It just occurred to me - we only call these 'invasive' not because they invade nature, but because they invade the spaces we as humans have carved into nature. If our presence wasn't there, perhaps the natural ecosystem wouldn't have space or room for some of these species to enter, but because of human activity, a space is carved out for these other species to grow in, and that's what causes us the stress.
Isn't it weird how we're so acutely aware of the effect of the species that invade our space, but so ignorant so often of our effect on the same spaces when we invade them?
I think I learned something valuable today chewing on this article.
The term "invasive species" never made sense to me. It just means something can evolutionary outcompete other things, because it is better at utilizing that environment.
Basically putting a label on things we don't like.
We don't like it because it can cause widespread damage to the ecosystem, not just to us. Life didn't evolve in a vacuum, and the balance of natural ecosystems can be fragile.
> [Feral pigs] are invasive and cause millions of dollars in agricultural damage each year, rooting and trampling through a wide variety of crops. They prey on everything from rodents, to deer, to endangered loggerhead sea turtles, threatening to reduce the diversity of native species. They disrupt habitats. They damage archaeological sites. They are capable of transmitting diseases to domestic animals and humans.
> Interestingly, in their native range in Europe and Asia, pigs do not cause as much ecological damage. In fact, some studies indicate that they may modify habitat in important ways for species that have evolved with them, such as frogs and salamanders.
My wife read about an endangered butterfly called the Small Blue. The female feeds exclusively on a plant called kidney vetch. Isn't that crazy? One fucking plant! This isn't a plant that you can buy in a garden center.
That's the magic about ecosystems. They develop over aeons, and have intricate interdependencies. Many species are extremely picky about how they mate, where they lay their eggs, what they eat when they're larva, what they eat as adults etc. If you wipe out a single plant, you could wipe out an insect that exclusively feeds on it, which could wipe out some other thing that feeds exclusively on that insect. If an invasive species that threatens a single native species, this isn't just "something we don't like", it can cause a chain reaction of extinctions.
Maybe you should look up its definition because that's not what invasive species means.
They aren't called invasive species when they have arrived on their own without human intervention and then outcompete.
Japanese Knotweed did not come to Europe and US by its own accord, it was intentionally planted in gardens from where it escaped and is now causing ecological and economical damage at a massive scale.
Calling it an invasive species is basically admitting that it was a mistake in introducing it to another environment, and also (sometimes legally) forbidding of adding any more and/or mandating destroying existing ones.
This is definitely true, but there is a useful distinction between the usual evolutionary competition between species in an ecosystem and the very sharp situation of an ecologically novel species being introduced into that ecosystem and out-competing the incumbents, and 'invasive species' is the best term we currently have for this second case.
Isn't it weird how we're so acutely aware of the effect of the species that invade our space, but so ignorant so often of our effect on the same spaces when we invade them?
I think I learned something valuable today chewing on this article.