WordcatTop Quality Articles

An ecosystem is a place where everything works in perfect balance. So it is an ideal home for the creatures that have evolved alongside it and live in it. A natural system created by the interaction of a community of organisms with their environment. Everything in the ecosystem depends on everything else to keep it healthy and balanced. This means that ecosystems are particularly vulnerable to change. Remove something from the equation, or make one small tweak, and the whole thing can fall apart fast.

Sadly, deteriorating eco-systems are rarely out of the news. The planet’s coral reefs are threatened by extinction as the sea warms way beyond their comfort zone. Precious landscapes and the creatures that live in them are being destroyed across the remote Arctic and Antarctic. The Maldives are sinking, their residents forced to buy new islands to live on as their homelands disappear below the waves. All over the tropics rainforests and being felled in great swathes despite frantic international efforts to conserve them.

The infamous ‘Red List’ of endangered species is growing horribly fast. Poor planning and agricultural practices have far reaching, nasty effects. Careless tree felling leads to chronic soil erosion, which washes out the nutrients and dries it out… eventually leaving nothing but sterile dust. In every corner of the earth eco-systems are collapsing. Environments that have existed for millions of years are disappearing. The UK has it’s share of threatened environments and endangered eco-systems. Wetlands once covered vast tracts of our countryside. Now they’re a rarity and the wildlife that used to thrive on, in and above them is in crisis. Woodlands are shrinking and mountain environments eroded by millions of tourist boots. Countless miles of hedgerow have already been uprooted.

It’s not all about global warming. It’s about other things too. Humans take up so much space. We smother the earth in concrete. We destroy unique places. We pollute. We take charge. We meddle. We change things, spoil things and churn things up. But taking a step back, human damage is nothing new. We’ve been imposing ourselves on the landscape for millennia. South Downs scenery, now smooth and rolling with short green grass, is far from natural. Before humans brought sheep into the picture the Downs were covered in dense undergrowth. Those pretty patchwork fields we love so much were once deciduous forest. Or scrubby heathland. The trouble is there are now billions of people on the planet. So many of us that we’re causing lasting damage.

Buy why does it matter if we lose a few eco systems? No eco system exists in a vacuum. Everything interlocks. Many scientists think that things depend on one another to a much greater degree than we ever suspected. In the ’80s came Chaos Theory, where something as insignificant as the flap of a butterfly’s wing might ultimately affect big, fundamental things like the weather. Then came Gaia, a respected theory holding that the entire planet is one huge organism. Where every living and non-living thing on it interacts and reacts to create a whole that works perfectly. Muck about with the constituent parts and you risk disrupting the whole caboodle.

Whatever your theories, thoughts or feelings, at the very least it must be worth making an effort to preserve the world’s fantastic variety and beauty for our grandchildren. We tend to think that, as humans, we’re different. We’re not, we’re part of the pattern too. If we destroy great chunks of the environment we’ll ultimately suffer just as much as our fellow creatures who inhabit it. 

There’s hope on the horizon. Because almost everything reported by the media is bad news, it can be tough tracking down the positive stuff. You’d be forgiven for believing that the end of the world is nigh. In fact the real picture is occasionally brighter than you’d imagine. For a start a whole load of species are being re-introduced into the UK as we clean up our countryside, reduce carbon emmissions and bring in new conservations measures.

The great bustard, for example, is thriving again in the UK after a very long absence. As is the beautiful red kite. Further afield, at the end of June 2009 Brazil’s president used his powers to veto parts of a contraversial bill that would have allowed a disastrous land grab in the Amazon. Had he not stepped in, the resulting environmental damage could have been catastrophic. And the US has finally signed an international agreement to reduce carbon emmissions. After years of Bush-led resistance and climate scepticism, there’s clear cause for optimism.

On a human scale more and more ordinary people are taking small but valuable steps to recycle, cut waste and reduce their impact. At the moment we’re still trying to tip the balance and we have a long way to go. It’s a painful process but a necessary one. People all over the world - in all walks of life - are keen to help, willing to change and ready to act to save ecosystems, environments and uniquely beautiful landscapes. Many of us have already taken every step that’s been recommended to us to cut down the damage we do. There’s all the usual stuff: 

Eat local, buy local, grow your own, cut driving to the bare bones, use public transport, waste as little as possible, use energy saving lightbulbs, turn appliances off rather than leaving them on stand by. Don’t pave over your front garden and use it as a car park. Plant flowers for insects and bees. Go solar. Make do and mend. Give to environmental charities. Never waste a thing. Use eco-friendly cleaning products and cosmetics. Don’t make a mess or pollute. Create space for nature. Campaign and protest. Hassle your MP. Raise money. Blog. Twitter. Eat less meat. Teach your kids to care.

None of which seems particularly dramatic in isolation. But it all adds up. Want to do more? Organisations like the BTCV and National Trust let ordinary people take volunteering holidays to help with vital conservation projects. Conservation and volunteer holidays abroad can take you to some of the planet’s most fascinating and dangerous places to play an active conservation role… not for the faint hearted! Whatever you decide to do, your actions will play a small but vital part in making things better. Unless you’re doing nothing at all, dont think you can’t make a difference. You can.