Urban Scout got me thinking about all of this crisis rhetoric that is fed to us on a regular basis. Coupled with the inaugural speech yesterday, and Barack Obama’s heavy use of “crisis”, I’ve formulated some ideas I want to share on the subject.
In Urban Scout’s article, he talks about how there is a strenuous use of the term “Energy Crisis”. Media outlets depict this event as a state-of-emergency like event. Scout argues that humans do not need energy. In fact, humans lived without energy for multitudes longer than any so-called “modern” civilization. Much of the world is inhabited by humans who do not need or even desire a supply of fossil fuel energy, and much like the human civilizations we evolved from, we too know how to live without fossil fuel energy, intuitively at least.
Masses have been clamoring on about Barack Obama’s inaugural event. I watched recordings of it on the internet and instead of being sucked into the ethos of his rhetoric, took a step back to analyze what he was saying to all these humans… many of which chanted “Obama, Obama!…” and “We want change!”. I noticed a steady use of emotional appeal; the tragic job losses, economic “crisis”, energy “crisis”, and several other “crisis” events. All of this was followed by equally powerful and emotionally charged language of uniting Americans around, namely, hope and change. In the realm of nerual linguistics programming, this would be considered the use of anchoring and trance words, but hardly in a positive way.
After viewing Barack’s speech, I went into thought of what the real issue is, the reason why these words he uses are so powerful. I came to a conclusion that any so-called crisis we are facing is no crisis at all. This is not a way to dehumanize tragic events or to downplay situations of great struggle or loss. But, American’s, haven’t really experienced anything very painful since the last wars on our soil. Instead, our lives have gotten worse in other ways, evolving our culture into one with a lifestyle and framework reliant on constant external inputs and constant internal ignorance. We have instead of suffering physically or situationally, suffered from an internal deterioration. Our spirit has become degraded and our minds perverted. I feel that because of this internal war, the large majority of American’s look upon issues of scarcity as crisis — hopeless events which will only be solved by gathering in large crowds to chant about change, in desperate search for a bandage to our growing internal sickness.
The true crisis, if I should even use the term, is that we constantly reaffirm that we must change our external realm. In response to declining energy availability, we search for new ways to get cheap and abundant energy. Instead of retrofitting what already exist, we seek to find new ways to keep the dead alive, just one day longer, figuratively speaking. But, if we could simply turn to ourselves and evaluate the toxic ways in which we think — about ourselves, the world, and the web of life we call Earth; If humans quit gathering to shout about their disapproval of external situations, and instead directed this energy to transmute the generations of pain and suffering built up in our subconscious, we could free ourselves from what seems like hell, and perhaps come to terms with the fact that civilization is the crisis. The crisis is that we want a bandage for the wound, but the wound is embedded in the way we use our minds, not with how natural laws work.
Today I came across this quotation in the book, “Vegetables” by the American Horticultural Society. It was helpful for me so I thought I’d share it, here it is:
“Once the amateur has realized that he himself is master of the situation in his garden,and that he is not the slave to a set of recipes, a great deal is gained. Gardening comes out of the realm of mystic beliefs and becomes an adventure in adaptation. Each plant grown becomes an experiment, instead of a routine performance. That plant becomes the test whether the applied principle was right. If the plant does not grow well or dies, the application of principles was not right, or the condition were such that the principle did not work. If, on the other hand, the plant behaves well, it shows the applicability of the principle.
By looking at the plants in this way, a garden becomes immensely interesting, it becomes the testing ground of ideas, and it frees the mind from dogmatism. The gardener becomes aware of the fact that experiments can be carried out everywhere, and are not restricted to highly specialized laboratories. Science is not a cult, it flourishes where these observations are faithfully recorded.”
