Native, Invasive, & the Ecology of Biogeography

[@jacobflack7747]

Crime Pays avoids disseminating college-level education to the average person & citizen scientists for zero dollars Challenge: Level Impossible. Love your work! It's great to see a snarky fella with a big personality spreading the love of Botany & Ecology to the rest of us shitheads in suburban US, keep up the excellent work!

[@dndarchive3541]

Thank you for talking about the American chestnut. When I was taking botany in college, our professor took us out into the Berkshires and showed us a few struggling, blighted trees. They were only about 3 feet tall. They had a handful of leaves left. Later on, when I was taking part in a forestry survey in that area, I celebrated every time I saw a chestnut hanging on. There were a few hidden away, doing their best. Since then, I've followed the breeding efforts of the American Chestnut Foundation with hope. I have my fingers crossed that someday, American chestnuts will be back!

[@raystephens9550]

Nobody expects the Passenger Pigeon.

[@suzu9404]

Thanks for putting all this together. I don’t have time to make it all the way through tonight, but will return to it.

[@kepler180]

3 days ago? this video came out 11 minutes ago

[@CrimePaysButBotanyDoesnt]

@@kepler180 Patreon gets first dibs

[@Roberta-q1q]

Joey is definitely more handsome than Luigi. In looks and in deeds!

[@Sockbottle]

Hey Tony, i just wanna say a huge thanks to you for being such an inspiration to me. I managed to land my dream job in biosecurity in australia and binge watching your videos was a huge help.

[@sethg4584]

Nice one, I work in biosecurity in New Zealand. Binge watching cpbbd is my religion lol

[@HumanFellaPerson]

Thanks for making this public!

[@iivin4233]

I'm glad you put a cohesive and long form vid together. I'm the kind of weird that likes this sort of thing.

[@miguel5785]

Great presentation, with useful examples and interesting considerations and ideas (the systemic perspective "it is the ecosystem itself that evolves"). I used to be a bit skeptic about invasives given the extent of novel ecosystems, but understood their danger better the more I studied the subject. Helping the local natural park technicians deal with invasives has also given me first hand experience of the issue. And your presentation provides a very useful overview of it all. Invasives will probably not be erradicated, and ecosystems will probably not go back to their old state, but we can manage them much better. Thank you!

[@miguel5785]

The shifting baseline syndrome explains why WWF Living Planet Report shows animal population declines of 35% in Europe and Central Asia vs 95% in Latin America and the Caribbean. Europe depleted its animal populations long ago.

[@CF565]

Finding out that as recently as 2000yo, much of China was densely forested and dominated by elephants, and there were probably robust hippo populations through the Levant, really were sobering moments of how narrow the average persons 'knowledge' of their ecology is. How many Americans have even heard of a passenger pidgeon?

[@CF565]

27:57 Shifting baseline syndrome may actually scare me more than climate change and ecological fragmentation. I think it's pretty well established that with dedication and good design we can regenerate even severely degraded ecologies, but as intact fully functioning ecosystems become rarer and rarer, and fewer and fewer people ever interact with them, it becomes harder and harder to convince people of a) what a healthy ecosystem *should* look like and b) why we should prioritize restoration. I used to encounter this all the time in the Bay- people who thought the degraded 2nd growth redwood groves in the hills represented what a actual coast redwood ecology looked like- they'd never been up to Humboldt and experienced the real deal, so even if they considered themselves nature-lovers, they didn't know what they didn't know. Likewise for the lost seasonal wetlands of the Central Valley, or the shallow salt marshes of the South Bay, or hell, what a normal healthy insect population looks like anywhere. We're rapidly becoming accustomed to a catastrophically degraded web of life.

