Wildlife and modern farming techniques (1 Viewer)

Is the situation equally grim in other parts of Northern Europe—Denmark, Holland, Germany?

UK’s favourite wildlife species at risk of extinction ‘without revolution in disastrous modern food farming’ - The Independent
https://apple.news/AiMS-UPpwSgSSDkaP0-tt9A

Pretty much the same, yes, at least in Netherlands. Perhaps slightly less bad in Denmark & Germany?

In general, the bigger the farm, the worse, and the flatter the land (easier to mechanise), the worse.

It's pretty grim in Germany, too. Many iconic rural species have suffered significant population declines. At least for Grey Partridges, it's downright catastrophic (now a very rare, if not de facto extinct, bird in most parts of the country). Most of this isn't new though, as the major changes began somewhere in the mid-twentieth century. What is apparently new is that it's beginning to affect the next batch of common birds.
It can vary a lot from region to region though. Up here for example, Tree Sparrows are still common. In some places in the NE, Red-backed Shrikes can reach amazing population densities.

Sadly, I think the only route forward of any value mentioned both in article and reponses is to deal with population growth. Not only are we farmers driven by the needs (real or perceived) of society, but the big companies mentioned are also fuelled by society. The way to have less impact is to have a smaller society.

Mike.

citrinella said:

Sadly, I think the only route forward of any value mentioned both in article and reponses is to deal with population growth. Not only are we farmers driven by the needs (real or perceived) of society, but the big companies mentioned are also fuelled by society. The way to have less impact is to have a smaller society.

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<sarcasm>
</sarcasm>

8-P

citrinella said:

Sadly, I think the only route forward of any value mentioned both in article and reponses is to deal with population growth. Not only are we farmers driven by the needs (real or perceived) of society, but the big companies mentioned are also fuelled by society. The way to have less impact is to have a smaller society.

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Indeed, the already huge and ever-growing human population is the elephant in the room. Even if by some miracle the population were to stabilize at the present level, the extent of undernourishment in the third world is such as would make a return to wildlife-friendlier agricultural practices infeasible for a very long time.

This article only briefly touches on urbanization of prime agricultural land (usually formerly primary woodlands), and thus heat island effects. It also skirts around the main game - the destruction of natural hydraulic, hydrological and topsoil formation cycles (flooding and sediment deposition to you and me), and so can only be considered the thin end of the wedge - but you get the point.
https://www.theguardian.com/environ...s-of-australian-forest-to-be-lost-in-15-years



Chosun :gh:

Chosun Juan said:

This article only briefly touches on urbanization of prime agricultural land (usually formerly primary woodlands), and thus heat island effects. It also skirts around the main game - the destruction of natural hydraulic, hydrological and topsoil formation cycles (flooding and sediment deposition to you and me), and so can only be considered the thin end of the wedge - but you get the point.

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Before we (as humans, not Chosun and I specifically) get too excited where this tends to lead (put everyone in dense cities, free-up more cropland where suburbia is), we have a couple of problems to solve there:

1. There has been some outlying research that shows humans start experiencing behavioral/psychological issues in cramped environments. There were some controversial studies about this a decade or more back on primates (controversial because no one wanted to hear it). Unfortunately, I can't find them anymore (saw them on PBS). Evolution might solve this, might not.
2. I currently live in a townhome where I share only one wall but have other neighbors within 20 yards all around me. I've lived in multi-story apartments with neighbors sharing nearly every wall, floor, and ceiling. And I can tell you, at least in the San Francisco Bay Area, people are incredibly selfish and inconsiderate. Listening to New Yorkers talk about dense urban living sounds horrible a nightmare. You never truly have any peace. And while plenty of people "adapt" and learn to live with it, it's still stressful at some level. I'd live in the more spread-out suburbs in a heartbeat, or even more rurally, if I could responsibly afford to.
3. I know lots of folks manage to make dense living work in many places in Asia, but the problems associated with it do not seem to balance the good of it in my mind. And again, seems incredibly unnatural. Also, in Southeast Asia it probably only works because of their culture (see #2 above).

Needless to say, I'm not in favor of such unnatural living conditions and really I'm not in favor of an urbmon future.

Which gets back to the white elephant of population.

I wonder if anyone has done studies on what the "ideal" population of the planet would be if, for example, we stuck to sustainable practices in places that can realistically be lived in with a priority set on living in harmony with nature and not against it?

I'm betting that number is disturbingly low compared to the current population of the planet.