We all know that civilizations rise and fall, this is a natural process. We also know that we are civilized…I hope! Civilizations seem to work similarly to forest ecosystems. If a forest, or a small patch in a forest, is disturbed this changes the sucsessional direction of the plant community. The impact can vary depending on the type of disturbance and the pre-disturbed site characteristics. A disturbance could come from outside the forest, like a tornado, hurricane, or even a human being clear cutting. Or, disturbances can be generated within the system, like a tree falling over. If an old tree falls this will affect the ecosystem dramatically. First of all, if the tree is large enough it may knock other trees over when it falls. This lets more light, air, and water to the forest floor, creating new niches. These post disturbance circumstances will bring opportunities for new species to colonize, specifically ones that are adapted to whatever those circumstance may be. A shade loving plant will not succeed in a sunny spot, a sun loving plant will. I think it is safe to say that human civilizations function in this same manner. When a civilization falls it lets way for a new one to grow. It is important that we DON’T idealize the collapse of a civilization as a static moment, but rather a bumpy dynamic transition. But, this also depends on the disturbance that causes the civilization to fall. Just like a disturbed forest, a disturbance on a civilization can be generated from within or from the outside. Those coming from the outside may end up with a more dramatic pin pointed civilization collapse, like a flood. Self-generated disturbances on the other hand can lead to a slower transitional period. A civilization dependent on finite resources (fossil fuels) has generated it’s own disturbance. Better yet we could say they have “created the opportunity for a disturbance”, because the dependence is not the actual disturbance itself but the fact that the resource has a definite limit, creates the opportunity for a major disturbance. Similarly to a forest, after the civil collapse the flow of energy within the system changes, new niches are available, and the sucsessional direction is changed accordingly. In a post industrial civilization there will be more opportunities for a craftsman to succeed then there will be for a race car driver. Our jobs will solely depend on the niches available, and they will reflect that. If a forest is clear cut, and a new one is planted in the same space there will be certain legacies from the old system that are prevalent in the new one. Those plants that heavily dispersed seed are likely to come back because the seed will still be present in the soil, and will sprout when the conditions are right. The same goes for our human systems; there is no reason to discard discoveries and findings from the “old” civilization if they are useful. That is if we have the chance to. If a flood washes the majority of the population away there is a lower probability that these legacies will get passed on.
I suppose we could assume from this that: collectively we follow the grand patterns of nature and if we realize this, we will be more suited to cope with these patterns and adapt.
After Mark and Paul left last night at about 1 am, I figured it was time to get in bed. Some nights I am so tired that I fall asleep instantly while other nights I will stay awake in bed for a half hour or so, absorbing everything from the previous day, and imagining. Last night I had these streams of information coming to me freely. It wasn’t like I was trying to think but rather the thoughts were coming to me, tuning me in. I became entranced as everything my unconscious mind had accumulated was being translated to me in an easy to comprehend way. I began to see the words “new” and “now”. Upon first glance I noticed the structural similarities between the two words. I analyzed the word “new” and realized that it something we all strive for, whether it is something physical or something mental, we are attracted to “new”. This is very evident in our consumer-based culture, where shopping and spending time at the mall are common rituals. New TV’s, new cars, new phones, new computers, new states of mind or whatever it may be, it seems like we are always searching for something new, or what we previously lacked possession of. Is this the driving force behind our rapid exploitation of resources and exponential growth models that we base all aspects of our culture on? Well it could be, along with other things, like ignorance. We are always ignoring things everyday out of convenience. We ignore where our food, fuel, fiber, and fun come from, because in the short-term it is much easier. But I think what we ignore the most is the “now”, or the present moment. This is something that is always new. It is a dynamic showcase that we all get to observe and interact with. It constantly presents us with unique circumstance that we must adapt to; to me that’s fun! May be that is why we use the word present to depict a gift, because the present moment is a gift. So if we can be aware of this presence that we are gifted with, then we would not need all of the other “new” things. Something is stopping us from being this presence: our past. We all hold on to our past very tightly and that is where we gain our identity. By being so chained to this identity creates the need for “new” material things like cars, TV’s, phones, computers, shirts, skirts, and I-pods, which in turn give us a quick fix that tricks us into thinking it makes up for what we were missing out on all along. The only way to get rid of this baggage is by simply acknowledging it, and eventually it will seize to exist. This is one way we can have more with less, because now is new.
