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Return of wolves to Yellowstone has led to a surge in aspen trees

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Re: Return of wolves to Yellowstone has led to a surge in aspen trees

#181

Post by Ifkaluva »

bbor wrote: post #155
sdenton4 wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Instead of thinking of this as a benefit of wolves (specifically), you can view it as an advantage of having something in their ecological niche. In this case, the niche is 'apex predator.' It's a niche which is repeated across pretty much every ecosystem. They keep populations of their prey species down, preventing overpopulation and the many indirect problems that come with it. Perhaps without an apex predator the…

(Perhaps if we had to contend with some homo-vampirus, we wouldn't have global climate change...) Humans—like ants—seem to be their own primary predator ;(

“Homo homini lupus”

Re: Return of wolves to Yellowstone has led to a surge in aspen trees

#182

Post by DHRicoF »

sghiassy wrote: post #67
mkw5053 wrote: post #23

It's amazing the impact that the reintroduction has had. On a recent winter trip there I also learned that the reintroduction literally moved rivers [1]: - Elk quit loitering along streams, so willow and cottonwood shot up, anchoring soil and narrowing channels. - The new woody growth gave beavers lumber; their colonies jumped from one in 1996 to a dozen within fifteen years, raising water tables and rebuilding wetla…

I’ve always found the idea of “restoring” ecosystems a bit philosophically tricky. When we say that reintroducing wolves led to ecological improvements, what’s our reference point? Are we comparing it to Yellowstone 100 years ago? 500? Pre-human settlement? Ecological baselines are inherently arbitrary—there’s no objectively “correct” state of nature to return to. The systems we call degraded are often just different…

Ecosystems are dynamic by nature, so "make them like where 222.22 years ago" is a little meaningless.

But biodiversity is a good target and as unbiased as you can get. More biodiversity means more adaptability and resilience of the system.

Re: Return of wolves to Yellowstone has led to a surge in aspen trees

#183

Post by the_af »

rizzom5000 wrote: post #172
sdenton4 wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Instead of thinking of this as a benefit of wolves (specifically), you can view it as an advantage of having something in their ecological niche. In this case, the niche is 'apex predator.' It's a niche which is repeated across pretty much every ecosystem. They keep populations of their prey species down, preventing overpopulation and the many indirect problems that come with it. Perhaps without an apex predator the…

> we're headed to a world with humans, livestock, and the few species... It looks more and more like we're headed toward a world where we'll regenerate extinct species in labs; and grow our steaks in meat factories. If we no longer need cattle farms, it's possible we'll vote to preserve more lands.

Is there any evidence this has any traction, is actually feasible (the reintroduction part), and is not merely a publicity stunt for some biotech startups?

I think a more realistic point of view is that once a species is gone, it's truly gone, and that we should worry about keeping alive those still existing, because there's no "undo" button.

Re: Return of wolves to Yellowstone has led to a surge in aspen trees

#184

Post by antisthenes »

sghiassy wrote: post #67
mkw5053 wrote: post #23

It's amazing the impact that the reintroduction has had. On a recent winter trip there I also learned that the reintroduction literally moved rivers [1]: - Elk quit loitering along streams, so willow and cottonwood shot up, anchoring soil and narrowing channels. - The new woody growth gave beavers lumber; their colonies jumped from one in 1996 to a dozen within fifteen years, raising water tables and rebuilding wetla…

I’ve always found the idea of “restoring” ecosystems a bit philosophically tricky. When we say that reintroducing wolves led to ecological improvements, what’s our reference point? Are we comparing it to Yellowstone 100 years ago? 500? Pre-human settlement? Ecological baselines are inherently arbitrary—there’s no objectively “correct” state of nature to return to. The systems we call degraded are often just different…

> I’ve always found the idea of “restoring” ecosystems a bit philosophically tricky.

I think you're confusing "arbitrarily meddling in wilderness" and "restoring ecosystems". The latter would be something like demolishing a Walmart and its parking lot and putting soil and trees in its place.

Basically giving back human development spaces back to nature and letting nature take care of itself. This involves things like cleaning up waterways.

Re: Return of wolves to Yellowstone has led to a surge in aspen trees

#185

Post by trgn »

cadamsdotcom wrote: post #6

Yellowstone seems like one of the most resilient ecosystems we do science on, seems it can reorganize to respond to changes in species. Can other ecosystems do this? Or is Yellowstone the only one?

Ardennes too, according to our guide at least, reintroduction of wolves changed ecosystem

Re: Return of wolves to Yellowstone has led to a surge in aspen trees

#187

Post by DiggyJohnson »

rizzom5000 wrote: post #172
sdenton4 wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Instead of thinking of this as a benefit of wolves (specifically), you can view it as an advantage of having something in their ecological niche. In this case, the niche is 'apex predator.' It's a niche which is repeated across pretty much every ecosystem. They keep populations of their prey species down, preventing overpopulation and the many indirect problems that come with it. Perhaps without an apex predator the…

> we're headed to a world with humans, livestock, and the few species... It looks more and more like we're headed toward a world where we'll regenerate extinct species in labs; and grow our steaks in meat factories. If we no longer need cattle farms, it's possible we'll vote to preserve more lands.

I’m usually the last person to take this side of a discussion but I don’t see how feasible since:

  - the existence species regeneration does not imply the incentivize to regenerate and manage the vast majority of extinct species  
  - lack of gene samples for vast majority of species  
  - we don’t and are not very close to having a viable model for environment and species fitness so we can’t accurately model what specifies to regenerate  
  - new species populations have to be managed before and after initial release 
  - land and labor capital investment

Re: Return of wolves to Yellowstone has led to a surge in aspen trees

#188

Post by jiggawatts »

sdenton4 wrote: post #78
sghiassy wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve always found the idea of “restoring” ecosystems a bit philosophically tricky. When we say that reintroducing wolves led to ecological improvements, what’s our reference point? Are we comparing it to Yellowstone 100 years ago? 500? Pre-human settlement? Ecological baselines are inherently arbitrary—there’s no objectively “correct” state of nature to return to. The systems we call degraded are often just different…

Instead of thinking of this as a benefit of wolves (specifically), you can view it as an advantage of having something in their ecological niche. In this case, the niche is 'apex predator.' It's a niche which is repeated across pretty much every ecosystem. They keep populations of their prey species down, preventing overpopulation and the many indirect problems that come with it. Perhaps without an apex predator the…

> homo-vampirus

https://www.rifters.com/blindsight/vampires.htm

The book is great “what if?” in several directions at once including human vampires.

Re: Return of wolves to Yellowstone has led to a surge in aspen trees

#190

Post by lukas099 »

rizzom5000 wrote: post #172
sdenton4 wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Instead of thinking of this as a benefit of wolves (specifically), you can view it as an advantage of having something in their ecological niche. In this case, the niche is 'apex predator.' It's a niche which is repeated across pretty much every ecosystem. They keep populations of their prey species down, preventing overpopulation and the many indirect problems that come with it. Perhaps without an apex predator the…

> we're headed to a world with humans, livestock, and the few species... It looks more and more like we're headed toward a world where we'll regenerate extinct species in labs; and grow our steaks in meat factories. If we no longer need cattle farms, it's possible we'll vote to preserve more lands.

I hope so. In the meantime, we should try to preserve as much natural genetic information as possible, even assuming we can vet the species back.
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