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What Myths About the Anthropocene Get Wrong

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Thursday, April 18, 2024

Jan A. Zalasiewicz, Scott L. Wing and the Anthropocene Working Group The concept of the Anthropocene epoch was born in February 2000 out of a moment of spontaneity. Chemist and Nobel Prize winner Paul Crutzen had been listening to a narrative emerging at an international convening of scientists in Mexico. All day, scientists had presented data that showed how the human-caused changes in climate, chemical cycles and biology of recent decades were jarringly different from the relative stability of the Holocene, the geological epoch that began 11,700 years prior. They kept referring to the remarkably rapid environmental changes of the late Holocene. Exasperated, Crutzen finally broke into the discussion: “We aren’t in the Holocene anymore, we’re in … the Anthropocene!” The improvised term quickly caught fire as a foundational concept among earth scientists, and in the last decade the word has proliferated through other sciences, the arts, humanities and popular culture. Along the way, “Anthropocene” gained many meanings and implications unrelated to—or even opposing—Crutzen’s original concept, blurring and sometimes wholly obscuring its original meaning. But what did Crutzen intend by the Anthropocene, a concept since enhanced and refined by years of scientific study? It’s absurdly simple. The shift from the Holocene to the Anthropocene epoch hits like a brick wall when looking at graphs that show changes in three major greenhouse gases and in global temperature during the last 30 millennia. All four of these critical planetary parameters shift from near-horizontal to near-vertical lines in the last 70 years or so. The graphs are simple, but they show changes in atmospheric chemistry and—lagging a little behind—temperature, that affect the habitability of the planet for all its organisms, including humans. On a time scale of millennia, the shifts don’t resemble a hockey stick as much as a stair step. Furthermore, these changes affect the whole atmosphere and ocean, so they are essentially irreversible on any human time scale. Our distant descendants will still be living with the planetary changes that humans have wrought in a single lifetime. The stunning effect of humans on the atmosphere can be seen in the concentration of three important greenhouse gases: nitrous oxide, methane and carbon dioxide. These gases have increased far more in the last 70 years than in the previous 30,000 years or more. Global temperature has begun to spike as a result, and it will continue to rise as the full effect of higher greenhouse gas concentration is felt. Martin Head If we zoom in on the time axis to look at just the last 300 years, ten human generations, we see remarkably large and rapid change in a whole range of factors that mark the effect of humans at a global scale: not just carbon emissions, but also production of metals, plastics, fertilizers, concrete and farm animals, and even a giant increase in the ultimate geological currency: sediment. The amount of sediment moved every year by humans now exceeds the amount moved by non-human processes by a factor of 15. Cropping the time frame tightly in this way, we see that the global shifts are most rapid beginning in the mid-20th century. The Anthropocene Working Group, a body of 34 scientists from 14 countries constituted in 2009 by the International Commission on Stratigraphy, proposed placing the beginning of a new Anthropocene Epoch in 1952, when sediments are marked globally by the first major increase in the element plutonium, derived from the earliest tests of thermonuclear weapons. Scientists proposed recognizing a new geological epoch, the Anthropocene, marked by rapid changes beginning in the mid-20th century. Sediments deposited in the last 70 years are marked by abundant artificial materials including concrete, metals, plastics and fertilizer. Ecosystems have also been transformed by the great increases in fertilizer production (ammonia) and raising livestock (meat production). Humans are also prodigious producers of sediment. Colin Waters By proposing a formal, geologically defined Anthropocene epoch, the working group intended to provide a precise definition for this recent, large, permanent and rapid transition in Earth’s physical, chemical and biological systems. The proposal was rejected by the international hierarchy of stratigraphy—of which the International Commission on Stratigraphy is a part—without citing substantive reasons, but most public criticisms