Conservation Sense and Nonsense
We use scientific studies and observation to explain why native plant “restorations” in California are rarely successful.
The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2012 annual report for this blog.
Here’s an excerpt:
4,329 films were submitted to the 2012 Cannes Film Festival. This blog had 20,000 views in 2012. If each view were a film, this blog would power 5 Film Festivals
Mistletoe has a mixed reputation. On the one hand, we associate it with the Christmas folk tradition of obliging those who stand beneath it to be kissed. But foresters have always considered it a parasite that sucks the life from the trees in which it lives. Today we have the pleasure of reporting the result of a study in Australia which exonerates mistletoe of this crime.* It’s our Christmas gift to our readers.
David Watson, an ecologist at Sturt University in New South Wales, Australia, had long suspected that his favorite plant, mistletoe didn’t deserve its reputation as a harmful plant. In 2004 he set out to prove his hunch. He removed all the mistletoe from 17 woodlands and compared them with 11 woodlands in which the mistletoe remained and 12 woodlands in which there was no naturally occurring mistletoe.
Removing the mistletoe was a huge task which took two years. A dozen people, using cherry-pickers and clippers removed 40 tons of mistletoe. They waited three years to study the differences in the three types of forest.
They found that there were more birds, mammals, and reptiles in the forests where the mistletoe remained. But the most significant difference in the three types of forest was that the number of insects on the forest floor where the mistletoe remained was much greater.
There are more insects on the forest floor where mistletoe resides because the leaves of the mistletoe contain more nutrients than the leaves of the tree that it occupies. The tree uses the water and nutrients in its leaves before the leaves fall, whereas the fallen leaves of the mistletoe are both more abundant and contain more nutrients. The leaves of the mistletoe also fall throughout the year when many of the trees are dormant. Hence, there’s more food on the forest floor occupied by mistletoe for the insects that live there.
Mistletoe is found everywhere in the world except Antarctica. There are 1,400 species of mistletoe in 5 families. Fossil pollen grains indicate that mistletoe has existed in North America for millions of years. Although a controlled experiment has not been done in North America, some scientists have noticed the benefits of mistletoe to forest life. David Shaw, at Oregon State University, has noticed that the endangered northern spotted owl nests in mistletoe.
Science tests our assumptions
This study of mistletoe is a nifty little example of the power of science to test our assumptions. Our assumptions are often mistaken. We should keep an open mind about any assumption that has not been tested empirically.
Native plant advocates assume that native plants are inherently superior to non-natives and conversely, that non-native plants are not beneficial to wildlife. Their assumptions are not supported by scientific studies. In fact, when their assumptions are tested empirically, they are often proven to be wrong. The native plant movement is an ideology that is not based on science. It is a horticultural preference which should compete in the marketplace of ideas with all other horticultural preferences.
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*Alanna Mitchell, “Beyond the kiss, Mistletoe Helps Feed Forests, Study Suggests,” New York Times, December 17, 2012. Available here.
Webmaster: We are republishing, with permission, a post from the website of Christian Kull, Associate Professor of Geography and Environmental Science at Monash University in Melbourne Australia. He is also Adjunct Professor at the University of the South Pacific. He is presently based in Suva, Fiji, where his wife is employed by a division of the Secretariat of the Pacific Community. (We have added a few edits for an American audience.)
We have read the debate in scientific journals between Professor Kull and his colleague, Jacques Tassin, with Tim Low, which is described in this post. It sounded very familiar to us. On the one hand, Kull and Tassin wish to consider the economic and environmental benefits of acacia. Their pragmatic evaluation of acacia is attacked by Tim Low, using the same alarmist arguments that we hear in the San Francisco Bay Area about another Australian tree, the eucalyptus.
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Are Australian acacias planted overseas miracle plants for rural development, or are they the worst kind of environmental weeds? The battle lines appear rather stark at times. At least when one reads environmentalist Tim Low’s rebuttal to a critique that Jacques Tassin and I wrote of his views. We thought our statement to be tempered and tried to build a reasonable case for responsible use of exotic agroforestry trees (see also previous blog). But Low calls us “in denial about dangerous aid,” flogs a misplaced example about mesquite in an argument about acacia, all the time preaching his argument to the converted in the journal Biological Invasions. Low has even taken his views to an online editorial on the Australian Broadcasting Corp website and has promoted his views to the Herald Sun (link).
Meanwhile, in Vietnam, an entirely different story is developing. On 2 November, there was a small seminar and dinner in Hanoi, Vietnam celebrating the contributions of Australian and Vietnamese scientists to the forestry sector, primarily through the promotion of Australian acacia species. The Vietnamese Government awarded medals to Sadanandan Nambiar, Chris Harwood, Khongsak Pinyopusarerk, Rod Griffin and Stephen Midgley for “contributions to Vietnam’s forest development.” Australian acacias are now a common part of Vietnam’s rural landscape, rehabilitating denuded landscapes, and providing wood for industry and fuel. Australian aid (via CSIRO, AusAID, and ACIAR) played a role in supporting such initiatives since 1987, working together with Vietnamese partners like the Research Centre of Forest Tree Improvement and the Forest Science Institute of Vietnam.
According to Stephen Midgley, there are now about 900,000 hectares of Australian acacia plantations in Vietnam (about the same area as the Californian Pinus radiata [Monterey pine] in Australia). Just last year, an estimated 120,000 hectares of acacias were planted in Vietnam – some 70% by smallholders [private property owners]. Acacias have been used as nurse crops to rehabilitate native forest areas; examples include the protection forests of Hai Van Pass and the Perfumed River catchment behind Hue. Acacias are now a valuable commercial asset, as hardwood woodchips and as furniture wood. Product value exceeded US$1.5 billion in 2011, with some US$400 million returning directly to the pockets of the growers, leading to improvement to livelihoods among acacia-growing communities.
