reading assignment

6/20/2020 How Humans are Making Novel Ecosystems | Natural History Museum of Utah

https://nhmu.utah.edu/blog/2019/10/18/how-humans-are-making-novel-ecosystems 2/6

By Riley Black

In 1890, an American ornithologist changed the nature of our continent forever. Enamored with the

birds of Shakespearean plays, Eugene Schieffelin released 60 starlings into New York’s Central

Park. He would try with bullfinches, chaffinches, nightingales, and skylarks, too, but those birds

never really took off. The European starlings, however, quite liked their new home. Today they

number more than 200 million in the United States alone, part of novel ecosystems that we

humans are continually creating.

Even though humans have been spurring the genesis of novel ecosystems for the duration of our

existence, it’s only recently that ecologists, philosophers of science, and others have begun to

recognize the concept. To some extent, the nature of evolution itself dictates that new ecosystems

will arise just as species originate and go extinct, but the idea has more to do with our current era

of environmental influence. By introducing species to new habitats, altering environments through

construction, spurring global climate change, and more, we are creating ecosystems that never

existed before. And it’s changing how we think about nature and its future. Writing in 2009

(https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0169534709002018), Richard Hobbs, Eric

Higgs, and James Harris noted that “These novel systems will require significant revision of

conservation and restoration norms and practices away from the traditional place-based focus on

existing or historical assemblages.”

By itself, a novel ecosystem is not good or bad. It’s simply a description of new interactions that did

not exist in a place historically. Close-to-shore areas near nuclear power plants are often warmed

by the activities involved in running the reactor, for example, and in turn this results in a different

ecological community that can be a boon to some species. American crocodiles seem fond of the

warmed waters around nuclear power plants in Florida. But a novel ecosystem can also be one

that is new but denuded of its diversity. A department store parking lot built over woodland is a

novel ecosystem, offering garbage for raccoons and pigeons but understandably being

inhospitable to many of the other species that used to live there.

Understanding the creation and evolution of novel ecosystems is part of taking responsibility for our

own actions. When we take a flight to see a friend, mow the lawn, or dump old pills down the drain,

we are making individual changes that can build and alter life on our planet. It’s not as if nature is

some place Out There that we are not connected to. Nature can be as close as a chickadee in your

front yard or the house spider making a web in the corner of your living room. If we can recognize

how our actions are constantly shaping and reshaping the environment, we can make informed

decisions about what we hope the future of nature will look like.

6/20/2020 How Humans are Making Novel Ecosystems | Natural History Museum of Utah

https://nhmu.utah.edu/blog/2019/10/18/how-humans-are-making-novel-ecosystems 3/6

Riley Black is the author of Skeleton Keys, My Beloved Brontosaurus, Prehistoric Predators, and a

science writer for the Natural History Museum of Utah, a part of the University of Utah in Salt Lake

City. Our mission is to illuminate the natural world and the place of humans within it. In addition to

housing outstanding exhibits for the public, NHMU is a research museum. Learn more.

(http://nhmu.utah.edu/)

Blog Author:

Riley Black (/blog-author/riley-black)

Category: Natural History (/blog/category/fun)

Tags: conservation (/blog/tag/conservation)

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