Being sixteen years old I often find myself in situations where I play a preconceived role; the role of a “teenager”, or a “kid”. Yet I am unsure what part of me this roll applies to…is it my spirituality, my knowledge… or maybe my physical body? And how did I get here, it’s as if I have been unconsciously positioned and now all the sudden I am conscious again. And of course if there is the “teenager”, there has to be another role for those have passed this stage: the adult. They have accumulated years of experience which also means they have gained wisdom, but unfortunately from what I have seen this isn’t always the case, some have instead been conditioned by the norms of our cult-ure. Who would have thought that a human could become so acclimated to these relatively new thought patterns and ways of interacting? The mindset that some possess is not only irrational but ultimately self-destructive. What I am talking about is the assumption of superior ness, as if they are the kings and we are the slaves, paying back their incredible debts. A lot of times when I appear in these scenes, Trevor, is being talked to but not my true nature. I come into conflict with my self and the Trevor that is being talked to or scolded. Should I agree with their accustoms for the convenience of it, or should I revolt? Lately I have had the urge to revolt and break away from this vicious pattern. The level of noxiousness that these people act on is driving me into these urges, thankfully. When I walk into school, am I a student, or when I enter a store, am I a raging consumer? I think not. Or better yet when I enter a doctor’s office am I automatically a patient? The very word “office” is defined as a place of business. So, Am I here to be healed or only for the doctor to gain profits? As I examine these thoughts I wonder: are these people really out to exploit me, or is it all an unconscious action?
Today I had an experience that opened my eyes up and encouraged me to write these thoughts down. I am home schooled, although I go to a technical center for the first half of the day. The class is named Biotechnology/ Environmental Sciences. We were assigned to do a demonstration in which we show a “sound agricultural practice”. I decided to demonstrate how to make a compost pile and how to sheet mulch, as these are quite simple practices that I thought would be easy for the instructors, and the class to understand. The instructors had a few questions afterwards about the demonstration; one was, ”what are some things you shouldn’t put in the compost bin?” I responded by saying that I put all of my waste products into my pile, but it is recommended to have a very hot pile to decompose animal products successfully. Of course they are compostable because they were designed to be! But one of the teachers looked ashamed when I said this, and then responded,” we’ll just say NO animal products”. Was I suppose to send it to the landfill, was that the right thing to do? I think not. I have seen this same consensus before in my own father, along with countless other cultural consensi. Another question was “how does someone apply these practices to ten acres of farmland?” And I responded, “You don’t”. They ended up liking the demonstration a lot and seemingly tried to push on me that I go to the regional and then may be the national convention to demonstrate this to professors and agriculturalists. They boasted about the chance to win a scholarship to a great college! The thing is, I am not going to the technical center to go to college, I am only there to get done with high school, which I never even chose to attend in the first place. Once again I felt like I was being exploited for some odd reason. A while back I read a book called “Original Wisdom” by Robert Wolff, and there was a part in the book where he visited aboriginal people of Malaysia to conduct scientific studies on their diets. However the aboriginal people had no clue why this was being done, so this seemed arbitrary to them. They ate what they ate and they were who they were. And I think this is partially the root of the conflict, we aren’t who we truly are, but rather distant from that. It’s as if we have illogically translated reality into something that is linear, sterile, and lethal, breaking things up into individual parts and identifying things as if they are separate pieces, while all along everything was interconnected. And on top of that we do this with total disregard for our home and our selves. But why? What is the underlying force that drives this? I think it is time to throw our collective corrosive culture into a compost bin and turn it into a useable resource, one that co-operates and regenerates, not competes and depletes.
