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How come they don’t investigate WHAT is actually causing this exactly? Yes climate is changing but did it change that much since 80s? What if it’s some pestic

How come they don’t investigate WHAT is actually causing this exactly? Yes climate is changing but did it change that much since 80s? What if it’s some pesticide? or some food packaging or something

lawrencevillain 5y ago
From the article it sounds like invasive species, plus the fact that we have royally screwed up the local ecosystem. For instance — white-tailed deer are growing exponentially, eating all the underbrush and outcompeting other animals, and they have no/few natural predators left. I agree that not much has changed since the 80s, I think it's just catching up to us now.
- techrat 5y ago
  Ripple effects. Humans have ruined a lot of ecosystems that had a natural balance. Wolf culling being one of the most obvious examples of our cause and effect. https://www.yellowstonepark.com/things-to-do/wildlife/wolf-reintroduction-changes-ecosystem/ https://www.yellowstonepark.com/things-to-do/wildlife/wolf-r...
- jakemauer 5y ago
  White-tailed deer have only recently recovered from over-hunting and returned to their pre-colonization population levels.[1] Do you have a source that frames their growth as exponential? 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White-tailed_deer#Population_and_controls https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White-tailed_deer#Population_a...
  - lawrencevillain 5y ago
    Apologies, I'm based in Pennsylvania and it's definitely more noticeable here. I expect it will become more apparent elsewhere too. We're at 3x the total population that existed when europeans started settling here, and without an appropriate way to cull the herd I don't see that changing. We have milder winters (so no starvation), less interest in hunting, and again a lack of natural predators. https://extension.psu.edu/white-tailed-deer https://extension.psu.edu/white-tailed-deer
  - rubylark 5y ago
    Deer population growth during that recovery period (of white tail deer at least) seems pretty exponential. [1] However in the absence of natural predators it seems that disease and human culling have pretty effectively kept their population to stay at about pre-colonial levels rather than continuing upward to the point of over population. [1] http://www.deerfriendly.com/decline-of-deer-populations http://www.deerfriendly.com/decline-of-deer-populations
  - BitwiseFool 5y ago
    The Hawaiian deer population follows boom and bust cycles. They were introduced for hunting purposes, have no natural predators, and tend to mess up the ecosystem so badly via overgrazing that they end up dying off and then recovering. https://www.civilbeat.org/2021/01/molokais-fabled-axis-deer-are-starving-to-death-in-droves/ https://www.civilbeat.org/2021/01/molokais-fabled-axis-deer-... I have no idea about exponential growth outside of Hawaii, though.
- cultofmetatron 5y ago
  plus the parasites that they spread are decimating moose populations yearly
- titzer 5y ago
  > white-tailed deer are growing exponentially Yes, and worse, some (uninformed people) see the growth of any species as a positive sign that nature is bouncing back, or whatever. When in reality, ecosystems are hugely out of balance and the vast growth of one species is just a spasm as the system shakes itself apart. The knock-on effect of one species's sudden growth spurt may take decades to play out in the shadows, but it is almost assuredly not a good thing.
hanniabu 5y ago
> What if it’s some pesticide? or some food packaging or something What if it was? I don't expect things to change much with corporate's death grip on the government.
- WalterBright 5y ago
  > I don't expect things to change much with corporate's death grip on the government. Statements like this always imply that if the government ran the businesses (socialism) things like this wouldn't happen. But the evidence is it is worse. The USSR had major problems with their heavily polluting industries, which persist today.
  - jussij 5y ago
    The USSR was a communists country. There is a world of difference between Social Democratic (i.e. socialism) countries like Finland, Sweden, Norway for example and the USSR. The hint is right there in the title, democratic. The USSR never had a functioning democracy.
    - WalterBright 5y ago
      Democracy never made socialism competitive with free markets. Democracy in Seattle led to the government purchase of port-a-potties at $250,000 each and $12,000,000 per mile bike lane striping. All involved were comfortably re-elected. Norway pumps 20% of its GDP out of the ground.
      - jussij 5y ago
        Firstly I was only pointing out your assertion that the USSR was a good model of socialism is wrong. As to being 'competitive in free markets', I would suggest that is more of a measure of capitalism than socialism. Socialism is about equality and a better measure of equality would be something like 'standard of living'. When you look at which countries lead the world on that measure it should come as no surprise Social Democratic nations dominate: https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/standard-of-living-by-country https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/standard-...
shadowgovt 5y ago