[@xiphosura413]

Very good point, you get this to a crazy degree here in Australia because most people can't even tell natives and invasives apart. They see some trashy scrub that's 1/2 native plants at best and decide that is what "the bush" is

[@meep3709]

So refreshing to actually learn something on KZbin. Bravo 🎉

[@pbee8294]

The reverb in the room isn't nearly as bad as the snot walls nice

[@CrimePaysButBotanyDoesnt]

Hush your mouth junior I'm going for the taqueria/botany classroom look.

[@pbee8294]

​@@CrimePaysButBotanyDoesntthanks for the awesome videos!

[@pbee8294]

@CrimePaysButBotanyDoesnt just some light hearted trolling.... thanks for the great videos eh?

[@logangreenwood362]

I’m spraying for crane fly at work rn, saw your face in the thumbnail I thought. First 10 seconds started and you had me pulling my phone out to make sure I actually saw you in the thumbnail, I was abt to say who tf is this pansy! Hahaha you got me!

[@garden_vibes7796]

I really appreciate how you come at these subjects. Im 24 and graduating with a degree related to all of what you talk about. Hope I can be as badass and educated as you as I start my career and continue my passion for plant science and ecological sustainability!!!!

[@pokerdealer2003]

You motivate me to expand my knowledge all the time.

[@Murdant]

As soon as I saw the first image of the American chestnut (C. dentata) trees and range, I got excited!

[@St.IsaacOfSyria]

It's always amazing to me to think that America was once a land of enchanted forests with tree the size of buildings. I mean those lumberjack photos could be out of a ghibli movie. To think what we once had is completely gone now. And now that the forest service refuses to let the forests burn and invasives are running rampant, I'm not sure even our 10x grandchildren will have what was once here.

[@Hayley-sl9lm]

The forest service is like the US Dept of Logging.

[@raystephens9550]

Yes, and Australia did the same thing, and those smaller Mountain Ash surviving will require no tree loss for more than 100 years to grow to their previous heights of above 100 metres (300 feet). The Huon not Pine of Tasmania was felled in bulk for its ship building properties as a water rot resistant timber, with convicts of Port Arthur providing the cheap slave labour assisting profit for the colonialist infestation in Tasmania by choice.

[@awildapproach]

This is the content I need.

[@cacogenicist]

I have a very large California Bay _Umbellularia californica_ in the front of my house up here in Portland. Must have been planted at least 50 years ago, probably more like 100 -- the house is 120 years old. In the last 10 years or so I've noticed that seedlings from the tree are popping up around the neighborhood. Definitely a relatively recent thing. Not quite sure why -- possibly winters have been milder. I think it's a little colder than ideal here -- or at least it used to be. Interesting thing is that the scrub jays absolutely hammer the shit out of the tree every fall (squabbling and fighting each other all the while), same as they do down in their native range in California and SW Oregon. Same jay species up here in Portland. The fecking invasive eastern grey and eastern fox squirrels like the California Bay nuts also, but it must be the jays stuffing the nuts all over and forgetting where they put them -- because the invasive squirrels would be invading the territory of other squirrels and getting their asses kicked if they traveled that far. Surprises me a little that the jays know what the hell this tree is up here, and come from far and wide to to stuff their craws with it every year.

[@oscarflip8561]

A good example of a bad decision bio control in the U.S. is the Thistle weevil(Rhinocyllus conicus), which was introduced to be a biocontrol for Cirsium arvense, Carduus nutans, etc, and hasn’t had much success controlling these invasive species, but has inadvertently caused damage to our cool, and highly ecologically important native Cirsiums.

[@Hayley-sl9lm]

😢 We all need to help propagate native thistles now. They're so important and even among folks who plant natives, they're not planted very often because they "look weedy." Thistles unite!

[@oscarflip8561]

🙌🏼 i’ve been trying to collect seeds of my local species to give to my local native nursery to get into cultivation. So showy, and highly ecologically valuable, but demonized, even among some native gardeners just like you mentioned because of a few invasive species.