CalvinFold said:

Before we (as humans, not Chosun and I specifically) get too excited where this tends to lead (put everyone in dense cities, free-up more cropland where suburbia is), we have a couple of problems to solve there:

1. There has been some outlying research that shows humans start experiencing behavioral/psychological issues in cramped environments. There were some controversial studies about this a decade or more back on primates (controversial because no one wanted to hear it). Unfortunately, I can't find them anymore (saw them on PBS). Evolution might solve this, might not.
2. I currently live in a townhome where I share only one wall but have other neighbors within 20 yards all around me. I've lived in multi-story apartments with neighbors sharing nearly every wall, floor, and ceiling. And I can tell you, at least in the San Francisco Bay Area, people are incredibly selfish and inconsiderate. Listening to New Yorkers talk about dense urban living sounds horrible a nightmare. You never truly have any peace. And while plenty of people "adapt" and learn to live with it, it's still stressful at some level. I'd live in the more spread-out suburbs in a heartbeat, or even more rurally, if I could responsibly afford to.
3. I know lots of folks manage to make dense living work in many places in Asia, but the problems associated with it do not seem to balance the good of it in my mind. And again, seems incredibly unnatural. Also, in Southeast Asia it probably only works because of their culture (see #2 above).

Needless to say, I'm not in favor of such unnatural living conditions and really I'm not in favor of an urbmon future.

Which gets back to the white elephant of population.

I wonder if anyone has done studies on what the "ideal" population of the planet would be if, for example, we stuck to sustainable practices in places that can realistically be lived in with a priority set on living in harmony with nature and not against it?

I'm betting that number is disturbingly low compared to the current population of the planet.

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Thanks Calvin

First for that number - I saw a paper (sorry, cannot cite) a few years ago that calculated world population to be sustainable and match average US standard of living ...
between 1 and 2 MILLION.

Second "(put everyone in dense cities...", Ah yes, read Isaac Asimov.

Third SE Asia ... I have loads of Chinese friends and have had several holidays there. It was really striking how different the atmosphere was in their big cities - far less aggression and frustration. I really think they must have adapted/evolved, given their long history of high population. I met many of these friends when they came to Scotland to study. I worked for a voluntary organization offering friendship and local contact so I used to take them around and show them the sites, tell them the history. Horror - your history is all about war and fighting and killing, yes they are not wrong. Their history is all about education, science, exploration (read 1421 by Gavin Menzies about Admiral Zheng He and the map Magellan had), culture. There is something seriously different and it makes our culture and history a bit embarassing. In a museum I saw a lacquered box which was an incredible piece of work dated 1314 - when Robert the Bruce and Edward II were leading our countries in all out war (Bannockburn) and beaten pewter was the order of the day for dishes and embroidery was probably our highest form of art (practised no doubt by "lots" of men). In the same museum there was an exhibition on jade work and they had started to learn how to work the hardest material known to them 6000 years ago, by (IIRC) 3000 years ago they had developed all the basic techniques used now for diamond and the results were exquisite.

Perhaps we could learn and adapt to get ourselves a less stressful future - but I still think population control would be even better - and which nation has been trying, I mean really trying ?

Mike.

citrinella said:

First for that number - I saw a paper (sorry, cannot cite) a few years ago that calculated world population to be sustainable and match average US standard of living ...between 1 and 2 MILLION.

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Typo for billion?

citrinella said:

Second "(put everyone in dense cities...", Ah yes, read Isaac Asimov.

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Asimov was one of the greats (I've read a great many of his works...except Foundation oddly), but the urbmons (urbon monads) reference is from Robert Silverberg's The World Inside. A very fascinating view of a future projected from ideals some people actually consider viable now and back in the 70s when it was written.

I've actually seen urbmons mentioned in debates about global population expansion, was a little surprised at such a quirky little reference being used.

:king:

As for cultural change...yeah China gave population control a real go and the very culture that allows it to live in crowded conditions also backfire and created a severe orphan and gender bias crisis that will be felt for generations to come.

Culture has a tendency to hurt as much as harm. I wish I could say "flexible culture" is any better than "homogeneity" but it doesn't seem either mentality is foolproof.

fugl said:

Typo for billion?

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Yes I think so. I recall a study of that nature with a conclusion of 1-2 billion.

MTem said:

Yes I think so. I recall a study of that nature with a conclusion of 1-2 billion.

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So for reference, we're at about 7.6 billion right now...

MTem said:

Yes I think so. I recall a study of that nature with a conclusion of 1-2 billion.

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Absolutely NOT a typo. The paper I saw took pains to emphasize that they really meant MILLION, not billion.

Mike.

CalvinFold said:

As for cultural change...yeah China gave population control a real go and the very culture that allows it to live in crowded conditions also backfire and created a severe orphan and gender bias crisis that will be felt for generations to come.

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Hi Calvin,

I don't know where the orphans reference comes from, but the gender bias has been debunked. I am not saying there is no selective abortion, but a paper in the British Medical Journal perhaps 15 years ago looked at the gender bias and found it was fully explained by improvements in medical care, nutrition, and their effects on survival of young humans.

In neolithic or whatever you like to call them conditions there is a higher mortality among young males from conception to breeding age than among females. Improvements in medicine hae a greater effect on survival of males than females, hence we end up with a gender bias in favour of males. This is present in other societies than China, but the gender bias has been noted there because the change has been very rapid, and I suspect because there are those looking to criticise the one child policy on any grounds they can find.

The other one I hear ad nauseam is the "demographic timebomb" argument - that there are not enough young people to provide for and look after the oldies. This must also be questioned - while this may be valid if one takes a _very_ short term view, in the longer term breeding more children means there is greater demand for resources and LESS to divide across all sectors of society; then all those children get old and you haven't solved the demographic timebomb, you've made it worse by multiplying up the number of oldies and their demands.