Those of you familiar with John Michael Greer’s work, will be familiar with what he has termed the Religion of Progress. Like all religious doctrine’s, the religion of progress is one of strict dogmata. But, unlike most religions humans take part in, the religion of progress is a subversive, unspoken rite of industrial civilization. Actually, everyone who participates in industrial civilization, is more or less an unknowing religious fanatic. But, as much of the ritual in industrial civilization, the ceremonies and practices are mostly invisible or subconscious.
The average American simply watches television, or more accurately, fantasizes about watching television in HD on their new plasma screen, without thinking of it as a religious practice. To most of us, our rituals are not religious at all. We simply drive our car to work, upgrade our obsolete belongings, and dream of a future where our vehicles fly and no humans die of an unjust disease or misfortune of health. Every “new” technology is simply bought and legitimized, without a single question or test as to why it is necessary or even better. In school we are taught that before all of our technological “advancements”, humans lives were archaic and quaint — not something we wanted to think about, much less ever have to experience.
Since the dawn of the industrial age the religion of progress has spread throughout the Western world quite rapidly. Our great-grand parents, grandparents, and parents have witnessed the brutal crusades of the “Progressors” (a term we can use to refer to those practicing members of the religion of Progress). Interestingly though, these crusades have been called world wars, conflicts, coups, and civil unrest. No attention has ever been directed to the true religious motivation of all of these events, because to do so would be blasphemous, and those claiming that such a religion even existed, would be ridiculed as “conspiracy theorists” or a social outcast all together.
Today I was reminded that the dogma of this religion is ingrained in our subconscious, our spirit, and has even corrupted our souls. Up until a fairly recent point in my life I too, was a devout “Progressor”. I was bought and paid for by the commercistic methodologies and mantras that dictate such dogma. I actually believed that a hybrid car could, or would, save the planet. I lusted for new electronic toys; cellphones, computers, cars, and more. It wasn’t until I denied my baptization into this religion that I’ve seen or felt the dogmas so deeply ingrained.
While having a talk with my brother I mentioned how with every new technology we adapt, we pay a price — usually a negative price. Sharon Astyk wrote about this not too long ago, so it had been fresh in my mind the past few days. It wasn’t really until this moment that I realized that there is a dogma, a doctrine to this faith. I gave an example using the cellphone; Once cellphones are adopted en masse, it becomes an assumption that it is a necessity. When we feel that the cellphone is a necessity, we lose the freedom of not being able to be truly alone, or out of contact. We also lose a sense of connection and security, and in turn are given the false security and connection that the cellphone is supposed to deliver. And without fail, my brother returned with the example of, “Well, if you’re stranded on the side of the rode without a cellphone, you’ll be wishing you had a cellphone.” he followed by defending the cellphone (which I doubt is in need of defending… it’s quite braggadocios on it’s own). “It’s just a tool; it all depends how you use it. You can’t do business without it.” I was quickly reminded by what Dmitry Orlov said at the Plan C Conference when he said something along the lines of, “I don’t take anyone seriously unless they don’t have a cellphone or a car.”
After blowing my cover, I was asked what I’m going to do with my current cellphone. I was honest and told my brother that I plan on getting rid of it. I then threw out the idea, which I more or less consider a fact, that cellphones are not going to be a round much longer. My brother seemed offended and said with a hostile tone, “No, I think they’ll be around for a long, long time.”
So it seems, of all of the dogmas of the Religion of Progress, the most paramount is that there will be continuity. From this one dogma stems all other dogmas and doctrines. I see it everywhere; from people talking about new cities that will be (re)built “green”, or of the imaginary future where renewable energy sources like wind and tidal power deliver us with all the energy we need to sit back and watch our beloved television every night, or defending each wave of advancement like the word of god. And always, no matter the subject, progress, or more accurately, fantasized advancement, is the basis of all the dogma.