[@Hayley-sl9lm]

​​​@@oscarflip8561Someone in a neighboring state was kind enough to send me some seeds, as I couldn't find a more local seed source. Where I sowed them in ground they never came up, but I had a lot of success getting them to germinate on soil blocks indoors on a heat mat (they didn't have dormancy) and then potting them up into containers when they had their first true leaves. Until I think I over-watered them and they started rotting and only one of them survived 😢, so I screwed up. But I'm going to keep trying though. What's amazing is that before a bunch of them died, they had tons of insect activity -- it was like they were instantly recognized by nature. Got some cool artichoke plume moths on them! If you haven't yet check out the Xerces' Society's thistle guide, that was a really cool publication.

[@oscarflip8561]

Awesome! Definitely keep trying, they’re also very important for goldfinches for nesting material and seed during their late nesting period. I normally just sow them directly outdoors with pretty good success, but most of the species where I live in SE Wyoming are biennials(idk if that would make a difference in germination rate). I have read that page! I specifically tried Cirsium canescens in my yard this year, and they had a really high germination rate outdoors, but we had an extremely hot and dry year and probably 90% of them died(I’m an abusive gardener and don’t water pretty much anything outside of potted transplants the first year 😂).

[@literaltrash1574]

I LOVE THIS SERIES SO MUCH

[@nathanwalker4144]

Thank you Joey!

[@seebastian5834]

DIY acoustic dampers as a replacement for expensive wall penels: hang a couple large towels from chairs/stand lamps/coat racks around the room.

[@chandlee3968]

It’s theorized that the loss of the American chestnut contributed to the extinction of the passenger pigeon.

[@andrewgraves4026]

Never heard that - thanks

[@daneish96]

Scotch Broom and Himalayan blackberry are a plague up here in WA. Foxglove is pretty bad in areas too, especially in clear cut spots in the foothills.

[@vlong7112]

So excited about this!! Thanks for the stickers, btw! Just got them today! The Giving Tree and plant diagram are my favorites 😍

[@Glaudge]

It's always fire season in a eucalyptus forest

[@xiphosura413]

This is why our 2nd lowest fire danger rating is "High"

[@takitos4824]

Well I wasn't expecting a long video but I will definitely take it haha, thanks for the info I will listen to it while my semester project

[@drmistermaster]

What's funny about scotch broom is that in CA we already have pretty native lookalikes (Acmispon sp., Thermopsis sp.)

[@mollyx9120]

I noticed a lot of invasive species are from the same/similar genus or lookalikes to native species

[@xiphosura413]

The intro is a terrifying glimpse into an alternate universe Tony, worn smooth by an eon in academia

[@andrewgraves4026]

Thanks great job! Really important stuff.

[@raystephens9550]

Always significantly educational and informative Tony, thank you. There is a great need for education in the USA, obviously, as an example: that ethics is more important than money, in choice of president. Australians are equally dull of mind. Sadly.

[@thatsalotofsodiumcoins1615]

Studying for finals right now and was blessed by this lecture 😭

[@ethanchesser756]

Hey Tony, asking for a friend. If they were gonna guerrilla garden in a Ridge and Valley ecosystem Southern Appa. what species would be best?

[@DisheveledSuccess]

I cant stop imagining a forest planting itself over millions of years...

[@tadblackington1676]

The reach of humanity is truely great. Our choices have immense impact on the rest of life on Earth. So we need to be thoughtful about what we do. This makes the issue of invasive species so difficult. We have moved so much we have started the Great American Interchange everywhere. When the isthmus of Panama formed waves of biota, and extinctions, swept both continents. But both ended up more biodiverse than they started off. Evolution is driven in no small part by disaster. The invasives running amok are also new native species in the forging, which are also pressing native species to form new species. These are basic rules of evolution that we can't forget. And with all the pressures we have brought down on the rest of life we can't just let the vulnerable blink out carelessly. There is a maxim in permaculture that "the problem is the solution". The way we do, build and move things around is the core of the biodiversity crisis. The way we do, build and move things around going forward can be the key saving biodiversity.

