Re: ok, then I take it back

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: : : : : : : : : We really got off on a tangent about the whole environmental thing. But I still don't know what to do with the frogs around my house (the whole invasive species thing). Any help? : : : : : : : : In the post about Greenfuse and all we got off on a tangent about other issues, which is fine, but my original question was what to do with invasive species. You can read below to get a better idea of that, but the real reason is that I have an invasive species of frog around my house that is outcompeting the native species and actually eating them. So my question still stands: do I follow the mechanistic view of nature and control the populations of invasive frogs to protect the native species because humans messed up the ecosystem in the first place or do I respect the right of those other frogs to exist and let them extripate (kill off in a local area) all of the native frogs from my swamp? : : : : : : : : I really welcome your response, but know that this is not an easy issue even if it seems like it at first glance. It is a true ethical dilemma that exists in real world conditions, so please, no trite answers. : : : : : : : I used to love seeing the bright green anoles around my homes. Now I never see them. Those damn brown Cuban anoles have displaced them. I actually watched a brown eat a green once. Flame me if you want, but I would gladly kill a thousand of those ugly brown invaders to be able to see a few of the pretty green ones I loved that have been killed off. : : : : : : : When we are talking about extripation that may eventually result in total extinction of a species, that is a more serious consideration than a less drastic change in the ecosystem. I would kill some frogs myself. : : : : : : Usually i just wait until I feel like that and then go kill a bunch, or i let my family take target practice atthem with bb guns (they love that) but then other times I feel responsible and if I ever look at the frog and consider what might be going through its mind, or place myself in its place, I would hate to be slaughtered because someone put my greatgrandfather somewhere he didn't belong. Plus there's the aspect that it is one of God's living creatures with at least some aspect of sentience and purpose. Do i have the right to destroy it wantonly? I could if I beleived they : : : : : : didn't have souls or thoughts, but i DO bleieve that they have these things on whatever level it may be. After I kill them i usually find myself asking them to forgive me, and I try to do it in the quickest way possible. Sometimes I feel silly about all of this, but other times I think it is right ot have awe and respect. Usually i go back to my standard, "if I was a wild human, how would I react to this situation?" What would my natural reaction be? But this is too hard to determine because my natural reaction varies with my perspective. AAAANNDDDD we're right back where we started. : : : : : : I think I may be able to resolve it if I could somewhere anchor these arguments to something I know to be universal. : : : : : : : : : : Humans go all kinds of places that they dont' belong, do we kill them? : : : : : If you make a decision that the frogs don't belong, and the conclusion of that is to remove them, then remove them. : : : : : But in all seriousness, what are the frogs trying to teach you? : : : : : Or perhaps I should say, what is it you should learn from this situation. : : : : : If it were me, I would leave them alone. You probably don't have the ability to remove enough of them to make a difference anyway. Why get upset about killing frogs when it makes no sense to even try. : : : : : I miss the green anoles and the rainbow skinks and the blue skinks and the other horny/scaly lizards I used to find in the woods when I was a kid, but what am I going to do? The brown ones kill the bugs so I let them live in peace. : : : : : Gee! I got so doggone upset about accidently killing this beautiful skink when I was just trying to catch it, I can't believe you would actually kill one species out of anger. : : : : : Either remove them or don't but don't go around haphazardly shooting, that's barbaric. : : : : : : : : I could write a poem about how boys suck right now but I think I am just going to put my hair in rollers, and soak in hot tub while i do my nails. 8 P : : : : : : I didn't mean that I killed in anger, but that when I felt like they were invaders disrupting the natural order, then I would feel justified to kill them. : : : : I don't really think that boys suck, you just like to shoot things, too much. : : That was directed more at Steve than you anyway. : : Earlier you said you wondered about the feelings of the frogs. : : I don't like to see one species invade another species habitat, but(and correct me if I am wrong) isn't it simply the natural order of things? I mean, maybe the species you are speaking of is becoming dominant because they are better suited there? Perhaps this would happen even if there was no human interference. How can you know for sure? : : I am having trouble with the idea of shooting the frogs as being better than the frogs invading. : : There is either a more viable solution or none at all. : Well there is no possibility that they would get from a geogrpahically isolated plae like cuba to this country apart from human interferance. Plus, in Cuba the system has had thousands of years to develop, so there are natural controls that are absent here. Sometimes new species do move by human means and it makes no difference, like the thousands of ornamental plants that we have around. But only those who end up better suited to this environment cause problems. We can't leave them without risking collapse of our ecosystem along with more extinction because the frogsthey displace have had thousands of years to fill their perfect niche thet these frogs won't fill. So it is far greater a problem than just new frogs becoming plentiful. Of course the ecosystem could adapt eventually, but how many thousands ofyears will it take, and at what cost to us? How many species will we loose? How many natural services will fail, such as water purification and pest control. Remember that everything is connected and when it is gone, there is a void. This is biodiversity. The less factors present in the system, the more chance for total collapse. Like the marble game where you pull pins out until they all fall. : So about more humane methods, we could trap them all and return them to cuba, but who will pay for it, and they will likely starve anyway because there are too many to fit in Cuba. Or we could keep them in tanks until they finish their lives, but they keep breeding, and who is going to provide and maintain the tanks? So then we could catch all the males and sterlize them so they'll die off, but then again, cost, and some frogs have been known to change sex when necessary. So the choice is kill or let them go and hope we survive the alterations. : Incidently, there is 1 common species we see that migrated on its own. The armadillo. It came in the period of human record from South America across Texas and into Florida.

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