of the Anthropocene stem from a range of sources: from within the heart of geology, to well outside it, among the social sciences and humanities. Tourists look down at the Hoover Dam. The amount of sediment settled behind the world’s thousands of big dams would cover all of California to a depth of five meters. Robert Nickelsberg / Getty Images Across a spectrum of disciplines, the Anthropocene touched—and often jabbed—a nerve: sometimes as a gut response to a disturbing new idea and sometimes with discomfort at unfamiliar sociopolitical implications. For whatever reasons, the Anthropocene came under fire. But the barrage of criticism has often focused on what the Anthropocene isn’t rather than what it is. Fundamental misconceptions have come to surround this concept and to cloud its meaning. Here we debunk ten common myths about the Anthropocene. 1. The Anthropocene fails to represent all human impacts. This is true enough—but it misses the point entirely. Recognizing an Anthropocene epoch does not at all underplay the impacts that humans have caused for many millennia by hunting, by farming, and by building cities and trade networks. But those early impacts were not global, were not synchronous around the planet and did not shift the global environment permanently. The reason for naming a new geological epoch, both in Crutzen’s original formulation and in the highly detailed proposal of the working group, is to mark the departure of the Earth and its inhabitants from the stable planetary system of the Holocene. The Anthropocene epoch was never meant to encompass all anthropogenic impacts. 2. The Anthropocene is too short to be a geological epoch—just one human lifetime. The Anthropocene’s duration is short, true—so far. But it’s the Holocene that shows the greatest change in duration from other epochs: nearly three orders of magnitude (0.0117 million years versus 2.57 million years for the Pleistocene epoch that precedes it). The difference in duration between Holocene and Anthropocene epochs is proportionately less, and the Anthropocene represents far more significant and enduring change to the planet than does the Holocene. 3. The Anthropocene is just a blip in Earth history. Or, as the New York Times writes, a senior member of the geological time-scale hierarchy calls it “a blip of a blip of a blip.” What this point of view misunderstands is that these approximately 70 years have altered the planet fundamentally and set it on a new trajectory. Already, many geological signals are sharper than, and as pronounced as, the sudden carbon release and global warming that initiated the Eocene epoch 56 million years ago. Take just the climate impacts from burning fossil fuels, of which 90 percent have been burned in the last 70 years. These impacts will roll across the planet for at least many thousands of years. We and many generations to come are locked into a climate unlike that of the Holocene. Carbon dioxide already in the atmosphere will make the Earth hotter than it has been for at least 3 million years. Many of the biological changes of the last 70 years are permanent, too: extinctions, of course, but also the spread of many species through the intended and unintended assistance of humans, making fauna and flora more homogeneous worldwide. The biosphere has been changed forever. This is no blip. 4. Anthropocene strata are “minimal” or “negligible.” That’s a very geological objection—but it’s wrong. Humans have, since the mid-20th century, been prodigious reshapers of the landscape and movers of rock and sediment (now, by more than an order of magnitude than natural sediment movers such as glaciers and rivers.) The amount of sediment settled behind the world’s thousands of big dams would cover all of California to a depth of five meters, and such sediments are full of distinctive markers, like pesticide residues, metals, microplastics and the fossils of invasive species. To define a time period formally, geologists must identify distinctive signals in sediments or rocks that can be correlated around the globe, and the presence of such markers is ubiquitous. The geology is real. Plastic debris collects after a rainstorm near Culver City, California. Microplastics that result from such debris can often be found in sediment. Citizen of the Planet / UIG via Getty Images 5. The geological record is too complex and gradational to draw one single boundary for the Anthropocene. All of history (of Earth and of humans) is complex, is gradational and varies through time and across space. Nevertheless, geologists define epochs because such time units are useful, indeed indispensable to their