[@kso808]

Talk about invasive plant species, I had to have invasive running bamboo professionally cut down from my back yard wooded area. A neighbor living kitty-corner to me had planted it some years ago in their back yard, and the mother plant eventually spread to my yard. Additionally, I myself had to do some maintenance cutting/removal in the immediate subsequent years. I have also employed a professional ecologist to remove its regrowth in recent years. I finally have it under control. However, I did not have it totally removed, because the area has embedded rock and native hardwood species and so the dead/dying bamboo rhizomes were left to decay underground. Needless to say, I feel like I'm starting with a blank slate to let native species to resume populating the area.

[@Hayley-sl9lm]

I had a great professor who called evolution "the longest war"

[@bartcubbins3528]

Stilt grass is our biggest threat here in the Blue ridge.....the woods/mountains I grew up in will be Very different from the ones I die in.....

[@joshk5686]

It's really sad hearing from someone who has lived in my area for a long time tell me about the spring ephemerals that used to bloom in the woods before the invasion of asian honeysuckle. The level of degredation in our ecosystems in the midwest is so bad that I don't think most people even know what the native ecosystem even should look like.

[@miguel5785]

Insects are the chosen ones. Plants do not flower for us. They flower for insects. We must stop thinking we're the center of creation.

[@bbugl]

I love how your language center sometimes just does stuff and then 5 seconds later the rest of your brain catches up. 😄

[@AffinityCola]

Scotch broom sucks so much shit up here in the PNW

[@junkettarp8942]

Hay Tony......I am a painter....I am making a little picture for you of Jack sitting under a tree because I know his very old....You could download it and print it out and frame it...I know you love him....I see you got Als green sloosh.

[@d0nn13m0n0]

The NPR voice almost made me puke but in retrospect it’s pretty funny

[@bvenable78]

I did not know that a person could have a favorite botanist. But now I have a favorite botanist. Loved this video! At the very beginning you said something about "fourth in the series" (or something like that). I looked through your videos but couldn't find anything that looked like this. Could you point me in the right direction?

[@tomjade2627]

Continental ecology pressures nice 👍

[@svena.halstensen5699]

52:28 not much natural about nature over here. even up here in Norwegian mountains (700+ meters above sea) nature is disturbed and reduced to monoculture deserts. spruce, endless fields of spruce in rows. and not even native spruce, but often Sitka or other more or less invasive species.

[@TrrsnSmrg]

I love how you chose to spot light chest nut blight. Have you done anything with hazel nuts?

[@brendanoconnor4591]

Swallow the spider to catch the fly 😂

[@adamseroka5609]

I see another "Learn your Land" watcher!

[@Hayley-sl9lm]

That guy rocks

[@whatabouttheearth]

Native, invasive, etc is only a thing because a multitude of co-evolved species coexisting in an ecosystem over an extremely long period of time “Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution” - Theodosius Dobzhansky

[@CrimePaysButBotanyDoesnt]

Yes, you just described ecology and ecosystems

[@thealternative9580]

I feel inspired into starting a nursery, restoration, gardening business. I’ll probably go broke and end up homeless.

[@william6223]

I thought you got doped on Valium. You got me.

[@alisonburgess345]

Yep, it's also a bit baffling when you discover a native plant is invasive. Here in Australia we have plenty... (Pittosporum undulatum, acacias etc)

[@alisonburgess345]

Oh, sorry, I just took out a sweet chestnut - the photo probably tells why. They get absolutely ENORMOUS.. I hope they return to the US. i believe there's a big effort to restore it.

[@DelenaLearns]

Mosquitoes do pollinate some plants but mostly mosquitoes and ticks do serve one purpose. They are food for others.

[@nbkawtgnobody]

The chesnut had wider range at least east ward, southward ,to maybe southwestward before the introduction phytophthora.