Over 20 species, so causes are as varied as the species. In several cases, it was a combination of human activity and (relatively) fragile initial population conditions. 11 of the species are native to Hawaii and Guam, and when human expansion puts pressure on your ecosystem, there's nowhere to move to. One of the fish species lived in one particularly slow-flowing section of one river. When your whole universe is one island, there's a lot of things humans can do that would render 100% of your habitat unusable.
- daveslash 5y ago
  Yeah, I agree. To add onto your sentiment that it was a combination [of things]... I'd like to add that it's a bit reductionist for people to suggest an extinction is one thing (e.g. it was pesticides, it was climate change, etc...). Sure, sometimes it might be ONE thing, but I would guess that in most cases it's a combination of stresses coming together.
justin66 5y ago
> How come they don’t investigate WHAT is actually causing this exactly? Who exactly do you believe should be studying causes of species extinction but is not doing it?
- 09bjb 5y ago
  Us!
bparsons 5y ago
It is usually just plain old development destroying their habitats. Suburbs, highways, logging etc. destroy their home and the species dies out.
pvaldes 5y ago
How many times have you heard the past government talking about the problem with Californian porpoise?
openasocket 5y ago
In the case of the ivory-billed woodpecker it was probably extinct in the 80s too. There hasn't been a universally accepted sighting of one since 1944, the few sightings made since then aren't really conclusive. For most of these creatures they only existed in one particularly small region or area. The San Marcos gambusia, for instance, historically only lived in a single 1km stretch of the San Marcos River. Species with that tiny of an area can be driven extinct by a single bad weather event or epidemic. Or because some real estate developer decides they want to build a couple apartments. It doesn't even necessarily have to be something big. It's unfortunate, but sadly something like the San Marcos gambusia would probably have gone extinct within a few centuries, human activity or not, unless it was able to adapt to expand its range. While climate change is definitely something to be concerned about, it is not, currently, the main driver of extinction events like this. The far bigger cause is more direct human activity, like poaching and land development.
- inglor_cz 5y ago
  This fish lives in a single rock hole in Nevada. Fewer than 200 individuals alive. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Devils_Hole_pupfish https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Devils_Hole_pupfish
- beerandt 5y ago
  Hawaii had iirc 14 species of birds on the list that were all native to either one island or a portion of one, with some preferring certain altitudes or only living on certain plateaus, etc. The funny thing about Hawaii though, is that there are only two or three (extremely isolated) places that remain with any true Hawaiian plant habitat, because Polynesians brought their own plants with them that almost universally outcompeted the native plants. Birds on islands are some of the quickest animals to specialize and differentiate into new species. Which makes Hawaii incredibly interesting, from an island biogeography perspective. Something as simple as the fact that no mosquitos made it to Hawaii until Captain Cook accidently introduced them, means no native fish, frogs, birds, lizards, or anything that specialized in eating them. Now extrapolate that to wiping out all the native flora and replacing it. That so much biodiversity remains in Hawaii today ought to actually give us some comfort in nature's ability to quickly adapt to significant change.
Taylor_OD 5y ago
It's absolutely changed that much in since the 80s. For humans? Not that much. For tiny animals and bugs? Small change is massive change.
- loonster 5y ago
  It seems like there were a lot more bugs that would get splattered on cars in the 90s than they do now.
  - ComputerGuru 5y ago
    That’s almost entirely aerodynamics. I recently drove a boxy truck from the 90s on the same stretch I’ve driven bug-free and had a deja vu from how bug-splattered the windshield was.
    - loonster 5y ago
      This news [0] article makes it seem like there was an 80% decline in bugs over the last 30 years. [0] https://apnews.com/article/insects-pa-state-wire-ap-top-news-plants-us-news-eccd411638994db6b5388c052c00dd3b https://apnews.com/article/insects-pa-state-wire-ap-top-news...
SamBam 5y ago
Far more extinction is caused (so far) by land development, logging, and things like that. Though probably in the next couple of decades we'll be seeing waves of extinctions caused by global warming.
noselasd 5y ago
Most of it is habitat loss. I.e. look at e.g. https://www.google.com/maps/@43.9922189,-97.664741,145755m/data=!3m1!1e3 https://www.google.com/maps/@43.9922189,-97.664741,145755m/d... , and it's just patches of fields no matter which way you go for hundreds of miles. Areas that once was wild forrest (or praerie), and housing numerous of of species having enough space to live and reproduce. Give it some more years, perhaps a few hundred, and e.g. this https://www.google.com/maps/@43.9922189,-97.664741,145755m/data=!3m1!1e3 https://www.google.com/maps/@43.9922189,-97.664741,145755m/d... , will look much like the above map, with fields for hundreds of miles in all direction. With it goes the home of many, many species.