work. In geology, each time unit is precisely defined by a “golden spike”—a specified level in a sedimentary succession at a specified location that is chosen because it can be correlated to other sedimentary sequences around the globe. This golden spike identifies a global time plane, but the planetary transition that motivates the placement of a golden spike can be anything but simple. The last ice age of the Pleistocene gave way to Holocene interglacial conditions over the course of about 13,000 years—and took a different course between Northern and Southern Hemispheres. Yet the defined Holocene boundary within that transition, at 11,700 years ago, is accepted and used without complaint. The Holocene-Anthropocene transition is much sharper and more globally synchronous, and so is easier to define and recognize. 6. Other animals have affected the environment and caused geological change, so there’s nothing special about the Anthropocene. Other animals have indeed changed the environment, but that can help rather than hinder the recognition of geological time intervals. For instance, the rise of mobile, muscular animals that could burrow through sediment serves as the basis for defining the Cambrian Period. But none of those previous changes has swept across all environments on the planet so quickly—or been triggered by an animal conscious of the changes it was making. This consciousness, we note, is yet to be effectively translated into action to ward off the worst consequences of these changes. Too many still pursue economic and industrial development without considering the long-term cost to planetary health. 7. The Anthropocene blames all humans equally for the global environmental crises. The Anthropocene assigns neither blame nor credit; it simply recognizes a great, abrupt and more or less permanent change to the course of Earth history. There is no doubt that some humans, societies, institutions and nation-states have driven far more change than others, and that the benefits and costs of change have been and are unevenly distributed. The societal value of the Anthropocene epoch is that it announces the unambiguous scientific evidence showing that humans have permanently changed the global environment. And it might encourage us to recognize that we all must deal with the rapid, permanent, global changes that are underway. 8. The Anthropocene signals defeat in our efforts to mitigate environmental change. The first step in solving problems is to diagnose them. We cannot return the Earth to the conditions in which our grandparents or any other Holocene generation lived. But we can make wiser decisions about the future that will ameliorate and mitigate change. That’s realism, not defeatism. 9. Naming the Anthropocene after humans is hubristic. The planetary transformation that ushered in the Anthropocene epoch was caused by humans. It could have been called a lot of things, but Anthropocene caught the imagination of many because its meaning is evident and accurate. If only that were true. Accepting that we are no longer living in a Holocene world is a first step in addressing the issues facing humans and non-humans in the immediate future. These myths have persisted in the scientific community despite being systematically refuted in scientific papers by the Anthropocene Working Group and others. This suggests that, like all myths, they are reactions based on ideology, conviction or personal philosophy rather than evidence. These misconceptions lie at the heart, too, of the recent formal rejection of the Anthropocene epoch by the hierarchy of international stratigraphy. Why has the Anthropocene been misunderstood and mythologized in so many ways? Probably because it’s deeply uncomfortable to many. It’s very brief (so far). It includes smelly landfill sites as strata to “foul up” a geological time scale that is sacrosanct to many geologists. And it raises the specter that the calm abstractions of geological time have come up against the tough predicaments we face in the present and future. Change is hard, and the Anthropocene is an uncomfortable concept. It is hard to accept that we as a society have gained so much power to change the Earth and have thought so little about how to use that power. Scientific knowledge can transform our perspectives (think of heliocentrism and evolution)—so it’s not surprising that the Anthropocene is hard to accept. But, recognizing our role in suddenly, recently driving the Earth towards a new future is a necessary first step to engaging with the planetary changes we have set in train. Get the latest on what's happening At the Smithsonian in your inbox.