The problem with the Religion of Progress, though, is that like all domgata, it exist to keep faith. For example, the dogma in Evangelical Christian faith is that the world was created in seven days and that Jesus will soon come back to rescue us from our deslote Easter Island of a planet filled with sin and evil. Realistically though, humans are just animals, and like all animals humans have intuition. Intuition tells all humans that the world was not created in seven days and that Jesus will not come to our rescue. So this juxtaposition gives the dogmata life, since it is grounded in fear — in the Evangelical case, a innate fear that Jesus is not coming back. In the case of the Religion of Progress, intuition tells us that progress cannot be sustained and that our planet (in terms of sustaining human life) is quite bluntly, fucked. I believe that is why we have people trying to disprove climate change and tell us that the economy is not collapsing, that America is not in it’s last days, etc. (insert thousands of other examples).
Luckily, like all dogmata and religious doctrine, it only takes the simple task of saying “I don’t believe it… I don’t have faith.”, to break the viscious cycle. Once we free ourselves from the dogma of Progress, we can actually come to terms with realities more real than the money economy ( or is it number economy?) or the “green” dillusions. Derrick Jensen said “The nazi’s made it seem like it was always in your best interest to do what they say. “Get on the cattle car, or be shot and killed. Go into the shower, or be shot and killed.”" We can say the same thing of progress, but in this case it’s not being killed, so to speak. We can say that we don’t believe in any aspect of progress; the newest cellphone, car, clothes, leap in technology, or that stupid fucking television. This disconnects us from the life support, the “comfort”, the dogma, and allows us to get off the proverbial sinking ship.
Trevor told me of a dream he had a few weeks ago. He was boarding the Titanic; all of his family was boarding the ship, and he was saying to them “Don’t get on the ship! I know what happens, it sinks!”. Everyone got angry at him, they detested him for saying it and boarded the ship anyway. The same can be said for those who quit believing in Progress.
Someone commented that I’ve been copying and pasting too much of our content… Well here is some more of that. This article, I found was very helpful for me. I’ve been developing these ideas about “invasive species” for a few months now, this is certainly something to add to the process. Check out Toby Hemenway’s site for more articles. And, if you’re sick of copied content, I’m going to be doing more writing in the next few weeks.
Let me tell you about the invasive plant that scares me more than all the others. It’s one that has infested over 80 million acres in the US, usually in virtual monocultures. It is a heavy feeder, depleting soil of nutrients. Everywhere it grows, the soil is badly eroded. The plant offers almost no wildlife habitat, and since it is wind pollinated, does not provide nectar to insects. It’s a plant that is often overlooked on blacklists, yet it is responsible for the destruction of perhaps more native habitat than any other species. Research shows that when land is lost to this species, native plants rarely return; they can’t compete with it. It should go at the top of every native-plant lover’s list of enemies. This plant’s name: Zea mays, or corn. Corn is non-native. It’s from Central America. Next on my list is the soybean, with 70 million acres of native habitat lost to this invasive exotic. Following those two scourges on this roll call of devastating plants is the European invader called wheat.
Wait, you say: these plants are deliberately spread by people; that’s different! But to an ecologist, it is irrelevant that the dispersion vector of these plants is a primate. After all, we don’t excuse holly or Autumn olive, even though without bird dispersal, they could not spread. Why are corn, soy, and wheat not on any blacklists? Because we think of them differently than plants spread by non-humans. This suggests that an invasive species is an idea, a product of our thinking, not an objective phenomenon. When we restore land, we restore to an idea, not to objective criteria.
Let me give another example of how our ideas dictate which species we’ll tolerate and which we won’t. The wooded hillside on rural Oregon where I once lived was thick with 40- to 120-year-old Douglas fir and hemlock. But as I walked these forests, I noticed that scattered every few acres were occasional ancient oak trees, four to six feet in diameter, much older than the conifers and now being overtopped by them. I realized that in these ancient oaks I was seeing the remnants of the oak savanna that had been maintained for millennia by fire set by the original inhabitants, the Calapuya people. The fir forest moved in when the whites arrived and drove off the Calapuya, and suppressed fire. So what I was seeing was a conifer forest created by human-induced fire-suppression, and it had replaced the oak savanna that had been preserved by fire setting. Which was the native landscape? Both were made by humans. If we say, let’s restore to what existed before humans altered it, we’d need to go back to birches and willows, since humans arrived as the glaciers retreated. But clearly that’s not appropriate.