[@thealternative9580]

Any good native nursery in west Texas? My dad lives in El Paso and wants to start gardening more.

[@raystephens9550]

Did the extinction of the Passenger Pigeon or the Rocky Mountain Locust have consequent botanic failure or reduction in co-evolved species? I recall hearing somewhere of an effect like this upon the white oak. >>From Google: "Passenger pigeons had an outsized ecological impact while they were here. Because of their vast numbers and the long distances they'd travel they played a significant role in seed dispersal-especially oak and chestnut trees-influencing the composition of forests across North America."

[@steveberkson3873]

Nice story about this..Overstory - Richard Powers

[@TheDiversifiedFarmer]

Howd it get warmed up to the new turf though.

[@papadoobie5651]

What are some good natives to plant in southern Oregon?

[@Hayley-sl9lm]

Are you like in the Siskiyous on the West side or in the middle or Eastern part of the state?

[@papadoobie5651]

@ wester OR not the coast but sw or. About an hour drive south of Eugene

[@Hayley-sl9lm]

@@papadoobie5651 Oh cool then you're somewhat close-ish to Willamette Wildlings in Creswell OR, and Native Foods Nursery in Dexter OR (both places that have great websites & a lot of cool species to explore -- if you're close enough to visit them, those people really know their stuff and could help). What exactly to plant will depend on the sunlight, moisture and drainage of your specific planting location but there are so many cool options and their websites might be a good place to start looking. Oregon White Oaks and Pacific Madrones are my favorite wildlife friendly drought tolerant trees, there are multiple varieties of Ceanothus native to the southern part of the state which is one of my favorite shrubs, manzanitas too, and some awesome carefree wildflowers like Showy Tarweed, california poppies and oregon sunshine are some of my favorites

[@Adrianzx]

fuck yeah bud put on the Van Halen! oh no it's Hot for Teacher!

[@Glaudge]

You could have talked about island countries like Hawaii are uniquely sensitive to invasive species e.g. cattley guava

[@CrimePaysButBotanyDoesnt]

I mentioned Australia

[@MichaelMikeTheRussianBot]

The ticks & deer? Deer aren't the most important host(s). They get hit with the nymphs, as we do. White-Footed Mice (Peromyscus leucopus) & Eastern Chipmunk (Tamias striatus) are the host for adult Black-Legged Ticks (Ixodes scapularis), which are the ones that can carry Lyme. Your point still holds, though. The people at NYDEC ( @ Mill Brook) that study this, have come to the conclusion that the best measure of Lyme is the degree of mammalian diversity. Greater diversity = fewer ticks = less Lyme Disease. Of course, the greater the (native) plant diversity, the greater the diversity of.... everything else. ;)

[@CrimePaysButBotanyDoesnt]

A mouse might harbor a dozen ticks. Deer can host thousands of ticks.

[@mikeoxsbigg1]

Wow, even in the Canadian deep south.

[@samuelfleury4249]

Australia invasive disasters are wild. Beer for Cane toads should expand to US but for buffel grass.

[@marryellenmonahan5585]

Was in Hilo Hawaii in late October. Learned most flora there is not native...

[@blowitoutyourcunt7675]

Strawberries took over

[@Dagarvs]

surely "Our crime pays lecture series, asshole" should be merch.

[@sedertful]

chestnut blight in america is a scapegoat for deforestation and native american removal / settler environment destruction

[@CrimePaysButBotanyDoesnt]

That's possibly the dumbest shit I've read in the comments section in months, especially with no explanation or articulation. Sounds like the AI divisiveness bots have been unleashed

[@bensanders5681]

So did invasive mean anything before humanity emerged from Africa? Was it a thing at all?

[@CrimePaysButBotanyDoesnt]

As in 40,000 years ago? I don't think there was anyone around well-versed in ecology to study it back then or use the word in a sentence. As a species we were more concerned with avoiding plagues, large predators, and not dying

[@HumanFellaPerson]

It was just dispersal events prior to modern humans moving shit all across the globe.

