"invasive" species Archives - Macska Moksha Press

Beyond the War on Invasive Species: Interview with Tao Orion

February 17, 2022 by Kollibri terre Sonnenblume

Tao Orion, author of “Beyond the War on Invasive Species”

Tao Orion is the author of “Beyond the War on Invasive Species: A Permaculture Approach to Ecosystem Restoration.” She is a permaculture designer, teacher, homesteader, and mother living in the southern Willamette Valley of Oregon. I interviewed her on May 18, 2020, for my podcast, “Voices for Nature & Peace.” What follows is a partial transcript of that conversation, edited for clarity. [Listen to the entire interview here]

K: A lot of people have heard the term, “invasive species” and most of them of course are assuming it’s something bad, but when it comes right down to it, it’s actually very difficult to define the term and we could even say that there isn’t one definition of that term.

T: Yes, that’s something that I found really interesting as I was researching my book, because I was really trying to find out if there was a clear, objective description of what an invasive species is, and I found that even the National Invasive Species Council—which in the US is the federal government level board that looks at invasive species issues—spent years on deliberating on the definition and even so, they weren’t able to come up with something that I felt was purely an objective description that could be [applied] in all contexts. It seemed to vary from place to place and time to time.

K: Monsanto was one of the companies involved in setting [that council] up.

T: That’s another disturbing element about how the big frenzy around invasive species and the purported damage that they do came to be so popular; a lot of that was informed and funded by pesticide interests to spur the sale of products, herbicides in particular, to deal with species invasions.

K: I think that most people are probably not aware of the fact that the use of pesticides and herbicides has been rising over the last 20 years, not falling. I think people hear about organic agriculture and they think we must be on the right path. But due in part to the war on invasives and also due to genetically modifying crops to be Round-up Ready so they can survive the use of pesticides—these two things seem to have driven an increase in the use of pesticides over the last 20 years.

T: Yes, it’s definitely alarming. My background is in organic agriculture. I was immersed in that world. Even before writing this book, I was under the impression that herbicides were somewhat less toxic in the realm of pesticide toxicity [as opposed to insecticides or fungicides, for example]. In researching herbicides more for invasive species management and agriculture in general, I learned a lot more about their toxicity and insidious toxicity to insects and mammals and other lifeforms that I don’t think gets talked about enough. People assume they’re more ecologically benign, but really they’re not, and that’s important to bring to the table.

Nuance in the misunderstood field of Invasion Biology

February 6, 2022 by Kollibri terre Sonnenblume

Book Review: “Invasion Biology” by Mark A. Davis, Oxford University Press

The topic of “invasive species” has been hot since the late 1990s, but the public’s understanding of the science behind it is woefully superficial. I ascribe much of this to the media, which, through hundreds of stories in print, online and on TV, has painted an overly-simplistic, black and white narrative about villains we must make war on. A lot of blame can be laid on the word “invasive” itself, a totally loaded term that can really only have negative connotations.

So people can be forgiven for not knowing that the scientific field of “invasion biology” is far more nuanced, and is in fact “currently distinguished more by debate and controversy than consensus.”

Rare Wildflower vs. Green Energy & Human Hubris (Part 2)

October 15, 2019 by Kollibri terre Sonnenblume

Tiehm's buckwheat [Photo by Gary A. Monroe, hosted by the USDA-NRCS PLANTS Database] — Tiehm’s buckwheat [Photo by Gary A. Monroe, hosted by the USDA-NRCS PLANTS Database]

This is part 2 of a two-part series. Read part 1: “Rare Wildflower vs. Mining Company.”

In part 1 of this series, I told how Tiehn’s Buckwheat (Eriogonum tiehmii) is a rare species found only on ten acres of land in Nevada and how its existence is threatened by the mining activities of Ioneer, an Australian Company. I also discussed the efforts by the Center for Biological Diversity (CBD) to save the species by petitioning the federal government and the state of Nevada to give it legal protection. Additionally, I provided information for the reader to support the Center’s efforts.

What I didn’t mention is what Ioneer is hoping to extract at the site: Lithium carbonate and boric acid.

Though a variety of industrial applications utilize lithium carbonate, demand is rising primarily due to its use in batteries, especially for electric vehicles. In other words, Ioneer’s operation could be considered part of the “green” or “clean” energy industry. Indeed, they make use of one of the monikers themselves: “Lithium is a strategic element linked directly to high technology and clean energy. It has been described as the new oil as it is a key component for batteries fueling the electric vehicle revolution.”

But “green” and “clean” don’t mean “no impact.” All extractive activities have destructive impacts on the natural environment, including lithium mining. Some would argue that fossil fuels are the worst, and that anything is better—that a lesser cost is preferable to a greater cost. Yet in this case, what is the cost?

The Troubles of “Invasive” Plants – zine

January 16, 2019 by Kollibri terre Sonnenblume

“On the topic of so-called ‘invasive’ plants, we don’t have an axe to grind, but there sure is one we would like to dull.”

“The Troubles of ‘Invasive’ Plants” is a 21,000+ word project by Nicole Patrice Hill & Kollibri terre Sonnenblume for Macska Moksha Press. Excerpts are posted online (see below), but the full version is available only as a zine that you can download here free-of-charge.

Hardcopies are for sale here.