In a similar vein, one of the rarest and most valued ecosystems in the Northwest are the native prairies, such as those found in the Willamette and other valleys. Yet these prairies are also the product of human manipulation. Prairies occurred naturally in the Willamette over 5000 years ago, but began to disappear after that. Ecologist Mark Wilson has written “As climate turned cooler and moister 4,000 years ago, oak savanna and prairie ecosystems were maintained only by frequent fires set by native people to stimulate food plants and help in hunting.” The local people used fire technology to maintain an environment that supported them even when the climate no longer supported that ecosystem.
So I applaud and encourage efforts to preserve native prairie in the region—they are valuable as endangered species habitat, examples of cultural heritage, and a way of preserving planetary biological wisdom. But we should restore these prairies with the strict recognition that we are creating—not recreating or restoring–a state that can not be supported by current climate and other conditions. Prairies are artificial in the Willamette Valley. The preservation of prairies there isn’t a matter of simply repairing and replanting a degraded landscape and then watching the prairie thrive, but constructing a species community and an environment for it that must remain on intensive life support, with constant intervention, for it to survive at all, as long as the climate remains unsuitable to it. The Willamette prairie remnants can’t be considered native; the only criteria they meet is that they were here in small patches when botanists first catalogued them. But so were dandelions. Botanists knew dandelions weren’t native, but the didn’t know that the prairies were human created, so the prairies were catalogued as native. Prairies in the Northwest haven’t been indigenous for 4000 years.
We love the local prairies and I firmly believe in the efforts to preserve them. But I want us to be clear that we are restoring to an idea. We are restoring because we want these things here, and not because there is a master blueprint that says they are the right ecosystem for the place. Ecosystems exist because current conditions favor those particular assemblages. Change the conditions, and the ecosystems will, absolutely, change. Both the climate and humans have changed the conditions plenty. Environmental change is the driving force behind shifting species makeup. With plants and most animal species, no evil species showed up and through sheer cussedness, killed off the locals. Instead, the conditions changed
The very concept of wild land, for most Americans, is founded on a misunderstanding: a very brief ecological moment during which a once-managed ecosystem was at the height of its degradation due to loss of its keystone species. The dark and tangled primeval forests, written about by Thoreau and Emerson, are simply the declining remnants of open and spacious Eastern food forests, turned to thicket after a century or two of neglect. But this idea of wilderness is deep in our mythology, national imagery, and consciousness.
Let’s look at some of the causes of species change. First: terminology. The word “invasive” is loaded. We hate invaders. The term also places focus solely on the incoming species, yet the ability of a species to survive is due to interactions with the biological and physical environment. So I prefer a more neutral, and I think, ecological more correct and descriptive term, such as opportunistic. Kudzu is not much of a problem in its native habitat, but it will take advantage of opportunities.
What creates those opportunities for species shifts? Intact ecosystems are notoriously hard to invade. We know this because, for example, seed dispersal rates are truly astounding. Birds are a major dispersal agent. They can carry seeds from multiple plant species in their gut, stuck to their feathers, and in mud on their feet. So picture billions and billions of birds, for 60 million years or so, traveling tens to thousands of miles, seeds dropping off of them every wing-beat of the way. Add to that bats, which are actually more effective at seed dispersal, per bat, than birds. Plus land-animal dispersals, not as far-ranging as birds but bringing much larger seed loads via droppings and fur. Include water-rafted trees and other plants, wind-dispersed species, and more.
This gives a picture of the whole planet crisscrossed with billions of birds and animals for millions of years, seeds and spores going everywhere, eggs being carried to new environments, dispersal, dispersal, dispersal! So why isn’t the whole planet a weedy thicket? Because the mere arrival of a new species, even in large numbers, is not what causes a successful colonization. Ecosystems are very hard to invade, and several conditions must be present for that to happen.