These ten misconceptions underplay how much we have altered the global environment and undermine the new perspective we need to deal with a drastically changed world

Jan A. Zalasiewicz, Scott L. Wing and the Anthropocene Working Group

The concept of the Anthropocene epoch was born in February 2000 out of a moment of spontaneity. Chemist and Nobel Prize winner Paul Crutzen had been listening to a narrative emerging at an international convening of scientists in Mexico.

All day, scientists had presented data that showed how the human-caused changes in climate, chemical cycles and biology of recent decades were jarringly different from the relative stability of the Holocene, the geological epoch that began 11,700 years prior. They kept referring to the remarkably rapid environmental changes of the late Holocene.

Exasperated, Crutzen finally broke into the discussion: “We aren’t in the Holocene anymore, we’re in … the Anthropocene!” The improvised term quickly caught fire as a foundational concept among earth scientists, and in the last decade the word has proliferated through other sciences, the arts, humanities and popular culture.

Along the way, “Anthropocene” gained many meanings and implications unrelated to—or even opposing—Crutzen’s original concept, blurring and sometimes wholly obscuring its original meaning. But what did Crutzen intend by the Anthropocene, a concept since enhanced and refined by years of scientific study?

It’s absurdly simple. The shift from the Holocene to the Anthropocene epoch hits like a brick wall when looking at graphs that show changes in three major greenhouse gases and in global temperature during the last 30 millennia. All four of these critical planetary parameters shift from near-horizontal to near-vertical lines in the last 70 years or so. The graphs are simple, but they show changes in atmospheric chemistry and—lagging a little behind—temperature, that affect the habitability of the planet for all its organisms, including humans. On a time scale of millennia, the shifts don’t resemble a hockey stick as much as a stair step. Furthermore, these changes affect the whole atmosphere and ocean, so they are essentially irreversible on any human time scale. Our distant descendants will still be living with the planetary changes that humans have wrought in a single lifetime.

Greenhouse Gases Graphic — The stunning effect of humans on the atmosphere can be seen in the concentration of three important greenhouse gases: nitrous oxide, methane and carbon dioxide. These gases have increased far more in the last 70 years than in the previous 30,000 years or more. Global temperature has begun to spike as a result, and it will continue to rise as the full effect of higher greenhouse gas concentration is felt. Martin Head

If we zoom in on the time axis to look at just the last 300 years, ten human generations, we see remarkably large and rapid change in a whole range of factors that mark the effect of humans at a global scale: not just carbon emissions, but also production of metals, plastics, fertilizers, concrete and farm animals, and even a giant increase in the ultimate geological currency: sediment. The amount of sediment moved every year by humans now exceeds the amount moved by non-human processes by a factor of 15.

Cropping the time frame tightly in this way, we see that the global shifts are most rapid beginning in the mid-20th century. The Anthropocene Working Group, a body of 34 scientists from 14 countries constituted in 2009 by the International Commission on Stratigraphy, proposed placing the beginning of a new Anthropocene Epoch in 1952, when sediments are marked globally by the first major increase in the element plutonium, derived from the earliest tests of thermonuclear weapons.

Anthropocene Graphic — Scientists proposed recognizing a new geological epoch, the Anthropocene, marked by rapid changes beginning in the mid-20th century. Sediments deposited in the last 70 years are marked by abundant artificial materials including concrete, metals, plastics and fertilizer. Ecosystems have also been transformed by the great increases in fertilizer production (ammonia) and raising livestock (meat production). Humans are also prodigious producers of sediment. Colin Waters

By proposing a formal, geologically defined Anthropocene epoch, the working group intended to provide a precise definition for this recent, large, permanent and rapid transition in Earth’s physical, chemical and biological systems.

The proposal was rejected by the international hierarchy of stratigraphy—of which the International Commission on Stratigraphy is a part—without citing substantive reasons, but most public criticisms of the Anthropocene stem from a range of sources: from within the heart of geology, to well outside it, among the social sciences and humanities.

Tourists look down at the Hoover Dam. The amount of sediment settled behind the world’s thousands of big dams would cover all of California to a depth of five meters. Robert Nickelsberg / Getty Images

Across a spectrum of disciplines, the Anthropocene touched—and often jabbed—a nerve: sometimes as a gut response to a disturbing new idea and sometimes with discomfort at unfamiliar sociopolitical implications. For whatever reasons, the Anthropocene came under fire.

But the barrage of criticism has often focused on what the Anthropocene isn’t rather than what it is. Fundamental misconceptions have come to surround this concept and to cloud its meaning. Here we debunk ten common myths about the Anthropocene.