An ecologist may look at this situation and worry that the acacias in Vietnam are going to ‘explode’ in the future, becoming problematic pests or replacing ‘natural’ forest. That is, they will become too successful for their own good. Indeed, apparently the weediness of acacias will be addressed to some extent at the upcoming IUFRO acacia sylviculture working party meeting in Vietnam. Chris Harwood, of Australia’s research agency CSIRO, wrote to me:
“On my just-completed trip to Vietnam I had a careful look (as I always do) in the farming landscapes of northern, central and southern Vietnam for signs of acacias spreading as weeds. There are no such signs. All the farming land is too intensively cultivated (Vietnam has a land area of 33m ha and a population of 87m), and all the acacias in the landscape are planted rather than naturally regenerated, except for very occasional patches of vacant ground which may have a few ‘volunteer’ acacia seedlings but which will soon go under cultivation. Quite large areas formerly under acacia plantations in southern Vietnam have been converted to rubber plantations during the last 5 years, with no evident difficulty. In the north, tea is successfully grown under Acacia mangium. The only caveat regarding weediness in Vietnam is that care must be taken when planting adjacent to native ecosystems to ensure that acacias do not spread into them. But this is a manageable potential problem and is just not an issue for the vast majority of acacia plantations that do not abut natural ecosystems.”
In addition to ecological questions about invasion potential, social scientists may ask about how access to land and other rural power relations are altered by such forestry development. Indeed they have already (link). But the point here might be that shouting from diametrically opposed ideological camps is probably not the best way to move forward. In this case, there is a will to plant acacias (what combination of government diktat and social consensus I don’t know) and they are already deeply incorporated into the physical and socio-economic landscape. In addition to shaping the already very anthropogenic landscape by farming rice, other crops, and tree crops like rubber (over 1 million hectares), the Vietnamese are farming acacias. The question then, instead of “go acacia go” or “doom is coming,” is how farmers, foresters, villager leaders, government agents, and scientists might each in their own way address the questions of the future of Vietnam’s regional landscapes – what values are important, what are the options, what are the constraints and potential problems, what does the evidence show. It is this kind of measured approach Jacques Tassin and I tried to make in our response to Tim Low.
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Webmaster: We believe that the debate we are engaged in with native plant advocates should be a land-use decision. This should be a civil debate, which in a democratic society should result in a decision that reflects the wishes of an entire community.
Unfortunately, native plant advocates seem to believe that their demand that non-native trees and plants be destroyed is a moral imperative. Although they claim environmental damage from non-native trees, they are unable to provide the scientific evidence to support that claim. In the absence of such evidence, their demands are just an imposition of their gardening preferences on the public. The tactics they use to impose their will are inconsistent with their claim that they are on the moral high-ground and the methods they use to eradicate non-native species are also inconsistent with their claim that they are benefiting the environment.
Last week we published an article about how plants are responding to climate change. We received a comment from Don E that questioned the accuracy of the climate data in the study in Ohio which found a relationship between increased temperatures and earlier blooming times. We didn’t have access to the information needed to respond to that comment, but we were unwilling to publish it without verifying its claims because we do not want to misinform our readers.
So, we asked the author of the study in Ohio, Kellen Calinger, if she could help us verify the accuracy of the comment. Ms. Calinger has generously obliged us with a detailed critique of the comment. With her permission, we are now publishing her reply in its entirety.
Don E: “There are controlled laboratory experiments to show that temperature, moisture, and CO₂ effect plant growth. The Ohio study was not a controlled study and the temperature data are questionable.”
Ms. Calinger: There are indeed controlled laboratory experiments regarding impacts of temperature, moisture, and CO2 on plant growth and my study was not controlled. My study falls under the broad heading of observational science. Observational and experimental studies are both extremely common and each has pros and cons. The pros of experiments include a high degree of control over the system allowing you to focus on impacts of your variable of interest while the cons include less realistic description of a natural system. The pros and cons of observational studies are essentially the opposite of an experiment; I didn’t control environmental variables in my study, but it likely reflects the reality of what’s happening in ecosystems far more than an experiment. Again, these are both accepted methods of the scientific community.
Don E: .”USHCN makes a huge TOBS adjustment in Ohio between 1979 and 1988. The justification for this is that they claim people in Ohio switched from reading temperatures in the afternoon, to reading them in the morning. That would theoretically push measured temperatures progressively down from 1979 to 1988. The Ohio raw data does not provide any support for the TOBS theory. In the middle of a long term cooling trend, measured temperatures rose very quickly from 1979 to 1988.”
Ms. Calinger: The TOBS adjustment (time of observation adjustment) is essentially to control for the time of day that temperature measurements were taken. A simple example would be that if I measured temperatures at noon from 1980-1990 and the next observer measured temperatures at 6AM from 1991-2000, it would probably seem like it was cooler in the ’90’s since 6AM is typically cooler than noon. If you don’t correct for the time of observation, the actual temperature trend would be obscured by daily variation in temperatures based on time of observation.
The U.S. Historical Climatology Network is part of the Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis center, and they lay out exactly how they treat data on their website–here’s the link: http://cdiac.ornl.gov/epubs/ndp/ushcn/monthly_doc.html
Don E: “In addition Ohio Valley Summer Temperatures have been plummeting for 80 years. July of 2009 was the coldest on record in the Ohio Valley, and July temperatures have been plummeting in that region since 1930. July 1934 and 1936 were both much hotter – even after NCDC adds 1.5 degrees on to recent temperatures relative to the 1930s.”
Ms. Calinger: It seems that the commenter got this information from the following blog: http://stevengoddard.wordpress.com/2012/08/03/ohio-valley-summer-temperatures-have-been-plummeting-for-80-years/
The blog presents a plot of temperature data for the Ohio Valley that starts in 1930 and runs until 2011 that indicates an overall trend of temperature decrease by 0.19 degrees Fahrenheit per decade. While I can’t know the intentions of the author of this blog, this seems to be a case of data manipulation to mislead. I went to the NCDC website used by the blog author and made an identical plot of Ohio Valley temperature data for July, but I didn’t restrict my plot to 1930-2011. Instead, I used the full temperature data set from 1895-2012 and found NO indication of temperature decrease. An extremely common tactic among climate change skeptics is to restrict a data set to a small subset of the total data that shows a cooling trend even though this is not indicative of the long term pattern.
