DO WE KNOW WHAT WE ARE DOING?
I ask you these questions after reading the Interior Department's plans that call for killing barred owls to save the spotted owl.
This is another example of "man as nature's referee." I wonder if it wise?
In this case the spotted owl, at the center of a long and loud case in logging country in the Pacific northwest 20 years ago, is still in decline. Back then the government set aside millions of acres to protect the spotted owl, but its population has dropped 40 percent in 25 years. Now Interior Secretary Ken Salazar says this plan is "a science based approach to forestry" that will affect millions of acres of national, state and private land in Washington, Oregon and California. It is a complex strategy that involves forestry, jobs, land management and the killing of the barred owl.
I don't doubt the sincere concern, but really wonder about the wisdom of meddling with this balance of life.
25 years ago we stepped in to try to prop up the spotted owl and those plans have failed. Is this one any better? Should nature be allowed to run its own course? We are now killing California sea lions in the Columbia River to protect salmon.
Nagging beneath all of this is the question, where does it all end? Let me know what you think.
DAY BOOK
SPRING SCENES
Some in two takes
A weird confluence of angles on a hill.
Tricky pruning.
Shadow play on the garden shed
Leaning succulent bloom
The muses of the potting bench in a shadow stairs
more shadow play
See you down the trail.
As for the killing of sea lions here in the Northwest, I'm deeply troubled by the killing of anything, yet also troubled by the fact that I think this is necessary. We've destroyed the salmon's natural path to their spawning grounds because of dams and now these sea lions gather at the base of the fish ladders and feast on fish that have no choice but to hang around and be devoured. This isn't the way nature intended it, but the salmon must be allowed to continue. These sea lions aren't in danger of extinction but the salmon are. Every method of relocation these creatures has failed and the time has come for them to be humanely put down. I regret this, but then I guess we need all that electricity produced by the dams.
ReplyDeleteIt is a tough choice. Knowing the killing happens to attempt to correct for man made intrusion softens it, still it is troubling for several reasons.
Delete