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from the ecosystems-without-apex-predators dept.
Common Dreams reports:
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service today declared the eastern puma extinct and removed it from the list of protected wildlife and plants under the Endangered Species Act. The eastern puma was a subspecies of the animal also known as cougar or mountain lion, which is still widely distributed across the West. It once roamed as far north as southeastern Ontario, southern Quebec, and New Brunswick in Canada; south to South Carolina; and west to Kentucky, Illinois, and Michigan.
The eastern puma's range contracted from the 1790s to the 1890s due to human persecution abetted by the extirpation, through hunting, of its primary prey, white-tailed deer. The last three eastern pumas were killed in 1930 in Tennessee, 1932 in New Brunswick, and 1938 in Maine.
"The extinction of the eastern puma and other apex carnivores such as wolves and lynx upended the ecology of the original colonies and beyond," said Michael Robinson of the Center for Biological Diversity. "Over a century after deer went extinct in the Northeast, they have returned with a voracious vengeance, and botanists lament the disappearance of formerly abundant plant communities. We have forests that have lost the top and the bottom of the food chain."
The eastern cougar was extinct well before it was protected under the Endangered Species Act, as was the case with eight of the other 10 species that have been delisted for extinction. Overall the Endangered Species Act has been 99 percent successful at saving species from extinction.
A different subspecies of the puma, the Florida panther, survives in a small, isolated and precarious population at the rapidly urbanizing southern tip of Florida. These animals, too, were once widespread, from their namesake state north to Georgia and west to Arkansas and eastern Texas. Cougars from the mountainous West have reclaimed lost habitat and currently reproduce as small populations in North Dakota, South Dakota, and Nebraska. Individual Florida panthers and midwestern cougars that have traveled long distances have been hit by cars, shot by hunters or killed by authorities in recent years throughout the Midwest and East, but there is no breeding population in the historic range of the eastern puma.
Editor's note: Not so fast; you can comment on the proposed rule at Regulations.gov.
Original Submission
(Score: 0, Disagree) by albert on Friday June 19 2015, @08:54AM
Not all extinctions are bad. Numerous creatures are hazardous. There may have some minor benefits, but those don't outweigh the downsides. I'm not missing this one any more than I'd miss the mosquito, the guinea worm, the corn ear borer, the measles virus, poliovirus, poison ivy...
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 19 2015, @09:28AM
Without an apex predator, the deer population has exploded.
The overly abundant deer are eating some plants at a rate that also causes a weird distribution in the flora.
It's the hubris of the species that is supposedly the most intelligent that makes them think that whatever they do to mess up the balance of natural systems is their right.
In the same way, the US Forest Service had a no-fires-ever policy.
With all the unburned undergrowth, when fires did occur, they got to be HUGE.
Humans pretending they are smarter than Mother Nature would be comical if the results weren't so sad.
-- gewg_
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 19 2015, @09:37AM
That would be western politicians putting pressure on the Forest Service. Purse strings being what they are. Wouldn't want all those nice expensive homes built in fire country to go the way of the trees now would we? In other parts of the country where people accept risks and build appropriately the forest is allowed to burn in a controlled manner. Of course that is easier in places without thousands of square miles of kindling with people wanting to live in the middle.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 19 2015, @09:41AM
Eliminate every tree, and the problem of forest fires will be solved as soon as trees are extinct.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 19 2015, @10:11PM
Eliminate all sapient life and all problems will no longer matter.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday June 19 2015, @10:16PM
That would be western politicians putting pressure on the Forest Service.
This long predates property protection. The US had some bad fires around the beginning of the 20th century and IMHO the Department of the Interior seized on that as a way to expand their Forest Service bureaucracy. While property protection was part of the justification, the real driver was the belief than any fire was bad no matter how small or how remote it was.
It is remarkable how effective they've been at suppressing fires over that time of heavy suppression. For example, between about 1910 or 1920 and 1988 (I viewed a map of recorded large fires in Yellowstone), it was extremely rare to see a fire larger than a 1000 acres (400 hectares) in Yellowstone National Park and 10,000 acres (4,000 hectares was almost unheard of). That changed in 1988 when a third of the park burned (almost 800k acres or 300k hectares, with much more outside the park boundaries) and some of the most important historical buildings in the park (particularly, the complex at Old Faithful) were threatened with destruction. Nowadays, we routinely experience in Yellowstone (I work in the park) fires larger than anything during that period above (every few years).
(Score: 4, Insightful) by JeanCroix on Friday June 19 2015, @12:59PM
And the next apex predator in line, i.e. humans, are being more and more discouraged from hunting the now overpopulated deer - whether it's by anti-gun activists, animal rights types, or just a culture that's becoming more and more urbanized. I myself haven't hunted since I was a teenager, although I keep telling myself I'll start again, "next season"...
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Friday June 19 2015, @01:18PM
Yeah, but where would you hunt? Out West I'd go to the National Forest to hunt, because there is so much of it. In the TriState area around NYC there are so many people it's tough to get far enough away to shoot or to find public land you can hunt on.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by M. Baranczak on Friday June 19 2015, @01:35PM
(Score: 2) by JeanCroix on Friday June 19 2015, @01:49PM
(Score: 2) by tempest on Friday June 19 2015, @01:57PM
Where there is an over abundance of humans they tend to be culled through traffic accidents.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 20 2015, @09:30AM
That's the dream. Humans are in need of a good culling, through traffic accidents or otherwise.
(Score: 2) by Joe Desertrat on Friday June 19 2015, @07:12PM
And the next apex predator in line, i.e. humans, are being more and more discouraged from hunting the now overpopulated deer - whether it's by anti-gun activists, animal rights types, or just a culture that's becoming more and more urbanized. I myself haven't hunted since I was a teenager, although I keep telling myself I'll start again, "next season"...