You can make these graphs at: http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/research/cag3/ce.html
Don E: “I would never call anyone a denier. That is an ugly term intended to denigrate skeptics by associating them with holocaust deniers. There are many highly regarded climate and physical scientists not funded by the fossil fuel industry that don’t accept the hypothesis that CO2 is the primary cause of climate change. BTW there has been no global warming in 16 years.”
Ms. Calinger: There is simply no debate in the scientific community about climate change. It is accepted that climate change is occurring and that warming is predominantly caused by humans. This blog provides a really good summary of the scientific consensus: http://www.desmogblog.com/2012/11/15/why-climate-deniers-have-no-credibility-science-one-pie-chart
Of 13, 950 scientific papers, 24 reject climate change. That’s pretty clearly an overwhelming majority.
Also, there has most definitely been warming in the past 16 years. This past summer was the 3rd hottest on record in the U.S. and seven of the 10 hottest summers in U.S. history have occurred since 2000.
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Webmaster: We are grateful to Ms. Calinger for her help to respond to Don E. We have certainly learned something from her and we hope that Don E has as well.
We take the time and trouble to research the claims of those who choose to deny the reality of climate change because we believe that it is presently the most serious threat to our environment. Human civilization is currently unwilling to take needed action to reverse this dangerous trend. Those who refuse to believe that it is necessary to take action are at least partly to blame for this. We hope that if and when human civilization acknowledges climate change and its consequences, we will finally make the tough decisions that are needed.
Postscript: The word “denier” is defined by Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary as “one who denies.” It is not used exclusively to describe those who deny that the holocaust occurred. In fact, it doesn’t even imply that the denier is denying something that actually exists. It is a neutral term that applies to any person who denies anything. For example, I deny that I am fabricating information about climate change. Therefore I am a denier of that accusation.
Although we do not use the word “denier” in order to denigrate those who choose not to believe in climate change, we are frankly mystified by their motivation.
Despite a minority of die-hard deniers and their corporate enablers in the fossil fuel industry, most scientists have quit debating that the climate has changed and will continue to change. Nor is there much doubt that the primary cause of climate change is the significant increase in the greenhouse gases that trap heat on the Earth’s surface. Scientists have now turned their attention to the huge task of understanding the consequences of a changed climate and predicting its future course. Our best hope is that such knowledge can help us to devise strategies for coping with the consequences.
In this post, we will share with our readers some of the recent research about how plants and trees are responding to climate change.
Non-native plants are more responsive than natives to higher temperatures
The State of Ohio has one of the most complete climate records in the country. They have had weather stations in stable locations throughout the state since 1895. From 1895 to 2009, these weather stations reported an average increase in temperature of 1.7 degrees Fahrenheit. All of the weather stations were outside of urban areas, so we can be confident that the data were not confused by the separate, but associated, phenomenon of the urban heat affect as population and development in urban areas increased during this period.
These data were combined with an equally rich source of information, the herbarium of the University of Ohio which contains 500,000 plant specimens. These two sources of information enabled a graduate student, Kellen Calinger, to assemble “one of the six-largest such data sets in the world tracking the history of the wildflower life cycle in response to climate change.” (1)
Ms. Calinger compared the bloom time of 141 species of plants with the temperature at the time of bloom. She reports that “…46% of the 141 species showed significant advancement in flowering in response to increased temperatures. And more of this advancement was seen in introduced species [AKA non-natives] than in native plants.”
Ms. Calinger predicts that the non-native plants that bloom before their native neighbors have a competitive advantage. Presumably, they are growing and occupying ground prior to the natives. If, indeed, climate change is giving non-native plants an advantage that would help to explain why attempts to eradicate non-native plants and replace them with native plants are often unsuccessful.
However, the report of this research then enters muddy territory. It speculates, but without offering evidence, that there may also be disadvantages to blooming earlier:
What do we know about the response of plants in urban areas?
So, how does this information apply to our urban area? In general, temperatures in urban areas are higher than in rural areas because so much of our ground is covered with buildings and hardscape that absorb and retain heat. This is called the urban heat affect. It seems logical to assume that what has been observed in the rural setting would be exaggerated in the urban setting. That is, plants in urban areas are likely blooming even earlier because the temperatures are higher, although there is probably an upper threshold, beyond which there is no growth benefit.
However, there are other factors in climate change that are more important in urban areas which are also affecting the growth of plants and trees. Greenhouse gases are greater in urban areas than in rural areas because of industrial and transportation emissions.
Carbon dioxide concentrations have increased 24% globally since 1960. We should assume that increase is greater in urban areas. Carbon dioxide is the primary fuel of photosynthesis, so we should not be surprised to learn that higher concentrations of carbon dioxide are associated with faster plant growth. (2)
Kevin Griffin (Columbia University) compared the growth of the native red oak in rural New York with their brethren in New York City over a period of 8 years. The average minimum temperature in August was 71.6 degrees at the city site and 63.5 degrees in the country. He also found elevated levels of nitrogen in the leaves of the trees in the city. Nitrogen is a plant nutrient. Griffen reported that, “The urban oaks, harvested in August 2008, weighed eight times as much as their rural cousins, mostly because of increased foliage.” (2)
Unfortunately, like most stories about climate change, this one is also a mixed blessing. While carbon dioxide and higher temperatures may benefit plants in the city, other elements in urban air do not. Higher levels of ozone can severely damage plant pores, which slows their growth and some trees are more susceptible to this damage than others. Cottonwoods are particularly susceptible to ozone damage. Ironically, ozone levels are actually higher in rural areas than in urban areas because some of the ozone is converted to oxygen in the city, while the remaining ozone “blows out to the country.” (2)
What are the implications for readers of Million Trees?
Here’s our take-away message from these research reports:
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(1) “Non-native plants show a greater response than native wildflowers to climate change,” October 5, 2012. Available here.