[@CrimePaysButBotanyDoesnt]

@HumanFellaPerson correct, but they actually didn't seem to occur that often, and were quite rare, and successful establishments seemed even more so. We know this from molecular clock dating of these lineages of plants. Conversely, humans have moved thousands of insects, fungi, animals and plants across oceans in the last 150 years alone.

[@HumanFellaPerson]

@CrimePaysButBotanyDoesnt gosh, humans man. Once they get going, they really tear into shit. Maybe we'll learn to chill out a bit someday. I'm so grateful for teachers like you! I've gotten so much from your channel! You do amazing work!

[@josephemerson6876]

GEO GIRL youtube channel has an interview with Dr. Alicia Stigall (she covers more invasive species in marine environments instead of plants) covering this topic that's approximately a half hour interview. Rachel Phillips is a NASA scientist with expertise in geology that leads the interview. Invasive species were a thing before the emergence of modern human beings with proof of it found in the fossil records. As covered in this video, the thing that separates environments from each other are barriers like the ocean typically or in the case of introducing invasive marine species to new areas shifting marine currents is one method. However some species of plant can disperse seeds across the ocean until they find a new surface. We also know the continents used to be much closer to each other in the past and are constantly moving. When these environments made connections with each other in the past so that separate environments could interact with each other again, the ability for non-native species to be introduced into environments that previously had barriers in place like the ocean became much easier. Given the constant shifting of the continents we all collectively call home, it makes total sense that invasive species have always been a thing for as long as separate environments that evolved independently from one another over a long period of time eventually come in contact. This isn't to say that that just because invasive species introduction has happened absent people in the past that it's not a concern though. One of the papers covers extinction of the global reef forming coral ecosystems (when it was arguably at its most ecologically diverse at any point in Earth history prior to invasive species introduction) and how it would take 100 million years before reefs would appear again. There's little surviving record data of invasive species impact on land unfortunately.

[@stephenricker3435]

I have always looked at ultra-functioning native ecosystems as the ultimate example of permaculture. Why would you fight against that and not emulate it?

[@CrimePaysButBotanyDoesnt]

Nobody's "fighting against" permaculture. I'm making fun of cultural traits that I repeatedly see among people within the human subculture that is permaculture-enthusiasts....like invasive species deniers, an almost evangelical avoidance of ever using any kind of herbicide for dealing with invasive species (herbicide is necessary sometimes), ecological blindness, myopic focus on anthropocentric uses of plants only, etc

[@eliharper6616]

Chinese privets are insane in the dfw area. Cant see the forest for the privets

[@katiekane5247]

You can take solice in the fact that botany didn't pay for you in your past. I feel bad about every non native I ever sold or planted, especially privet and Ivy. The nursery I worked at was better at stocking natives than the big box stores but they were just harder to sell in the market of the time. It's a shame that profitability controls everything. Fuck corporate control, it's ruined so many of the sectors I've worked in. I admit it, I was an unintentional eco terrorist. I'll submit to my beatings now. I've let the yard go native but my kid will probably go Rambo on my "weeds" when I die. Then again, she's lazy so maybe she'll leave it alone

[@CrimePaysButBotanyDoesnt]

It's a cultural thing. There's just not enough demand for natives yet because people have no insight on the issue. I think that is changing though

[@dengueberries]

What you got there, a Kermit smoothie?

[@heavymetalpermaculture]

This permaculture hippy agrees...except about the Roundup, fuck that stuff. It's so prevalent it's coming down in rain.

[@Hayley-sl9lm]

My view -- as someone who was only able to get a house bc the whole yard was infested by an invasive blackberry thicket that was like eating the foundation, herbicides are sometimes necessary yo. That raining down shit is scary, I think what I read about was pertaining to dicamba but maybe it's a thing for glyphosate too. But that is more from large scale agricultural use though.

