The flora and fauna of Ascension
Sunday, February 18th, 2007Relatively near St. Helena, the island of Napoleon Bonaparte’s second exile, lies Ascension island. Famous scientist Charles Darwin passed the island on one of his journies and described it as barren with very few plants. Today, less then two centuries later, part of the island has become covered with a tropical rainforest through various ad-hoc planting efforts and scientist have been surprised by the speed at which this complex ecological system has developed. Even though the flora and fauna are now richer than before, not everyone agrees that this has been an unequivocal positive transformation; at least four native species have become extinct and others have become endangered.
Most people probably feel that the complex forrest is an improvement over the previous sparse vegetation. This touches once again upon the question whether we should actively try to control and change our environment or to leave everything unchanged as much as possible. And what part of the latter goal of leaving everything unchanged have we already missed by going from a population of 2 million to one of over 6 billion? I think that the lesson to be learnt from Ascension is that change will favor some life and it will kill others. As human beings we should be prudent to strive for change, in particular when we do not fully understand all the factors involved, since at every turning point there is the chance of us ‘becoming out of favor‘.