(2) Guy Gugliotta, “Looking to Cities, in Search of Global Warming’s Silver Lining,” New York Times, November 26, 2012. Available here.
According to California Trees (1) the US Forest Service has determined that tree cover in the country’s urban areas is decreasing by 4 million trees a year. Although no research has been done on tree loss throughout California, the US Forest Service reported a one-percent decline in trees and shrubs in Los Angeles despite a big campaign to plant one million trees there.
You might think that the loss of trees in urban areas is the result of increasing development and you would probably be at least partially correct. But many trees are lost for more trivial reasons that we think could be easily prevented. Here are some local examples of trees in the Bay Area that were needlessly destroyed or soon will be.
Deforestation causes climate change
We have been accumulating these stories in the past few months, but are finally inspired to share them with our readers because of the recent storm on the East Coast, Sandy, which caused over $50 billion in damage and the lives of over 100 people. What’s the connection? The connection is that Sandy has finally forced people to take the threats of climate change more seriously.
When will this new interest in climate change translate to an interest in saving our trees? Probably not soon, because few people understand that globally, deforestation contributes 20% of greenhouse gases that cause climate change. The public and its elected representatives are focused primarily on transportation as the source of climate change. Transportation contributes only 10% of greenhouse gases globally.
Here in California, we are gearing up to put our climate change law (AB 32) into action by creating a cap and trade auction which will enable emitters of greenhouse gases to purchase carbon offsets. Ironically, one of the things that carbon emitters can do to offset their contribution to greenhouse gases is to plant trees. Yet, those who destroy trees are not being required to purchase carbon offsets. Until the people who destroy trees are required to pay for the damage they do to the environment, we are unlikely to see a change in the cavalier attitude that governments seem to have about destroying trees.
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(1) California Trees, Winter 2012, Vol 20, no 2
Joseph Mascaro is one of the scientists Emma Marris interviewed for her ground-breaking book, Rambunctious Garden. (1) Marris visited Mascaro on the Big Island of Hawaii, where he was studying the forests, comparing native with “novel” forests, the name given to ecosystems composed of both native and introduced species of plants.
According to Marris, Mascaro considers Ariel Lugo his mentor. Lugo is a US Forest Service scientist living and working in Puerto Rico. He is one of the first scientists to observe and report that non-native forests in Puerto Rico are performing important ecological functions and benefiting native forests by restoring depleted agricultural soils and providing shelter to native seedlings.
Lugo, like many native plant advocates, received his education in ecology at a time when there was deep suspicion of introduced species. The conventional wisdom was that introduced species were competitors of preferred native species, that they were inferior members of an ecosystem and that they would eventually dominate and replace their native predecessors.
When Lugo’s team reported that the understory in the non-native forest was so dense that it made the forest impenetrable, he was incredulous. Slowly, the reality of the non-native forest penetrated the prejudices of his training. He submitted his findings for publication repeatedly. After a lengthy debate, his study was finally published in 1992. He still considers himself an outlier amongst his colleagues in the Forest Service.
Joseph Mascaro is now a Postdoctoral Associate at the Carnegie Institution for Science in Stanford, California. His study of the novel forests of Hawaiian lowland rain forests has recently been published: “Novel forests maintain ecosystem processes after the decline of native tree species.” (2) We will do our layman’s best to report his main findings.
Judging the forest by the functions it performs
The scientific community seems to agree that introduced plant species have resulted in a net increase in species on the Hawaiian Islands: “Seventy-one vascular plant species are known to have become extinct in Hawaii over the past ~1700 years, while at least 1,090 introduced plant species have become naturalized during this period: an approximate doubling of its pre-human contact flora.” (2)
Mascaro’s study asks and answers the question, what are the functional implications of increased diversity due to invasion? He proposes and tests three hypotheses:
He reports his findings: “At local scales, we found that novel forests had significantly higher tree species richness and higher diversity of dominant tree species. We further found that aboveground biomass, productivity, nutrient turnover (as measured by soil-available and litter-cycled nitrogen and phosphorus) and belowground carbon storage either did not differ significantly or were significantly greater in novel relative to native forests.” (2) Our interpretation of this study is that the novel forests of the lowland rain forests of Hawaii maintain basic functioning where native forests are now absent and that the novel forest facilitates the revegetation of barren lava flows by creating fertile soil.
He also speculated that “Because large portions of the Earth’s surface are undergoing similar transitions from native to novel ecosystems, our results are likely to be broadly applicable.” (2) It is this conclusion that his findings can be generalized to other locations that brought Joseph Mascaro’s study to our attention.
Mascaro recently wrote to the Webmaster of the Save Mount Sutro Forest website and sent his study. He lives in San Francisco and drives over Mt. Sutro daily, on his way to work. Mascaro told the Save Sutro Webmaster, “I wanted to let you know that your website and effort are much appreciated. As a practicing ecologist, I find it bewildering that efforts to restore native plant communities (some of which I find very important) would be directed at a diverse, old-growth, functioning ecosystem smack in the middle of one of the largest cities in the country….Cases like Sutro are often emotional and controversial, and while I don’t disparage anyone’s view, I tend to think that great pause must be taken before destroying something that is centuries old. I hope you will continue your effort.” (quoted with permission)
We are grateful to Joseph Mascaro for his research on the novel forests of Hawaii and for expressing his opinion of the value of the forest on Mt. Sutro. We are also grateful to the Webmaster of Save Sutro Forest for her insightful and articulate defense of the Sutro Forest.
The evolution of ecology
We began this post with the observation that scientists have found it difficult to report their findings about novel ecosystems that are not consistent with their educational training. When we expect to see something, it is often difficult for us to see something that contradicts those expectations. We commend scientists such as Ariel Lugo for reporting his observations, although they weren’t consistent with his training.
We are also pleased to report that we have observed, first-hand, a change in the training of university students in ecology. We attended two sessions of an undergraduate seminar in a local, major university. That seminar is reading and evaluating Rambunctious Garden. The students were entirely receptive to the revision of traditionally negative judgments of introduced species. That revision is the main theme of Rambunctious Garden. These students are the next generation of ecologists. They are the beginning of a new conventional wisdom about the role of introduced species in our ecosystems.