[@katiekane5247]

​@@Hayley-sl9lmI've started using a foam paintbrush on cut stems instead of spraying. Some species need foliar spray but I avoid it at all costs. Neighbors planted Chinese Wisteria and English Ivy years ago before we moved here. Ivy is a pain to control in the SE USA

[@Hayley-sl9lm]

@@katiekane5247 I rarely spray because my situation now, rather than just being an invasive blackberry thicket, is that have invasive blackberries just trying to snake through all of my wanted natives so I can't spray them because they're too close to things I don't want to damage. I cut & paint on stump killer more often, if I can't dig the root up. Long term I'll have to see if it's as effective, I think the more foliar material you can hit the better transfer down to the root that you can get, but even then that is only useful in the fall for my target invasive. And you can't do it when it's windy, you can't do it when it's raining, like it is a difficult tool to use well/responsibly.

[@TheDiversifiedFarmer]

Black Walnut Neotropical Black Walnut

[@alejandrorobles6865]

Bruh why is it in spanish ai translation

[@ladylamellae]

Gonna have to disagree with you a little bit, I'm not sure how prevent it is in the modern day but eco-fascism absolutely was a thing that went hand in hand with scientific racism. It's more of an old school blood and soil fascism rather than industrial fascism which is probably why we don't see it as often anymore but a lot of old hippies did go pretty far right so I'd say the ideas are probably still present in our culture. There are the cottage core white nationalists too so yeah actually it's definitely still a thing. Not super common but it is there.

[@whatabouttheearth]

I don't know the part of the video you are referring to but yeah, eco-fascism, as in actually fascists, is certainly a thing in sections of the fascist movement.

[@CrimePaysButBotanyDoesnt]

The only times I've ever heard the term -- or anything about it really -- is from young leftists circa 2020 parroting each other's ideas on social media and warning about it in reference to people criticizing modern civilization's behavior as "cancerous". Talk about how human population is beyond Earth's carrying capacity and that the price to pay for an exponentially-growing human population is eventual biosphere collapse and you'll get labeled an "eco-fascist" by one of the most annoying, unthinking people on the internet....the burden of an education rich in humanities but illiterate in natural sciences. It seems virtually a non-existent threat, and no one who's an ecologist nor educated enough to be taken seriously have i ever heard exude "eco fascist" ideas, quite the contrary they all tend to be left-leaning. The whole thing is reminiscent of the tea party ranting about the dangers of shariah law coming to the US in the 2010s. Talking about it in the current context and using it to shut down people who express disenchantment regarding modern civ's behavior is 110% idiotic

[@fuxan]

​@@CrimePaysButBotanyDoesnt if only the feedback loop was quick to respond...some idiot has 5 kids and is forced to starve on an island that can only support 4 people at a time...mommy and daddy and their 5 kids suffer or someone is going to go. If only we didn't have the ability to walk or look away from our own sheet.

[@thepeacefulenemy4026]

@@CrimePaysButBotanyDoesntI think people use “fascism” way too casually, but I take issue with couching environmental concerns in the language of overpopulation. Much like a “flat” tax disproportionally benefits the elites and burdens the poor, “overpopulation” assumes that all humans, and all types of societies, contribute equally to the problem. But it really allows the people who consume the most resources-and especially those who profit from that overconsumption-to shift responsibility disproportionately to poor 3rd world populations, who have the least power to change things, who consume and benefit the least, but who suffer the most because of the destruction. Just like tech bros causing housing prices to skyrocket, and then bitching about homeless people. But you’re a pretty sharp cat. I’m sure you know all that already.

[@CampingforCool41]

Eco fascism in the context of overpopulation would be suggesting we intentionally wipe out a significant portion of the population with weapons or disease. It’s been a fad online though to call any discussion of overpopulation as a real concern “eco fascist”. Lots of futurists as well, love to say that the carrying capacity of earth for humans is far higher than our current population. And maybe that would be true in an absolutely ideal, perfectly balanced system, but it’s delusional to believe we are anywhere near creating such a system and to use that as an argument that we aren’t currently overpopulated.

