Slashdot Mirror
Condor Chick Born In Wild
hank writes "Great news (Yahoo! News link) today on the endangered species front! A condor chick born in the wild is alive and well. Originally, biologists planned on interfering and giving "life support" to the egg; however, biologists were surprisingly pleased to see the father aggressively protecting his young. Wisely, they decided to let nature take control. The chick in Los Padres National Forest in Santa Barbara County is the first conceived, hatched and raised in the wild to survive more than a day. It was 4 days old on Monday. What does this mean for genetic cloning and incubation research? Can nature really repair itself? What do you all think?"
the ones that can't die off
Yup, true enough. Humans are changing the ecology of the planet. Very fast. Organisms that cannot keep up die off. The real question is whether or not we like these changes. I like having birds, whales, trees, and even condors around. I think some conservation is in order.
I'd wager to say that most people probably agree with me. If most folks don't agree with me, then I ask: how much of Earth has to look like L.A. before we change our habits?
ADAPT is the key word here. The individuals that are best able to ADAPT are not necessarily the strongest individuals. Make sure you make a distinction here. "Strong" and "weak" don't necessarily have anything to do with this.
I also find your blending of fields interesting. Darwin and ecology? Cause and effect. When ecological parameters change, that which can adapt to the changes survive and those which cannot die out.
Your background is even weaker than I originally thought. Don't you have any clue what Darwin discovered? Darwin discovered natural selection, which is what the whole thing you are arguing is based on. And blending fields?? Perhaps you would care to explain to me how in the world one can study ecology without studying Darwin? Darwin's principles are the major driving force in ecology. I'm not blending fields at all. Darwin's findings are central to almost all issues in ecology includign why animals go extinct, why they have certain physical and behavioral characteristics, etc.
"I would love to see how you would demonstrate that the singular cause of the Condor's demise has been industrial man."
I wouldn't say the singular cause is industrial man. But that is definiately a large part of it. More than likely, DDT played a role in this as DDT effects are cumulative throughout the food change and top predators in an ecosystem tend to have the highest levels (and receive the most damage from it).
This depends. There are some species called keystone species. If these particular species die out, they can have destabalizing effects on the entire ecosystem. The problem here is that we often don't know which species are keystone species. Also, we don't know what effects this mass extinction period we are entering will have on the planet in general. So it's best to play it cautious. (truth be known, some of the keystone species are things that no body really careas about. Like some species of bacteria).
"As for the condor one could ask whether it is a real important species in the ecosystem. Apparently it isn't."
You are probably right. The condor is probably not a keystone species, so its loss would not really have any kind of domino effect that destabalized the entire ecosystem. But people like large birds, even if they aren't all that important in the grand scheme of things.