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(1) Emma Marris, Rambunctious Garden, Bloomsbury, 2011
(2) Joseph Mascaro, R. Flint Hughes, Stefan A. Schnitzer, “Novel forests maintain ecosystem processes after the decline of native tree species,” Ecological Monographs, 82(2), 2012, pp. 221-228 by Ecological Society of America
We try to give people the benefit of the doubt. We assume that native plant advocates believe what they say even when we know what they’re saying isn’t true. We assume they share our commitment to protecting the environment even though we don’t agree about how to achieve that goal.
When the Center for Biological Diversity (CBD) was required by the Arizona Supreme Court to pay $600,000 in punitive damages for fabricating fraudulent evidence to support their unsuccessful effort to take federal grazing rights from a rancher in Arizona, we assumed it was just an example of over-zealous environmentalism. People who believe they are on an important mission sometimes think the means they use to achieve their goals are justified by the righteous ends of their cause.
However, recent events have forced us to reconsider our generous interpretation of CBD’s motives. In particular, we find the Center for Biological Diversity’s action and inaction on these two local issues contradictory:
Is Center for Biological Diversity motivated by money?
So how do we reconcile these seemingly inconsistent actions vs. inactions of CBD? What motivates their selection of particular species of plants and animals for protection?
Ted Williams calls himself an “environmental extremist.” He is the author of a regular column in Audubon Magazine which is appropriately entitled, “Incite.” One of Williams’ articles demonizing eucalyptus is typical of the provocative approach of his column. In that article, he fabricated “data” about bird deaths to justify the crusade to eradicate eucalypts.
Williams is proud of his credentials as an environmental provocateur and he uses those credentials to defend his criticism of Center for Biological Diversity in an article in High Country News (1). He expresses his opinion that CBD is motivated by money. He points out that CBD has filed hundreds of suits against the federal government, using environmental laws, such as the Endangered Species Act, and that every time it wins it collects attorney fees from the federal government. The cost and number of these suits has become a major obstacle to US Fish & Wildlife and the Environmental Protection Agency in fulfilling their mandate to protect rare species.
Although these accusations are accurate, we don’t think this is an adequate explanation for CBD’s choice of issues to pursue. We turn to the New York Times to put this accusation into perspective. The Times reports (2) that CBD had filed 700 lawsuits when the article was published in March 2010, and they were successful in those suits 93% of the time. Those suits forced the government to list 350 endangered species and designate 120 million acres of critical habitat for their recovery.
However, revenue generated by the success of these suits was only $1.4 million in 2008, compared with $7.6 million from contributions and grants. In other words, only 16% of CBD’s revenue in 2008 came from their suits against the federal government.
Furthermore, the founder and Executive Director of CBD earned $116,000 in 2008, which doesn’t seem out of line for an organization with over 60 employees and offices all over the country (including the San Francisco Bay Area).
We don’t think the leadership of CBD is motivated by money.
It’s about power and control
We turn to the New Yorker magazine (3) to understand and explain the motivation of Center for Biological Diversity and its local ally, Wild Equity. In 1999, the New Yorker published an in-depth study of the leadership of CBD entitled, “No People Allowed.”
The article reports the creation of CBD and its early history in the southwest where it was founded and is still headquartered. Their initial efforts were direct-action, typical of traditional environmental organizations; then they discovered the power of the law: “’We’re crazy to sit in trees when there’s this incredible law where we can make people do whatever we want,’” said Robin Silver, one of the founders of CBD.
Using federal environmental laws, they apparently brought the timber industry in the southwest to a virtual halt and they were making similar progress in eliminating all grazing in the southwest when the article was published. Perhaps there was some benefit to the environment, but there was also significant economic loss to the human community in the southwest, according to the New Yorker.
So, what does CBD want? The New Yorker tells us that the founder’s deconstructionist philosophy is “a decentering and disempowering of the human.” Their goal is described: “…the center is endeavoring to undo the dominion of man over animals and plants…the only way to get to the desired state is to deconstruct stuff that exists in the world: legal arrangements, social and economic forms, and even physical structures.” CBD’s Executive Director tells us his motivation in the New Yorker article as well as the long term goal of CBD: “[Kieran] Suckling cheerfully admitted that he’s ‘using one side of industrial society against itself,’ but only temporarily; in the long run, he says, there will be a new order in which plants and animals are part of the polity. For example, legal proceedings could be conducted outdoors—in which case ‘the trees will make themselves felt.’”
We find the reference to the desires of trees particularly interesting. Apparently Mr. Suckling believes he speaks for the trees. What about the non-native trees which CBD demands we destroy on behalf of other plants and animals which it prefers? Mr. Suckling apparently considers himself the spokesperson for just particular trees of his choosing. Apparently the rights of trees will be limited to native trees when CBD has successfully established this new order.
Mr. Suckling also implies that CBD’s control of the environment is only temporary until the new order is established in which plants and animals are in control. This reminds us of a similar fantasy about a new social and economic model which was originally proposed by Karl Marx. In creating the concept of communism, he envisioned a temporary dictatorship of elites which would eventually be ceded to a “dictatorship of the proletariat.” The world has now witnessed many attempts to install communism as the governing economic model, but we have not seen the dictatorship of elites willingly cede their power to the people.
This quote of CBD’s Executive Director from Ted Williams’ article, also helps us to understand why CBD sues the federal government to achieve their goals: “’They [employees of federal agencies] feel like their careers are being mocked and destroyed—and they are,’ he told the High Country News. ‘So they become much more willing to play by our rules.’” In other words, suing—and the threat of suit—is CBD’s means of controlling the federal agencies that are responsible for protecting the environment, i.e., forcing them to do what CBD wants.
Humans will always be in control of land-use decisions. It’s only a question of which humans are in control and CBD intends to be the humans in control. If we hand them that power, we will find it difficult to wrest it from them if we decide they are not using that power wisely or fairly.
