05-09-2015, 02:04 PM
[#0000FF]I like the old saying "Hindsight is always 20/20". I have coined my own: "History is never wrong".
Our forefathers (with plural wives) can be blamed for a multitude of bad decisions. We are living with the fallout today. Thankfully some of their actions and inventions have been beneficial. Sadly, a lot of them have proven catastrophic. The permanent loss of a whole bunch of different species is one of the worst examples of poor planning and rash actions.
New settlers in a new land did not have an "owner's manual" on how to make the best of it without trashing it for future generations. They often got giddy with the overabundance at the time, with little thought of what might come after. Without history and guidelines to deter their wanton destruction of wildlife and habitat how could they know?
In some cases more modern generations have been able to recognize, halt and at least partially reverse the impending loss of individual species. In other cases not so much. Sometimes a species has declined beyond the tipping point, where they can no longer reproduce at a rate sufficient to rebuild a population.
In other cases...such as the coral reefs and other manifestations of changing climatic conditions...we have little or no chance of affecting those changes. They are beyond human control. We don't have to like it but we have to accept it. And...as you suggest...the dinosaurs ain't comin' back. Forget Jurassic Park.
All that being said, we can all take individual responsibility for the things we can control. We can respect nature and our surroundings and avoid doing things that will cause harm to any of it. And we can be proactive enough to stand up to our law makers and let them know how we feel...and that they should not sacrifice our environment and our future recreation for the selfish desires of big campaign contributors.
As far as the reluctance to add forage species to an existing ecosystem. My opinion is that it is usually more a matter of "won't" instead of "can't". When something is being done successfully elsewhere it is only reasonable that it is worth trying in Utah. Yeah, we have funny liquor laws and some strange ideas about a lot of things. And our clocks all run about 100 years slow. But if anybody at the top REALLY wanted to give something a try it COULD happen. It's just that in a top-down political system that is our DNR it is usually safer to make NO decision than a wrong decision. People would rather avoid doing anything rather than risk damaging the walls they have built up around themselves in their hard won positions.
Domino effect? Definitely. Some worse than others. But the loss of a nonessential species is not going to bring on the Millenium.
[/#0000FF]
[signature]
Our forefathers (with plural wives) can be blamed for a multitude of bad decisions. We are living with the fallout today. Thankfully some of their actions and inventions have been beneficial. Sadly, a lot of them have proven catastrophic. The permanent loss of a whole bunch of different species is one of the worst examples of poor planning and rash actions.
New settlers in a new land did not have an "owner's manual" on how to make the best of it without trashing it for future generations. They often got giddy with the overabundance at the time, with little thought of what might come after. Without history and guidelines to deter their wanton destruction of wildlife and habitat how could they know?
In some cases more modern generations have been able to recognize, halt and at least partially reverse the impending loss of individual species. In other cases not so much. Sometimes a species has declined beyond the tipping point, where they can no longer reproduce at a rate sufficient to rebuild a population.
In other cases...such as the coral reefs and other manifestations of changing climatic conditions...we have little or no chance of affecting those changes. They are beyond human control. We don't have to like it but we have to accept it. And...as you suggest...the dinosaurs ain't comin' back. Forget Jurassic Park.
All that being said, we can all take individual responsibility for the things we can control. We can respect nature and our surroundings and avoid doing things that will cause harm to any of it. And we can be proactive enough to stand up to our law makers and let them know how we feel...and that they should not sacrifice our environment and our future recreation for the selfish desires of big campaign contributors.
As far as the reluctance to add forage species to an existing ecosystem. My opinion is that it is usually more a matter of "won't" instead of "can't". When something is being done successfully elsewhere it is only reasonable that it is worth trying in Utah. Yeah, we have funny liquor laws and some strange ideas about a lot of things. And our clocks all run about 100 years slow. But if anybody at the top REALLY wanted to give something a try it COULD happen. It's just that in a top-down political system that is our DNR it is usually safer to make NO decision than a wrong decision. People would rather avoid doing anything rather than risk damaging the walls they have built up around themselves in their hard won positions.
Domino effect? Definitely. Some worse than others. But the loss of a nonessential species is not going to bring on the Millenium.
[/#0000FF]
[signature]