[@desperatelyseekingrealnews]

Lots of ches ut trees in UK

[@Hansulf]

As European, yes, most of our ecosystems are fucked 😢 But some have evolved out of a mix of introduced species 😂

[@raystephens9550]

Our population became an infestation in about 1970, if the 73% attrition of Earth's wildlife in flora and fauna is the measure, or in 1914 with the Passenger Pigeon Martha dying or maybe back in the days of Rome when the Caspian Tiger was first threatened with not existing like the Arabian Ostrich. We are without a doubt deserving of Earth's viral agencies of population reduction. Imported disease didn't do either the local people or the colonialist anything good. In the so-called new world, "measles" and small pox were killers of millions ending local agricultural industry from Alaska to Amazon to Tierra del Fuego and took back to Europe what was once a childhood disease people developed immunity to which became in crowded cities of Europe a mutated adult disease, the STD called syphilis. Proof that there is no such thing as a "freebie".

[@rapier5]

I understand why towns don't have botanists on call. Because nobody cares. Americans don't care if it doesn't pay which brings us full circle doesn't it?

[@CrimePaysButBotanyDoesnt]

Yes it's why we live in a intellectually declining materialistic cesspool, culturally speaking

[@g4nked]

Hey when are you going to realise you need to live in Australia and botanise the fuck out of this country?? 😂❤ At least come visit melbourne specifically and dont tell anyone youre comming except for me so we can go for a walk together and you can inspire me to quit garden landscaping and begin my study as a botanist 😂 Oh the dreams i have.

[@frankwilson2607]

I know how much you hate buckthorn J - Revegetation of Elymus grasses suppresses invasive Rhamnus cathartica in deciduous forest understories Shuster et.al. Ecological Engineering Volume 210, January 2025, 107438

[@eliharper6616]

Nahhhh da mosquitoes are da pollinators... with a taste for blood😈... makes me like them more like wasps lol

[@CrimePaysButBotanyDoesnt]

Like a quarter of the mosquito species that are in North America are native anyway

[@eliharper6616]

@CrimePaysButBotanyDoesnt and that quarter vastly outnumbers native species. At least here in the south lol. Idk if being invasive gives them an advantage to overpopulate, or if the ecosystems they inhabit are so degraded that predators can't keep a check on populations or both, but I think that's why the get such a bad reputation. In a less disturbed world, the vast majority of us wouldn't consider the mosquito a threat. But yeah, fuck aedes aegypti and the tiger mosquitoes and I also can't see the ecological necessity for ticks either. So I'm witcha on that one Have a nice day. Go fuck yourself. Bye!

[@rebeccaketner816]

Why IS he so angry!? It’s the world…

[@klausschwabshubris]

Not creepy at all.

[@SteveMMarek]

WTF you drinking? Did you juice all those lawns you killed? JK. Drink whatever you want.

[@HarryDirtay]

Would have been neat to see if the native chestnuts would have survived the blight eventually. Maybe purging the nation of everything chestnut was a bit of an over reaction.

[@CampingforCool41]

It probably would have gone full extinct honestly, with surviving trees too far apart to reproduce. And even if some stragglers managed to survive it would likely take millions of years to really flourish again. But the thing about humans is, even though we can destroy, we can also work genetic miracles that bypass evolutionary timespans. People are working on breeding blight resistant American chestnuts, and directly taking the blight resistant genes from the Chinese chestnut. So , even though we won’t see the American chestnut back to its full glory in the wild in our lifetimes, the possibility is there that it could come back within thousands of years, rather than in millions.

[@joshuamatthew6040]

Genetic entropy

[@horndude77]

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oncosiphon_pilulifer - This is getting really bad in Arizona.