A doctor from Delhi came to work in our department 10 or 15 years ago. He was full of admiration for China's one child policy. At the time China implemented it India also implemented a similar policy, but it was immediately withdrawn following a furore from religious groups. In the time since implementation China's population had risen by 40% while India's had risen by 70%. Population growth in India was outstripping economic growth so income per capita was going down. To make matters worse inequality was grwoing with the rich getting a larger slice of the cake, so the number of people living in abject poverty was growing rapidly, despite economic growth that would on first glance make a western country very envious. He predicted increasing social tensions in India - and I think this has been correct.

Interestingly, the latest I have heard from China (reported fairly recently in the Times) is that birth rates went up immediately after the end of the one child policy but this was short lived and rates have fallen back. My Chinese friends, generally well educated midlle class and urban, were universally supportive of the one child policy. Maybe that feeling is more widespread and genuine.

Mike.

citrinella said:

Absolutely NOT a typo. The paper I saw took pains to emphasize that they really meant MILLION, not billion.

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Is that your view, also, that the good life for everyone—every individual on the planet—requires the reduction of the present population to 1/3500th of its present size?

fugl said:

Is that your view, also, that the good life for everyone—every individual on the planet—requires the reduction of the present population to 1/3500th of its present size?

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No I am not proposing a reduction, I was just reporting what the paper said. I don't think the authors were proposing a population reduction of that size either, just stating their finding that that population size would meet those conditions according to their model.

It is my view that we need to put the brakes on population increase and eventually we may need to reduce population because we cannot find means to maintain such a large population without doing enormous damage to all the other life on this planet and putting such unbearable pressure on the natural resources that we have oppression and wars over them. Innocent people who lack the power we rich westerners possess are being killed and hurt because the world population has grown unmanaged. What is your view on that ?

Mike.

Citrinella,

My sources and understanding of the outcome of the One Child policy apparently have a different bias than yours, but I think it's moot to this discussion based on addition information you and others provided. So for the sake of cordial discourse (and the rosier outlook), I'll go with your assessment. ||

Even if China and India both "reduced" their birthrates even post-One Child, it's still an overwhelming numbers game. 30%, 70%, 5%, etc.--it's still a percentage based on an already huge number of people being born which still is a huge number of new humans no matter how you look at it.

At what point will we be forced to look at an urban monad type of solution? I know in Asia there are serious plans afoot for giant skyscraper cities...where you could be born, live, work, recreate, and essentially never leave the skyscraper. Sounds like the beginnings of the same idea.

I don't think any of us would advocate proactive culling of the population (I hope!). But I'm also not sure what the solution is either. Nature may solve it for us in the form of another plague (and if history is any indication, it will be some sort of virulent flu) but that's obviously scary and depressing, though it does let our ethics off the hook.

Any other pro-active solutions in the vein of One Child are going to run up against growth-based, consumer-based economies (which even China is slowly evolving into). Grow-grow-grow. Debt-debt-debt. It's a system designed to overpopulate and deplete resources.

I can't help but latch-onto the Agent Smith observation about humanity:


It's very difficult coming-up with the solution while simultaneously admitting to be part of the problem...

CalvinFold said:

Citrinella,
Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium with the surrounding environment;

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I guess this was for amusement, but Umm, really ? I don't think there is any justification for Agent Smith's assertion. Any organism that gains an upper hand will streak away, maybe only temporarily till other organisms adapt. It certainly has nothing to do with instinct.

CalvinFold said:

It's very difficult coming-up with the solution while simultaneously admitting to be part of the problem...

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Absolutely, but we are not just part of the problem, we ARE the problem.

Mike.

citrinella said:

I guess this was for amusement, but Umm, really ? I don't think there is any justification for Agent Smith's assertion. Any organism that gains an upper hand will streak away, maybe only temporarily till other organisms adapt. It certainly has nothing to do with instinct.

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Yeah, it's just a metaphor with more complexities, though I think the basic implied tenet is there.

To me it implies that yes, occassionally there are plagues of rodents (human-induced, interestingly), they generally decimate a smaller area and die off because of it.

I'm fairly certain you got the gist of it in any case, so it's a hair splitting exercise, isn't it? Surely it's not the hubris of being "human"?

I understand what you're getting at, but I use this quote as meta-reading and understanding...an illustrative point.

citrinella said:

Absolutely, but we are not just part of the problem, we ARE the problem.

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Touché. Per Agent Smith and my own example...usually plagues of animals die-off before doing widespread damage. Humans have the potential to, and are well on their way to accomplishing, wiping out huge swaths of flora and fauna, not to mention the biosphere itself.

Still kinda makes us a metaphorical virus in my mind, since especially virulent viruses wipe-out their host before they can pass themselves on, making themselves their own worst enemy. Our host is the planet, and if we don't wipe out the whole thing, we'll wipe out enough to wipe *us* out at this rate.