Biodiversity Loss and How Humans Affect It
Biodiversity needs action from everyone! The human population has grown from 1.5 billion in 1900 to present-day 7.8 billion, according to worldpopulation.net. With the human population growing so rapidly it is obvious that other species will have to adapt to the quickly changing environment. Some species aren’t able to adapt to the changes and slowly each species population decreases and eventually if shattered into enough subsections the species will go extinct.
There are 8.7 million species known to man, though I’m sure there are many more. Scientists estimate that 150 species go extinct each day according to e360.yale.edu. That’s over 100 times the natural rate of extinction. Some of the most important species are called keystone species. If a keystone species goes extinct it will drastically change the environment and all the species that it surrounds. Some keystone species are going extinct and not affecting us too much in our everyday life. But if more go extinct it will have a domino effect and completely change species diet and environment causing a major shift for all living species, But if we help and become aware, we can fix biodiversity without any major collapses in the food chains or environmental collapses, which will inevitably happen, if no work is done to stop it!
Most people have no idea what animals are keystone species and don’t know the impact that they cause if killed. Beavers are a great example of a keystone species, with the dams that they build it increases water levels creating a wetland environment. This increases the fish population, bird population, and waterfowl population. The image below will help develop a good understanding of a keystone species.
Humans, as you can imagine, are playing the biggest role in the depletion of biodiversity. Humans historically industrialize profitable species by creating more efficient ways of harvesting which are usually not good in any way for the environment. Like using huge boats to industrializing fish, using farm equipment for wheat, using heavy machinery to cut down the forest. And when the item demand outstrips the item supplies it depletes the resource making it wanted and valuable. With all of this comes pollution, and lots of it. 2.57 million pounds of carbon gets pumped into the air every second. With all the carbon being pumped we are heating up the atmosphere like a furnace, causing the icebergs to melt and the waters to warm. This is destroying many different species and main keystone species. That’s just one of the problems that we have created for ourselves, and have left for generations to come to deal with.
The Amazon rainforest is home to over 2,500 species according to worldatlas.com and according to rainforests.mongabay.com over 289,00 square miles of forest have been cut down since 1978, that’s only 42 years!
Can you imagine what those forests will look like in another 40 years? Especially with the rapidly rising population of humans.
The next big step in affecting the future of humans, biodiversity, and the earth is some sort of population control without having to end people’s lives. Such as a child limit for a generation or two. China has tried to put a limit on the number of children a family can have, but this did not go too well and the limit was removed. With humans being the only species that are expanding at the rate we are, we will have to either wait for enviable doom or populate another planet which both can not be done right now. According to un.org by 2050, the human population will reach almost 10 billion people, If the earth’s population raised 6 billion in only 120 years I doubt that we will only raise 2.8 billion in 50 years, especially with the number of people that inhabit the earth at this moment.
I think this quote from The Matrix is a dark interpretation of what is going on in this day and age. Agent Smith: “Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium with the surrounding environment, but you humans do not. Instead, you multiply and multiply, until every resource is consumed. … There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern… a virus.” It seems sort of ironic to me. Coronavirus (COVID-19) is not what humans wanted but its what the earth needed to breathe for a bit. And with everything mother nature has thrown at us in just 2020 alone like the Australia wildfires and (COVID-19) I think the earth is naturally trying to depopulate the earth.
We have to help biodiversity. It’s EVERYWHERE but without action from the specie that is causing the most damage to it we have no chance of maintaining a stable amount of biodiversity.
Works Cited
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q-wjAvfK4Aohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q-wjAvfK4Ao
“World Map / World Atlas / Atlas of the World Including Geography Facts and Flags.” WorldAtlas, www.worldatlas.com/.
National Geographic Society. “Keystone Species.” National Geographic Society, 29 Aug. 2019, www.nationalgeographic.org/encyclopedia/keystone-species/.
Butler, Rhett A. “Rainforests.” Mongabay.com, Mongabay, 9 Feb. 2020, rainforests.mongabay.com/.
Lovecky Tromp, Willow. Oral interview. Conducted by Vina Tromp, Orion. 16th April 2020
Lana and Lilly Wachowski. The Matrix. Netflix. Published by the Wachowskis. March 31, 1999