We can’t defend all of the activities of humans when we damage the environment to suit our purposes. However, we don’t think the Center for Biological Diversity would be a better steward of our land. Even if they were capable of wise land-use decisions, we are unwilling to suspend democratic methods of making those decisions. As human society repeatedly demonstrates, absolute power corrupts absolutely. We are no more willing to hand our fate to Center for Biological Diversity than to any other despot, benevolent or not.
We invite Center for Biological Diversity to prove us wrong
We would like Center for Biological Diversity to prove us wrong. CBD can demonstrate that their motivation is not simply the confiscation of public land from human use as a means of destroying human society and civilization. They can start by filing suit on behalf of the endangered Clapper Rail to stop the pointless and destructive eradication of non-native Spartina in San Francisco Bay, using a toxic pesticide about which little is known. CBD can demonstrate their commitment to protecting animals even if humans are not punished by that effort.
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(1) Ted Williams, “Extreme Green,” High Country News, May 21, 2011
(2) Anne Mulkern, et. al., “Brazen Environmental Upstart Brings Legal Muscle, Nerve in Climate Debate,” New York Times, March 30, 2010.
(3) Nicholas Lemann, “No People Allowed,” New Yorker, November 22, 1999.
We have provided our readers with photographic evidence that eucalypts are not invasive in the San Francisco Bay Area (click here and here). Now we are going to tell you about more confirmation of this fact from a reputable source that will be difficult for native plant advocates to ignore: Encyclopedia of Biological Invasions.
The Encyclopedia was edited by Daniel Simberloff (U of Tennessee) and Marcel Rejmanek (UC Davis) and published by UC Berkeley Press in 2011. Many of our readers will recognize Simberloff as a prominent scientist in invasion biology. He is responsible for the “invasional meltdown” hypothesis which is central to invasion biology. A recent survey of empirical tests of the hypotheses of invasion biology found that there is considerable support for the “invasional meltdown” hypothesis, but that support is declining.
Professor Simberloff has aggressively defended the assumptions of invasion biology against scientists who think that a revision of those assumptions is required by recent empirical evidence. When Professor Mark Davis and 18 of his colleagues in ecology signed a comment in the Nature journal entitled, “Don’t judge species on their origins,” Professor Simberloff promptly recruited 140 of his colleagues to publish a rebuttal.
We establish Professor Simberloff’s credentials for our readers as a scientist who firmly believes that non-native species are a serious threat to biodiversity so that native plant advocates will consider him a credible source of information regarding eucalyptus.
“Eucalypts” according to the Encyclopedia of Biological Invasions
According to the Encyclopedia of Biological Invasions, eucalypts are “some of the most important solid timber and paper pulp forestry trees in the world.” There are about 40 million acres of eucalypts planted in tropical, sub-tropical, and temperate countries. The predominant species of eucalyptus in the Bay Area, Blue Gum (E. globulus), is grown in 13 countries in addition to the US and Australia. About 70 species of eucalypts are naturalized outside their native ranges. “However, given the extent of cultivation, eucalypts are markedly less invasive than many other widely cultivated trees and shrubs…they have been orders of magnitude less successful as invaders than pines and several other widely planted trees…Where eucalypts have invaded, they have very seldom spread considerable distances from planting sites, and their regeneration is frequently sporadic. “ (1)
Although the Encyclopedia admits to being puzzled by why eucalypts aren’t invasive, it offers “three major reasons for the limited invasiveness of eucalypts:”
Reason One: Seed dispersal of eucalypts is limited
The seeds of eucalypts have no natural means of dispersal, such as fleshy tissue which can function as wings on the wind. Tests have shown that the seeds “are dispersed over quite short distances.” (1) “Seed dispersal is mainly by wind or gravity and is virtually limited to twice the tree height.” (2)
The seeds of the Blue Gum are encapsulated in a woody pod which makes them inedible to birds and mammals. So, the seeds of the Blue Gum are not dispersed by animals.
Reason Two: High mortality of eucalyptus seedlings
Eucalyptus seedlings die quickly if they don’t establish roots in moist soil quickly. If the soil is too moist they are susceptible to destruction by fungus. If there is too much leaf litter or there is an understory, they are unlikely to find the quick access to the soil they need to survive. There is a narrow range of conditions needed to successfully establish eucalyptus seedlings.
Reason Three: Lack of compatible mycorrhizal fungi
Mycorrhizal fungi exist in the soil and sometimes form a symbiotic relationship with the roots of plants. They are often essential to the health of the plant because they facilitate the absorption of water and nutrients by the plant. Some biologists speculate that the specific species of mycorrhizal fungi needed for successful seedling development have not been exported with the eucalypts to foreign soils.
A balanced discussion of the pros and cons of eucalypts
Given the strong commitment of the authors of the Encyclopedia of Biological Invasions to invasion biology, we are impressed with its even-handed discussion of the ecological pros and cons of eucalypts as well as its recognition of the lack of hard data to support a particular conclusion: “Conclusions about positive or negative environmental and economic impacts of eucalypts are often anecdotal, highly controversial and context dependent.”
The authors suggest that eucalypts not be planted near streams as the moving water is a means of seed dispersal. On the other hand, when planted on degraded soil, the eucalypts have provided a fuel source which reduces pressure on remnants of native forests. Eucalypts have been a valuable source of nectar for honey production all over the world. More birds are said to be found in native forests than eucalyptus forests in California. However, three times as many salamanders are found in the eucalyptus forests compared to native forests in California.
The Encyclopedia also addresses the controversial question of whether or not eucalypts are allelopathic, which means chemicals in their roots or leaves suppress the germination of the seeds of other plants. It reports that there is no conclusive evidence on this question. However, the accumulation of leaf litter is probably a physical barrier to the germination of seeds in its understory, which is not an allelopathic method of suppressing competition. This is clearly true of other trees as well. For example, the tannins present in both oak and eucalyptus leaves prevent the rapid break down of the leaf litter which accumulates and creates a physical barrier to competing vegetation. This is one of many examples of the characteristics that both native and non-native plants have in common.