A major reason for ecosystems being tough to invade is that nearly all the resources in undisturbed ecosystems are being exploited. Nearly every niche is filled, every nutrient flow is being consumed, almost every opportunity is taken. Two major changes make ecosystems invasible: disturbance, and the appearance of new resources. Take disturbance. Perennially disturbed places, like riparian zones, are sensitive to opportunistic species. So is farmland, or developed areas, or anywhere than humans or nature cause disturbance. It drives me nuts when I read that “species X” has destroyed 50,000 acres of habitat. When you do a little digging you find that, no, that area was farmed, or new roads cut, or logged, or polluted, or otherwise disturbed, and then the new species moved in.
For example, the poster child of invasion biologists is the brown tree snake, blamed for invading Guam and killing off several species of birds. The untold story is that for decades the US Navy used over half of the island as a bombing range, leaving most of it unfit for life. Much of what remained was crowded by displaced people, and developed by the military, and thus turned into poor and disturbed habitat. The tree snake just cleaned up the struggling remnants that were already in serious decline.
Stop the disturbance, and you’ll almost always eliminate or reduce the effect of the new species. Land I lived on was clear-cut in the early 1970s and not replanted with fir until the 1980s, and was covered with patches of Himalayan blackberry and Scot’s broom when I arrived in the early 1990s. By the late 1990s, both species were gone from most places and nearly dead everywhere else, because the trees had grown back and shaded them out. The problem is disturbance, not that a species pushes out others because it’s tough or mean.
This suggests that we need to take care of naturally disturbed areas like riverbanks, since most of the species we’ve labeled as problematical thrive on disturbance. Even in these riparian zones, though, conditions are altered from what they once were because of the loss of the beaver and from damming. Thus nature is just trying to deal with our changes as best as she can, and she’ll use whatever resources she can find. A return to a natural disturbance regime will allow the once-present vegetation to return, if that is our choice for that land,
The second cause of successful invasion is the appearance of new resources. Often the new resources that that allow an otherwise intact ecosystem to be colonized are pollution and fertilizer runoff. For example, a number of aquatic opportunists, such as purple loosestrife, thrive in more polluted and higher-nutrient environments than the plants they replace. Many species that evolved in clean water are harmed by pollutants. Loosestrife, though, has high rates of nutrient uptake, and this trait allows it to out-compete many other species in polluted water. But in permaculture, we say that that every problem carries within it the seeds of its own solution. And so loosestrife can be used in constructed wetlands and in natural environments to clean nutrient-rich water. They are an indicator of a problem, a response to it, and nature’s way of solving a problem, not the problem itself. If you really hate loosestrife and want it to go away, clean up the water. Without doing that, you’ll be flailing away at the problem forever. Spraying and yanking is not an effective strategy to remove unwanted species. Nature is far more patient and persistent, and has a bigger budget, than we do. To remove an unwanted species, change the conditions that made it more favored than the desired vegetation.
Unwanted species generally arrive because humans have changed the environment to make conditions more favorable for the new species. And when we “restore” landscapes, or more often, introduce a set of species that we have decided are the ones we want to see there, we are altering the landscape to suit our idea of what should be there, not to match some divine plan. These two understandings burden us with a huge responsibility to make intelligent choices, but more importantly, to recognize that we are often arbitrarily making a choice based on our own preferences, not because there is only one right choice for a landscape, When we put resources into landscape management, however, we direct the shape of that landscape toward only one choice. That’s the best we can do. Thus I’d like to see us be less dogmatic in the way we cling to those choices.