The Scarlet “I”: Climate change, “invasive” plants & our culture of domination

January 16, 2019 by Kollibri terre Sonnenblume

This is part three of a three part series. Read part one & part two. The full series, along with additional material, is available as a zine, here.

Dandelion (Taraxacum officinalis) [Photo by KtS]

By Nicole Patrice Hill & Kollibri terre Sonnenblume

Changing plant communities at the local scale are symptomatic of the changing climate globally. Patterns of temperature, precipitation and seasonal timing are shifting, and with them, the patterns of birth, growth, reproduction—and survival—of all living creatures.

One widely observed syndrome is “season creep,” in which Spring has been arriving progressively earlier in the calendar year. This does not mean that every Spring starts sooner than the year before, but that an overall trend has been observed. For example, a survey of leafing, flowering and fruiting records from 1971-2000 for 542 plant species in 21 European Union countries showed advanced timing for 78% of the plants. According to other sources, “Spring events, such as blooming, frog breeding and migrant bird arrivals, have advanced 2.3 days per decade.” Winter snow cover duration—as measured from Fall to Spring—has decreased throughout the Northern Hemisphere since 1978. The earlier the snow melts, the less water is available during the hot summer, which affects a wide range of plants, animals and other life.

Winters have been warming. For example, the average February maximum temperature in the US rose by 0.3 F per decade from 1895-2016. This general rise in the “floor” has been accompanied by an increase in “extreme” events, such as “false Springs” when temperatures warm up enough to trigger life cycle stages in a variety of species. When more “normal” weather arrives later—or another extreme event follows, but this time on the cold side—a plant can be injured or even killed. A common example is when a hot spell causes fruit trees to flower, and then a frost—even just a “normal” one—zaps the flowers, thereby taking out that year’s harvest.

When we were farmers, we experienced how extreme events affect crops. In the Spring of 2013, periods of warmer-than-average weather alternated with periods of colder-than-average weather a few times, and the transitions between them were quick, as in 36 hours. Spring greens thriving in “normal” cool temperatures would go to flower prematurely when the temperature rapidly heated up. Then, warm weather crops would stall out when the temps fell. Annual vegetable plants don’t do well with such erratic conditions and we watched helplessly as our failure rate climbed.

Shooting the messengers: How plants are unfairly blamed for wasteful human water practices in the U.S. West

January 9, 2019 by Kollibri terre Sonnenblume

This is part two of a three part series. Part one can be found here.

Saltcedar trees at an undisclosed location in southern California [photo by KtS]

By Nicole Patrice Hill & Kollibri terre Sonnenblume

Popular ideas are not always factual ideas.

When the subject is a particular “invasive” plant species, common assumptions about its undesirable impacts are not always scientifically documented or even true. Add to this an inherent bias in the field of invasion biology for interpreting nearly all effects of non-native plants as detrimental without considering the possibility of positive outcomes and you’re sure to get villains nearly every time.

Let’s look at two well-known examples of so-called “invasive” plants that are under the gun: Tamarisk, aka Saltcedar (Tamarix spp.) and Russian Olive, aka Oleaster (Elaeagnus angustifolia). In the western United States, these two trees are now the third and fourth most frequently occurring woody riparian plants, and the second and fifth most abundant species along rivers. To eradicate them would entail destroying a significant amount of healthy vegetation (with no little amount of collateral damage to other flora) and would incur a hefty cost. Congress authorized $80 million for Saltcedar removal between 2005 and 2009, which included herbicide,[1] but that is pennies compared to what would be needed for everything. So the case for removal needs to be strong.

But the case is not strong. The main claims made against both species are that they a) push out native flora, b) monopolize groundwater, and c) don’t provide for native fauna. Saltcedar is additionally accused of increasing the salinity of its immediate environment. Yet these claims have never been proven and plenty of evidence to the contrary has been produced.

The Troubles of “Invasive” Plants: Collateral Damage, Monsanto, and the tragedy of Pinyon-Juniper eradication

January 3, 2019 by Kollibri terre Sonnenblume

St. Johnswort (Hypericum perforatum) [photo by KtS]

By Nicole Patrice Hill & Kollibri terre Sonnenblume

This is part one of a three part series. In this part we discuss: a) the negative effects of invasive plant removal methods, b) the involvement of Monsanto in popularizing invasion biology, and c) the tragedy of Pinyon-Juniper forest eradication in the western U.S. under the rubric of “native invasive species management.”

Defining “invasive species” is a slippery proposition.

The U.S. federal government defines it as “an alien species whose introduction does or is likely to cause economic or environmental harm or harm to human health.”

The National Wildlife Federation elevate s environmental considerations, describing it as “any kind of living organism… that is not native to an ecosystem and causes harm.”

The Connecticut Audubon society is less discriminating about the effects of introduction. For them, an invasive is any “non-native species that has been introduced, either intentionally or accidentally into a new habitat or has escaped cultivation.”

A plant species doesn’t have to venture far outside its native range to be considered invasive. Such is the case of the endangered Monterey Cypress (Cupressus macrocarpa), which “ is a frequent target for the chain saws of the San Francisco Recreation and Parks Department—even though two small stands in Monterey, just fifty miles south, are cherished and protected as natives.” Meanwhile, a 500 mile drive north of its relict range , a large specimen planted by European settlers in the 1850’s is an officially designated “Oregon Heritage Tree,” which we assume grants it some safety.

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