The Encyclopedia attributes the flammability of the eucalyptus forest to leaf litter which is exacerbated in California by rare deep freezes. These deep freezes cause die-back of eucalypts, contributing to fuel loads. It makes no mention of the oiliness of leaves as a factor in flammability.
There has not been such a deep freeze in the East Bay in over 20 years and 20-year intervals of such weather events have been historically typical. These deep freezes do not occur on the San Francisco peninsula because its climate is moderated by the ocean and bay surrounding it. Its climate is therefore warmer in winter and cooler in summer. Therefore, this caveat about the flammability of eucalypts does not apply in San Francisco.
The myth lives on…..
Despite the fact that there is no evidence—scientific or experiential—that eucalypts are invasive, the myth lives on amongst the community of native plants advocates. We will continue to provide the evidence that eucalypts are not invasive. We hope that eventually the public will be sufficiently informed that they will become resistant to this claim of native plant advocates which is one of many myths used to justify the needless destruction of eucalypts.
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(1) Marcel Rejmanek and David Richardson, “Eucalypts,” in Encyclopedia of Biological Invasions, eds, Daniel Simberloff and Marcel Rejmanek, University of California Berkeley Press, 2011.
(2) Craig Hardner, et. al., “The Relationship between Cross Success and Spatial Proximity of Eucalypts Globulus ssp. Globulus Parents,” in Evolution, 212, 1998, 614-618.
The San Francisco Forest Alliance has made considerable progress in informing the public of the destructive projects of San Francisco’s Natural Areas Program (NAP). NAP and its supporters have taken notice of the growing opposition to their plans to transform our public parks into native plant museums. They are cranking up their public relations effort to confuse the public.
The Recreation and Park Department of the City of San Francisco is the sponsor of the Natural Areas Program. They have recently created a cynical video about NAP which misrepresents the reality of what NAP has done to our parks and what they plan to do in the future. The San Francisco Forest Alliance has produced a rebuttal to this video which is available here. Because the Recreation and Park Department disabled the ability to post comments to their video, we call the rebuttal the “Free Speech Version.”
The Sierra Club has also published an article about the Natural Areas Program in their newsletter, The Yodeler. This article is also chock full of misinformation both about NAP and about its critics. This is our rebuttal to this article. These are issues that we have covered in the past, so we’re not providing much detail here, but we’ve included links to previous Million Trees posts. (The Yodeler article is italicized and in quotes and our rebuttal is not italicized.)
[Edited to add: The SF Forest Alliance has posted a letter written by a Sierra Club member which the Yodeler Editor has refused to print. ]
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“San Francisco Natural Areas Management Plan in peril”
“In San Francisco, where nearly everyone claims to be an environmentalist, how can there be opposition to certifying environmental review for the city’s Significant Natural Resource Areas Management Plan (SNRAMP) to guide the care of the city’s natural areas?
The plan covers all aspects of preservation for the city’s natural areas, which include many of the most vital remnants of the city’s original ecosystems, including a diverse array of landscapes and habitat types.”
Webmaster: There is no opposition to an environmental review of the Natural Areas Program. Rather there is opposition to the Draft EIR because it is a white wash. The Draft EIR fabricates a plan which is easy to defend but bears little relationship to the written plan (SNRAMP) that it is legally obligated to evaluate.
Most of the natural areas had no native plants in them when they were designated as natural areas. The claim that the natural areas are “remnants of original ecosystems” is bogus. Some were essentially building rubble from the constructions of former occupants of the land.
“Much of the conflict surrounding the plan has to do with concerns about tree removal. Most of the trees in the designated natural areas will remain where they are. The vast majority of lands—including almost all the lands within the less critical MA-2 and MA-3 management subareas—will remain forested.”
Webmaster: Native plant advocates killed approximately 1,200 trees by girdling them before they were caught and stopped. Since then NAP has destroyed hundreds of trees in many natural areas. Their written plans (SNRAMP) state that they plan to destroy 18,500 trees over 15 feet tall and countless smaller trees which they choose not to define as trees.
“However, many trees are in sorry shape, suffering from old age, disease, beetle infestations, and cumulative damage from years of neglect.”
Webmaster: The trees that NAP plans to remove are not hazardous or unhealthy. They have been selected for removal solely because they are shading native plants or areas where NAP wishes to expand existing native plant gardens. Most of the plants that are native to San Francisco require full sun. The written plan makes this reason for tree removals perfectly clear. Those who claim that the trees are unhealthy have either not read the written plan or they willfully misrepresent it.
Critics of NAP are not opposed to the removal of hazardous trees. The City of San Francisco has the right and the obligation to identify hazardous trees and remove them. Neither a written management plan for NAP nor an Environmental Impact Report is required to remove hazardous trees.
“Some trees are the wrong species in the wrong places, displacing habitat needed by native birds, pollinators, and other critters. A stand of planted blue gum or Monterey cypress may be large and “majestic”, but take up space needed for native habitat (grassland, dune-scrub, oak woodlands, etc.)”
Webmaster: This is the heart of the controversy. Most of the trees will be destroyed only because they are the “wrong species,” not because they are hazardous. Those who know both the science of ecology and the reality of wildlife in San Francisco do not believe that wildlife benefits from the destruction of existing trees and vegetation. Animals have long ago adapted to the existing landscape which has been here for over 150 years. We also make no distinction between native and non-native wildlife. Both are equally valuable to us and we find the distinction distasteful, just as we find racial prejudice distasteful.
“The SNRAMP is designed to strike a balance, making the most of the ecological value of existing forested areas while in certain critical areas (such as small patches on Mount Davidson), the plan calls for limited tree removal.”
Webmaster: Mt. Davidson will lose 1,600 trees over 15 feet tall when SNRAMP is implemented in addition to about 200 trees that have already been destroyed by NAP or its supporters. Most of the trees on 10.2 acres of Mt. Davidson will be destroyed. This is not a “small patch.”