Unfortunately, dogma is present on all sides. Friends of mine approached the Portland city government with a plan to create some edible plant corridors along Springwater Trail, a 40-mile bicycle and pedestrian loop around the city. Their idea was for bikers and pedestrians to be able to snack on berries and fruit. The city official in charge said, “Nope, we have a natives-only policy on the trail.” The trail is a paved pathway that goes through industrial areas and along backyards, road right-of-ways, and scrubby vacant lots. It probably goes through a dozen or more different environments, based on soil, water, sunlight, and all the other factors that determine what plant communities will grow there. But the policy is natives only. Wouldn’t it make sense for the primary species that will be using that trail to have a habitat that suits that species’ needs for food and comfort, particularly since it’s in a busy urban area? But instead the landscaping is to be driven by an idea, by dogma. I totally support the idea of having natives-only areas on the trail. But let’s allow the new landscaping to serve those that it’s being built for, too.
I began this with corn and soybeans. One of my favorite snarky questions for natives-only people is: “What did you eat for breakfast?” I ask that because it is our choices that determine how much of our landscape is going to be consumed by non-native species. I didn’t eat camas cakes with pink-flowering currant syrup this morning, and I’ll bet you didn’t eat any local plants either. Of course, I’d rather see someone growing indigenous species in their yard rather than having a sterile, resource gobbling lawn. But my Portland yard is not, in my or several other lifetimes, going to be part of a natural ecosystem. I might be able to cultivate some endangered native species in an attempt to pull a rare plant back from extinction. That’s one good reason I can see for growing indigenous plants in my yard. But the most frequent native plants I see grown in yards are salal, Oregon grape, and others that are in no danger of extinction and don’t, to ur knowledge, support specialist species dependent only upon them. And since much of my yard is watered, it is inappropriate for me to grow natives that are adapted to our dry summers. It’s always stuck me as bizarre to see Northwest natives being irrigated.
But even more than indigenous plants, I’d rather see someone providing for some of their own needs from their yard. When we eat a bowl of cornflakes for breakfast, or oatmeal, or store-bought eggs, we are commissioning with our dollars the conversion of wild land into monoculture farms. I’ll bet that a large percentage people reading this buy local food, shop organic, and so forth. But the farms growing that food are almost all moncultures, and out of the urban matrix. In other words, it is farmland that, if consumption decreased, has a far better chance of being restored to a functioning ecosystem than a home lot. If I grow some of my own food, that means that somewhere out in the country, a farmer won’t have to plow so close to the riverbank, or could let some of that back field go wild. That land has a far better chance of functioning as an ecosystem than my yard will. Oh, I have visions of how city and suburban landscapes could be functional ecosystems, but that’s another subject. My point is, we need to be putting money and energy into growing indigenous species where they will do the most good, where they can truly contribute to ecosystems and their functions. Much of our efforts in eliminating exotics is a complete waste of resources at best, and at worst is a terrible use of poisons to destroy a hybrid habitat whose function we don’t yet grasp. Let’s be honest at what we are restoring to: an idea of what belongs in a place. If we want to get rid of an invasive exotic, let’s get rid of some monocultured corn, and let a bit of farmland return to being a real ecosystem.
Another great post from Sharon Astyk’s blog — give it a read in full: here
He rode over the coutryside
In a mighty coach
Once, a fear pierced him,
In that he mistook the shadow of his equipage
For darkness.The original form of this poem was written before the invention of the SUV ;-). The SUV, is, among other things, a graphic symbol of our fears - we buy them in part because they are big, and seem (however falsely) to be secure, and to make us powerful when we are doing a scary thing, racing metal machines at each other at high speeds. The SUV is a bad guy, the public face of greed for many environmentalists, but it is also an easy target that masks some basic truths. Push all of us environmentalists hard enough and you’ll find the things we are not willing to give up, even though they are not unadulterated goods. We aren’t willing to give up our job serving some appalling corporation or our investments in the same, because doing so would mean giving up our insurance or hope of retirement. We aren’t willing to let go of our appliances because we’re afraid we couldn’t manage without them. We are not willing to have fewer children, because we fear we might be alone someday. We are all afraid that of the dark, and sometimes the dark is cast by the shadow of our equipage, the literal and metaphorical stuff we carry around with us. Let us remember, that even the driver of the SUV is often merely afraid - just like us. So there is hope.
