don't think it would be right to focus on exterminating it when there are invasive species that do actively threaten the environment.

Aren't they all negatively impacting the environment, thereby earning the title "invasive species?"

You want them to be okay in areas where they "used to be anyway" but they're going to destroy everything there. We can't really measure impact when we've barely discovered that filling Yellowstone with Wolves finally restored the entire park by killing all the deer who ate vegetation that eroded every river's bank into lifeless sand.

And if we're going to say it's okay for invasive species to do their job, by claiming they're like the wolves of any yellowstone they happen to invade, then Humanity becomes instantly justified to destroy everything else for it's own gain.

EDIT: Maybe is should be like the Australian Emu War. We kill them, and if we find out we really can't stop them, THEN we give up.

That means our best approach is to slay all invasive species ruthlessly forever. It will either be the right thing to do, or the species will earn it's place and our attention will move on.

[Techno-Druid]

Aren't they all negatively impacting the environment, thereby earning the title "invasive species?"

You want them to be okay in areas where they "used to be anyway" but they're going to destroy everything there. We can't really measure impact when we've barely discovered that filling Yellowstone with Wolves finally restored the entire park by killing all the deer who ate vegetation that eroded every river's bank into lifeless sand.

And if we're going to say it's okay for invasive species to do their job, by claiming they're like the wolves of any yellowstone they happen to invade, then Humanity becomes instantly justified to destroy everything else for it's own gain.

EDIT: Maybe is should be like the Australian Emu War. We kill them, and if we find out we really can't stop them, THEN we give up.

That means our best approach is to slay all invasive species ruthlessly forever. It will either be the right thing to do, or the species will earn it's place and our attention will move on.

There's a difference between invasive and introduced. An invasive species would be like the Burmese pythons in Florida which actively threaten the Everglades by severely decreasing the amount of small mammals within the ecosystem.

An example of a non-invasive introduced species would be the banteng in northern Australia which have less of a negative impact and actually have adopted to the native fauna.

Then you have unintentional reintroductions like horses in the Americas or fallow deer in Europe (which were introduced into Western Europe by the Romans from the Middle East). These species or their close relatives were present in a region and went extinct due to overhunting only to be unintentionally brought back

[yetgdhfgh]

Hippos are fucking dangerous at the best of times but a hippo high on coke? That is something i would wanna stay away from!

[Sting]

Killing every invasive individual isn't really possible in most cases. Look at canadian geese, they're quite a plague for farmers in the Netherlands but no matter how many they shoot there will always be more.

[Thoughtful Trolli]

Or we can abandon the idea of trying to dictate ecology through a deontological morality and embrace utilitarianism instead, judging different cases of repopulation separately.

I'll do that when I have money and can fucking eat what I want when I want to eat it. Or I might not even then fuck everyone to death.

Killing every invasive individual isn't really possible in most cases. Look at canadian geese, they're quite a plague for farmers in the Netherlands but no matter how many they shoot there will always be more.

Yes and this sounds just like American Boar.

"If we can kill it we should" seems like the best guideline, since we're taught by science to not predict anything or draw any conclusions at all from anything that hasn't been retested to the point it drops below our ambiguity.