“Unfortunately, a small but vocal group of “tree advocates” has been campaigning loudly against any tree removal in any park, anywhere in the city. They have exaggerated the envisioned amounts of tree-removal, and promulgated disinformation about the scope and objectives of the plan, wildly accusing advocates of ecological restoration of wanting to revert the entire park system to its former “wasteland” of dunes and scrub.”
Webmaster: Critics of NAP are not a “small group.” Several thousand people have signed the petitions of the San Francisco Forest Alliance, asking the City’s policy-makers to stop the destruction in San Francisco’s parks.
Here is a quote from the management plan for NAP which clearly states its objectives: “Prior to colonization and the stabilization of dunes and introduction of invasive species, trees were not a dominant feature of the San Francisco peninsula…Much of the area probably resembled the coastal scrub habitats of San Bruno Mountain or the grassland scrub mosaics of the Marin Headlands…The long-term goal of urban management in MA-1 and MA-2 areas…is to slowly convert those areas to native scrub and grassland.”
It is not necessary to exaggerate the objectives of NAP for the 1,100 acres of park land they have claimed as natural areas. Their objectives are clearly stated in their management plan.
“Contention has also come from segments of the well-organized off-leash-dog advocates. Partly because of continuing disagreements with the Golden Gate National Recreation Area over management of Crissy Field and Fort Funston (see September-October 2005, page 23). Some oppose any environmental restriction on dogs, and some seem to object to any fencing anywhere or any attempt to route pedestrian and canine traffic into well-defined paths—even to protect erosion-prone areas or sensitive plantings. We don’t believe that these represent the majority of responsible dog-owners, but they have been the most vocal.”
Webmaster: People who visit San Francisco’s parks with their dogs are impacted by NAP because NAP has claimed 80% of all off-leash areas as “natural areas. Only 118 acres of park land in San Francisco have been designated for off-leash areas. In other words, there are 1,100 acres of “natural areas” but only 118 acres of off-leash areas and NAP has claimed 80% of those 118 acres. (SNRAMP 5-8)
The Draft Environmental Impact Report (DEIR) for NAP proposes to close or reduce the size of several off-leash areas. The DEIR offers no evidence that these areas have been negatively impacted by dogs. It also states that all off-leash areas in the natural areas are subject to closure in the future if it is deemed necessary to protect native plants. Since NAP has offered no evidence that the proposed immediate closures are necessary, one reasonably assumes it will offer no evidence if it chooses to close the remainder of the 80% of all off-leash areas in San Francisco located in natural areas. We know from the DEIR public comments that NAP supporters demand their closure.
Given these facts, no one should be surprised that people who wish to walk their dog in the parks have reacted to the Natural Areas Program and the restrictions it has proposed. The Sierra Club’s representation of dog owners as being unreasonable is unfair and misrepresents the nature of their opposition.
“Some feral-cat advocates have objected to reductions in large feral-cat colonies on park lands. There are also some people who object to the use of any herbicide. Then there are those who argue against the plan from a posture of ecological nihilism. They maintain that under the new conditions informing evolution in the “anthropocene” era, it makes little sense to spend money and resources trying to save native ecosystems which are inevitably doomed to extinction. Rather, they suggest, we should embrace the “rambunctious” exuberance of weeds gone wild.”
Webmaster: The Sierra Club finally acknowledges that NAP uses herbicides. What a breakthrough! However, it tells us nothing about NAP’s herbicide use, which would explain why park visitors object. NAP’s herbicide use has increased over 300% in the past three years. It used herbicides 86 times in 2011 and it has sprayed 87 times in the first 9 months of 2012. Most of the herbicides it uses are classified by the City’s Integrated Pest Management Program (IPM) as “Most Hazardous” and “More Hazardous.”
In addition to NAP’s herbicide use, volunteers have been seen and photographed spraying herbicides in Glen Park without posting as required by the City’s IPM policy.
The Draft Environmental Impact Report (DEIR) for NAP says next to nothing about NAP’s pesticide use. It does not report either the volume of pesticide use or the types of pesticide used. This is one of the conspicuous omissions in the DEIR for which it is criticized. If that omission is not corrected in the final version, you can be sure that the public will object.
In naming a new geologic era the Anthropocene, scientists are merely acknowledging man’s pervasive impact on the Earth. Acknowledging this fact does not “give up” on the Earth. Rather it offers us the opportunity to adopt more realistic goals of what we can accomplish while making a commitment to stop damaging the environment further with the pesticides and prescribed burns that are used by the restoration industry and its sponsors in the chemical industry.
“All these concerns have already been addressed in the planning process leading up to the issuance and approval of the management plan, during countless public meetings. The purpose of environmental review is to assess the environmental impacts of the plan. The current Draft Environmental Impact Report (EIR) does this in a reasonable fashion, and to that extent—at least for the San Francisco portions of the plan—it is adequate and complete. It is beyond the scope of an EIR to resolve all the underlying conflicts”
Webmaster: There were three public meetings prior to the approval of the management plan in 2006. The Recreation and Park Commission held one public hearing (in two sessions) when they approved the management plan. All other public hearings were demanded by critics of NAP in a fruitless attempt to convince the Recreation and Park Department to revise its plans so that NAP would be less destructive.
“The final draft of the SNRAMP was published in 2006, but the environmental review process has been continuously delayed. As a result, a whole new cast of characters has come into play, including new planning commissioners, new staff, and new voices among the advocacy groups. These each have had to be brought up to speed, inevitably some protest that their voices were not heard, and the whole process gets delayed even more.”
Webmaster: Any delays in the environmental review process were not caused by critics of NAP. They were caused by supporters of NAP who want an even more extreme version of NAP and are suing to get it.
There is new opposition to NAP because the public has had six more years of experience with NAP. They have watched the plans being implemented in their parks even though there is still no approved Environmental Impact Report and they don’t like what they see.
Critics of NAP do not need to be “brought up to speed.” We can see with our own eyes the destruction of our parks and the conflict caused by the extremist vision of recreating wilderness in the second most densely populated city in the country.
No amount of smoke can obscure the reality of the Natural Areas Program.
Conservation Sense and Nonsense 