lawrencevillain 5y ago

From the article it sounds like invasive species, plus the fact that we have royally screwed up the local ecosystem. For instance — white-tailed deer are growing exponentially, eating all the underbrush and outcompeting other animals, and they have no/few natural predators left. I agree that not much has changed since the 80s, I think it's just catching up to us now.

techrat 5y ago
Ripple effects. Humans have ruined a lot of ecosystems that had a natural balance. Wolf culling being one of the most obvious examples of our cause and effect. https://www.yellowstonepark.com/things-to-do/wildlife/wolf-reintroduction-changes-ecosystem/ https://www.yellowstonepark.com/things-to-do/wildlife/wolf-r...
jakemauer 5y ago
White-tailed deer have only recently recovered from over-hunting and returned to their pre-colonization population levels.[1] Do you have a source that frames their growth as exponential? 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White-tailed_deer#Population_and_controls https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White-tailed_deer#Population_a...
- lawrencevillain 5y ago
  Apologies, I'm based in Pennsylvania and it's definitely more noticeable here. I expect it will become more apparent elsewhere too. We're at 3x the total population that existed when europeans started settling here, and without an appropriate way to cull the herd I don't see that changing. We have milder winters (so no starvation), less interest in hunting, and again a lack of natural predators. https://extension.psu.edu/white-tailed-deer https://extension.psu.edu/white-tailed-deer
- rubylark 5y ago
  Deer population growth during that recovery period (of white tail deer at least) seems pretty exponential. [1] However in the absence of natural predators it seems that disease and human culling have pretty effectively kept their population to stay at about pre-colonial levels rather than continuing upward to the point of over population. [1] http://www.deerfriendly.com/decline-of-deer-populations http://www.deerfriendly.com/decline-of-deer-populations
- BitwiseFool 5y ago
  The Hawaiian deer population follows boom and bust cycles. They were introduced for hunting purposes, have no natural predators, and tend to mess up the ecosystem so badly via overgrazing that they end up dying off and then recovering. https://www.civilbeat.org/2021/01/molokais-fabled-axis-deer-are-starving-to-death-in-droves/ https://www.civilbeat.org/2021/01/molokais-fabled-axis-deer-... I have no idea about exponential growth outside of Hawaii, though.
cultofmetatron 5y ago
plus the parasites that they spread are decimating moose populations yearly
titzer 5y ago
> white-tailed deer are growing exponentially Yes, and worse, some (uninformed people) see the growth of any species as a positive sign that nature is bouncing back, or whatever. When in reality, ecosystems are hugely out of balance and the vast growth of one species is just a spasm as the system shakes itself apart. The knock-on effect of one species's sudden growth spurt may take decades to play out in the shadows, but it is almost assuredly not a good thing.

hanniabu 5y ago

> What if it’s some pesticide? or some food packaging or something What if it was? I don't expect things to change much with corporate's death grip on the government.

WalterBright 5y ago
> I don't expect things to change much with corporate's death grip on the government. Statements like this always imply that if the government ran the businesses (socialism) things like this wouldn't happen. But the evidence is it is worse. The USSR had major problems with their heavily polluting industries, which persist today.
- jussij 5y ago
  The USSR was a communists country. There is a world of difference between Social Democratic (i.e. socialism) countries like Finland, Sweden, Norway for example and the USSR. The hint is right there in the title, democratic. The USSR never had a functioning democracy.
  - WalterBright 5y ago
    Democracy never made socialism competitive with free markets. Democracy in Seattle led to the government purchase of port-a-potties at $250,000 each and $12,000,000 per mile bike lane striping. All involved were comfortably re-elected. Norway pumps 20% of its GDP out of the ground.
    - jussij 5y ago
      Firstly I was only pointing out your assertion that the USSR was a good model of socialism is wrong. As to being 'competitive in free markets', I would suggest that is more of a measure of capitalism than socialism. Socialism is about equality and a better measure of equality would be something like 'standard of living'. When you look at which countries lead the world on that measure it should come as no surprise Social Democratic nations dominate: https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/standard-of-living-by-country https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/standard-...

shadowgovt 5y ago

Over 20 species, so causes are as varied as the species. In several cases, it was a combination of human activity and (relatively) fragile initial population conditions. 11 of the species are native to Hawaii and Guam, and when human expansion puts pressure on your ecosystem, there's nowhere to move to. One of the fish species lived in one particularly slow-flowing section of one river. When your whole universe is one island, there's a lot of things humans can do that would render 100% of your habitat unusable.

daveslash 5y ago
Yeah, I agree. To add onto your sentiment that it was a combination [of things]... I'd like to add that it's a bit reductionist for people to suggest an extinction is one thing (e.g. it was pesticides, it was climate change, etc...). Sure, sometimes it might be ONE thing, but I would guess that in most cases it's a combination of stresses coming together.

justin66 5y ago

> How come they don’t investigate WHAT is actually causing this exactly? Who exactly do you believe should be studying causes of species extinction but is not doing it?