Most states now have far more liberal hunting seasons for deer than when I was younger. The problem is that with suburban growth there is too much land closed off to hunting, either by being in private hands or it is too residential. No longer can you drive down any back road and find a place to hunt. Public lands where you can hunt often see so much pressure that the deer quickly flee to the prohibited areas. The biggest predators deer now have are motor vehicles and domestic dogs.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 19 2015, @10:16PM
Domestic dogs? Never heard of that as being a problem for deer. Dogs can be killed by just one kick and many urban breeds really don't know how to hunt. It isn't like cats that are born killers so much so that they murder for fun. Not that I do not believe it. They could easily kill several young deer in one go.
Surely the number one killer are the front grills of commuting vehicles. Mine took out four deer in just one year of commuting through a rural shortcut about 40 miles each way.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday June 19 2015, @10:20PM
Domestic dogs? Never heard of that as being a problem for deer. Dogs can be killed by just one kick and many urban breeds really don't know how to hunt.
There are feral dogs and fawns can't kill with one kick.
(Score: 1, Disagree) by albert on Friday June 19 2015, @09:50PM
You didn't read my comment: "There may have some minor benefits, but those don't outweigh the downsides."
Yes, not having an exploding deer population could be a minor benefit. Deer do cause car crashes. We ought to encourage shooing the deer. We could even allow commercial hunting all year long.
OTOH, this is about a predator that would be happy to jump on your back and bite down on your neck. No thanks. I don't need that running around putting my life in danger. The same goes for the foolishly reckless wolf reintroduction: no, we don't need them, even if extra herbivores change plant life. We don't need plant life to be unchanging forever, as if unaffected by humans.
The ideal environment is the one that suits us best. This only includes the species for which benefits outweigh the downsides. Pretty much every species is in some way beneficial, probably even smallpox. (want to reintroduce that one?) The fact that you can list some minor benefit for a large predator in no way means that the benefit outweighs the downsides.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 19 2015, @10:58PM
a predator [...] running around
...as they did for millions of years before your species ever showed up.
Clearly, YOU are the interloper.
putting my life in danger
Some advice for you, fraidy cat city boy: never leave "civilization".
Don't even leave your gated community (there might be predators out there--the ones with only 2 legs).
some minor benefit for a large predator
Your contempt for the natural world is noted.
Again, don't ever leave the city.
-- gewg_
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 19 2015, @09:32AM
... Niggers, Muslims, Indians, frigid Bitches, and all the other humans too.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 19 2015, @09:39AM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sx19iv-yv5w [youtube.com]
(Score: 2) by Justin Case on Friday June 19 2015, @11:21AM
Agree. Lions are bad news. Usually afraid of humans, but beware if they get over that, because they can and will take you apart.
Over 99% of all species that ever existed have gone extinct. It's a tautology called survival of the fittest. It is part of nature, and you can't stop time. I would think so called environmentalists would be in favor of leaving things be instead of expensive interventions to hold back the ocean waves. "Nothing must change, anywhere, evar!!!"
(Score: 3, Insightful) by tangomargarine on Friday June 19 2015, @08:43PM
There's a difference between a species going extinct because it can't compete, and a species that gets hunted into extinction by humans which otherwise was doing fine.
I suppose you could argue that the puma wasn't competing effectively against humans with firearms, but do we criticize the Native Americans for not deserving what they had because they got outcompeted with superior technology?
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by tathra on Friday June 19 2015, @10:03PM
tangomargarine hit the nail on the head. its not about trying to keep everything exactly the same, its about limiting the impact of human-caused extinctions and destruction. sabertooth tigers probably went extinct because their giant saber teeth weren't really suited for hunting, and wooly mammoths could have gone extinct anyway due to changing climate, those extinctions are fine*, but pinta island tortoises, western black rhinos, caribbean monk seals, baiji river dolphins, pyrenean ibexes, ivory-billed woodpeckers, and javan tigers (all went extinct in the past 20 years due to humans) were doing just fine in their ecosystems until humans killed them all for sport, trophies, or by destroying their habitats. comparing natural extinctions to human-driven ones is a false analogy.
* mostly fine in the case of wooly mammoths; over-hunting definitely had a hand in their extinction, but the climate was changing enough that they might've gone extinct anyway
(Score: 2) by Justin Case on Friday June 19 2015, @11:59PM
So you're fine with all the creatures nature has provided, except humans?
Just out of curiosity, what species might you be?
> comparing natural extinctions to human-driven ones is a false analogy
I see. You don't think humans are part of nature. Have you identified the planet we came from yet then?
(Score: 2) by tathra on Saturday June 20 2015, @09:24AM
straight to the strawman, eh? where, specifically, did i say anything about not being fine with humans, or that i don't think humans are a part of nature? try again, except this time counter what i actually said instead of what you wish i'd said.
(Score: 2) by richtopia on Friday June 19 2015, @02:40PM
After growing up in Michigan and being very active in Boy Scouts, I was a bit surprised when I moved to Arizona and discovered that there are creatures that actually want to kill me! The plants too!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 19 2015, @08:22PM
I don't think that "want" is the best word there.
"Are able to" is certainly apt.
As we mentioned the other day with the wolves and rodents, even an apex predator prefers bite-sized meals.
Leaving a partially-eaten carcass near your stomping ground is an invitation to other predators to move into your territory.
...and Michigan doesn't have bears or wolves or lynx or wolverines or diamondbacks??
-- gewg_
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 19 2015, @06:59PM
Enjoy your Lime Disease.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Friday June 19 2015, @08:46PM
Lyme Disease, even. [wikipedia.org]
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Joe Desertrat on Friday June 19 2015, @07:16PM
Numerous creatures are hazardous.
No creatures are as hazardous to other life as humans.