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Back in 1976, I was living in London, Ontario, and studying to become a librarian. There was a bulk-foods store in town called "Grains, Beans and Things", where I discovered the joys of purple loosestrife honey.
Fast forward to 1992. I went back for a reunion and GB&T was still there (though in the process of moving to a new but nearby location). There was a sign in the front window exhorting customers NOT to feed the squirrels because they were a nuisance. And the purple loosestrife honey was long gone.
Some time in the 1980s or 90s it became decidedly politically-incorrect to be a fan of purple loosestrife. "It's not a native plant! It's an invasive species! It has no natural predators! It will choke out our wetlands and leave death and destruction in its wake!" So what did they do about this monstrous purple bogeyplant?
Well for one thing, they imported some beetles from somewhere in Europe and under cover of darkness, deposited them in purple loosestrife patches to gorge their little hearts out. Hmmm. I guess non-native beetles are okay as long as they are fightng the good fight against a domestic menace.
Now fast forward another twenty years. Turns out, purple loosestrife is still out there, but it's only about 5% or so of the wetland. And the other species that they were supposedly killing off are still out there too. Perhaps that's in part because they stepped in promptly with those non-native beetles and addressed the national epidemic, but the general consensus amonst scientists these days seems to be that rumours of a weed-induced apocalypse were gross exaggerations.
And you know, I really don't understand this "non-native species" argument. After all, Canada is largely a nation of immigrants. If anything, its probably the native populations who have been treated as second-class citizens - to the extent that they even accept the concept of citizenship as non-aboriginals have come to define it.
Is it any wonder that there are sceptics out there who don't buy into the dire warnings about climate change and global warming? Now don't get me wrong. Certain things are measurable and quantifiable and I don't dispute them for a moment. But the devil is in the interpretation - lies, damn lies and statistics as the saying goes. Average temperatures probably ARE going up over time. The polar ice cap probably IS melting at a faster rate than it was. That doesn't necessarily mean that they will continue to do so at the same or at an accelerating rate. A few decades is a relatively short period of time in the vast history of the planet and the universe. And even if things do continue on their current course, it seems to me that the real problem is whether climate change happens at such a rapid and unpredictable rate that we are unable to come up with good-enough adaptive or delaying tools and mechanisms. As humans, we do have a few points in our favour that the dinosaurs, for example, lacked.
In some respects, it might of course be a GOOD thing if the polar ice cap melts and the vast desolate swaths of northern wasteland become more habitable. Yes, certain species would undoubtedly die out. Over time, others would evolve to take their place. That doesn't mean we should bury our heads in the sand and avoid dealing with the problems as we perceive them at the moment. The pure and applied research that we do now, the innovations and inventions and just plain wild or bizarre ideas that we come up with - some of them, anyway - will no doubt be of SOME use for SOME purpose at SOME time!
Fast forward to 1992. I went back for a reunion and GB&T was still there (though in the process of moving to a new but nearby location). There was a sign in the front window exhorting customers NOT to feed the squirrels because they were a nuisance. And the purple loosestrife honey was long gone.
Some time in the 1980s or 90s it became decidedly politically-incorrect to be a fan of purple loosestrife. "It's not a native plant! It's an invasive species! It has no natural predators! It will choke out our wetlands and leave death and destruction in its wake!" So what did they do about this monstrous purple bogeyplant?
Well for one thing, they imported some beetles from somewhere in Europe and under cover of darkness, deposited them in purple loosestrife patches to gorge their little hearts out. Hmmm. I guess non-native beetles are okay as long as they are fightng the good fight against a domestic menace.
Now fast forward another twenty years. Turns out, purple loosestrife is still out there, but it's only about 5% or so of the wetland. And the other species that they were supposedly killing off are still out there too. Perhaps that's in part because they stepped in promptly with those non-native beetles and addressed the national epidemic, but the general consensus amonst scientists these days seems to be that rumours of a weed-induced apocalypse were gross exaggerations.
And you know, I really don't understand this "non-native species" argument. After all, Canada is largely a nation of immigrants. If anything, its probably the native populations who have been treated as second-class citizens - to the extent that they even accept the concept of citizenship as non-aboriginals have come to define it.
Is it any wonder that there are sceptics out there who don't buy into the dire warnings about climate change and global warming? Now don't get me wrong. Certain things are measurable and quantifiable and I don't dispute them for a moment. But the devil is in the interpretation - lies, damn lies and statistics as the saying goes. Average temperatures probably ARE going up over time. The polar ice cap probably IS melting at a faster rate than it was. That doesn't necessarily mean that they will continue to do so at the same or at an accelerating rate. A few decades is a relatively short period of time in the vast history of the planet and the universe. And even if things do continue on their current course, it seems to me that the real problem is whether climate change happens at such a rapid and unpredictable rate that we are unable to come up with good-enough adaptive or delaying tools and mechanisms. As humans, we do have a few points in our favour that the dinosaurs, for example, lacked.
In some respects, it might of course be a GOOD thing if the polar ice cap melts and the vast desolate swaths of northern wasteland become more habitable. Yes, certain species would undoubtedly die out. Over time, others would evolve to take their place. That doesn't mean we should bury our heads in the sand and avoid dealing with the problems as we perceive them at the moment. The pure and applied research that we do now, the innovations and inventions and just plain wild or bizarre ideas that we come up with - some of them, anyway - will no doubt be of SOME use for SOME purpose at SOME time!