09bjb 5y ago
Us!

bparsons 5y ago

It is usually just plain old development destroying their habitats. Suburbs, highways, logging etc. destroy their home and the species dies out.

pvaldes 5y ago

How many times have you heard the past government talking about the problem with Californian porpoise?

openasocket 5y ago

In the case of the ivory-billed woodpecker it was probably extinct in the 80s too. There hasn't been a universally accepted sighting of one since 1944, the few sightings made since then aren't really conclusive. For most of these creatures they only existed in one particularly small region or area. The San Marcos gambusia, for instance, historically only lived in a single 1km stretch of the San Marcos River. Species with that tiny of an area can be driven extinct by a single bad weather event or epidemic. Or because some real estate developer decides they want to build a couple apartments. It doesn't even necessarily have to be something big. It's unfortunate, but sadly something like the San Marcos gambusia would probably have gone extinct within a few centuries, human activity or not, unless it was able to adapt to expand its range. While climate change is definitely something to be concerned about, it is not, currently, the main driver of extinction events like this. The far bigger cause is more direct human activity, like poaching and land development.

inglor_cz 5y ago
This fish lives in a single rock hole in Nevada. Fewer than 200 individuals alive. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Devils_Hole_pupfish https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Devils_Hole_pupfish
beerandt 5y ago
Hawaii had iirc 14 species of birds on the list that were all native to either one island or a portion of one, with some preferring certain altitudes or only living on certain plateaus, etc. The funny thing about Hawaii though, is that there are only two or three (extremely isolated) places that remain with any true Hawaiian plant habitat, because Polynesians brought their own plants with them that almost universally outcompeted the native plants. Birds on islands are some of the quickest animals to specialize and differentiate into new species. Which makes Hawaii incredibly interesting, from an island biogeography perspective. Something as simple as the fact that no mosquitos made it to Hawaii until Captain Cook accidently introduced them, means no native fish, frogs, birds, lizards, or anything that specialized in eating them. Now extrapolate that to wiping out all the native flora and replacing it. That so much biodiversity remains in Hawaii today ought to actually give us some comfort in nature's ability to quickly adapt to significant change.

Taylor_OD 5y ago

It's absolutely changed that much in since the 80s. For humans? Not that much. For tiny animals and bugs? Small change is massive change.

loonster 5y ago
It seems like there were a lot more bugs that would get splattered on cars in the 90s than they do now.
- ComputerGuru 5y ago
  That’s almost entirely aerodynamics. I recently drove a boxy truck from the 90s on the same stretch I’ve driven bug-free and had a deja vu from how bug-splattered the windshield was.
  - loonster 5y ago
    This news [0] article makes it seem like there was an 80% decline in bugs over the last 30 years. [0] https://apnews.com/article/insects-pa-state-wire-ap-top-news-plants-us-news-eccd411638994db6b5388c052c00dd3b https://apnews.com/article/insects-pa-state-wire-ap-top-news...

SamBam 5y ago

Far more extinction is caused (so far) by land development, logging, and things like that. Though probably in the next couple of decades we'll be seeing waves of extinctions caused by global warming.

noselasd 5y ago

Most of it is habitat loss. I.e. look at e.g. https://www.google.com/maps/@43.9922189,-97.664741,145755m/data=!3m1!1e3 https://www.google.com/maps/@43.9922189,-97.664741,145755m/d... , and it's just patches of fields no matter which way you go for hundreds of miles. Areas that once was wild forrest (or praerie), and housing numerous of of species having enough space to live and reproduce. Give it some more years, perhaps a few hundred, and e.g. this https://www.google.com/maps/@43.9922189,-97.664741,145755m/data=!3m1!1e3 https://www.google.com/maps/@43.9922189,-97.664741,145755m/d... , will look much like the above map, with fields for hundreds of miles in all direction. With it goes the home of many, many species.