1. The Anthropocene fails to represent all human impacts.

This is true enough—but it misses the point entirely. Recognizing an Anthropocene epoch does not at all underplay the impacts that humans have caused for many millennia by hunting, by farming, and by building cities and trade networks. But those early impacts were not global, were not synchronous around the planet and did not shift the global environment permanently. The reason for naming a new geological epoch, both in Crutzen’s original formulation and in the highly detailed proposal of the working group, is to mark the departure of the Earth and its inhabitants from the stable planetary system of the Holocene. The Anthropocene epoch was never meant to encompass all anthropogenic impacts.

2. The Anthropocene is too short to be a geological epoch—just one human lifetime.

The Anthropocene’s duration is short, true—so far. But it’s the Holocene that shows the greatest change in duration from other epochs: nearly three orders of magnitude (0.0117 million years versus 2.57 million years for the Pleistocene epoch that precedes it). The difference in duration between Holocene and Anthropocene epochs is proportionately less, and the Anthropocene represents far more significant and enduring change to the planet than does the Holocene.

3. The Anthropocene is just a blip in Earth history.

Or, as the New York Times writes, a senior member of the geological time-scale hierarchy calls it “a blip of a blip of a blip.” What this point of view misunderstands is that these approximately 70 years have altered the planet fundamentally and set it on a new trajectory. Already, many geological signals are sharper than, and as pronounced as, the sudden carbon release and global warming that initiated the Eocene epoch 56 million years ago.

Take just the climate impacts from burning fossil fuels, of which 90 percent have been burned in the last 70 years. These impacts will roll across the planet for at least many thousands of years. We and many generations to come are locked into a climate unlike that of the Holocene. Carbon dioxide already in the atmosphere will make the Earth hotter than it has been for at least 3 million years. Many of the biological changes of the last 70 years are permanent, too: extinctions, of course, but also the spread of many species through the intended and unintended assistance of humans, making fauna and flora more homogeneous worldwide. The biosphere has been changed forever. This is no blip.

4. Anthropocene strata are “minimal” or “negligible.”

That’s a very geological objection—but it’s wrong. Humans have, since the mid-20th century, been prodigious reshapers of the landscape and movers of rock and sediment (now, by more than an order of magnitude than natural sediment movers such as glaciers and rivers.) The amount of sediment settled behind the world’s thousands of big dams would cover all of California to a depth of five meters, and such sediments are full of distinctive markers, like pesticide residues, metals, microplastics and the fossils of invasive species. To define a time period formally, geologists must identify distinctive signals in sediments or rocks that can be correlated around the globe, and the presence of such markers is ubiquitous. The geology is real.

Plastic Pollution in California — Plastic debris collects after a rainstorm near Culver City, California. Microplastics that result from such debris can often be found in sediment. Citizen of the Planet / UIG via Getty Images

5. The geological record is too complex and gradational to draw one single boundary for the Anthropocene.

All of history (of Earth and of humans) is complex, is gradational and varies through time and across space. Nevertheless, geologists define epochs because such time units are useful, indeed indispensable to their work. In geology, each time unit is precisely defined by a “golden spike”—a specified level in a sedimentary succession at a specified location that is chosen because it can be correlated to other sedimentary sequences around the globe. This golden spike identifies a global time plane, but the planetary transition that motivates the placement of a golden spike can be anything but simple.

The last ice age of the Pleistocene gave way to Holocene interglacial conditions over the course of about 13,000 years—and took a different course between Northern and Southern Hemispheres. Yet the defined Holocene boundary within that transition, at 11,700 years ago, is accepted and used without complaint. The Holocene-Anthropocene transition is much sharper and more globally synchronous, and so is easier to define and recognize.

6. Other animals have affected the environment and caused geological change, so there’s nothing special about the Anthropocene.

Other animals have indeed changed the environment, but that can help rather than hinder the recognition of geological time intervals. For instance, the rise of mobile, muscular animals that could burrow through sediment serves as the basis for defining the Cambrian Period. But none of those previous changes has swept across all environments on the planet so quickly—or been triggered by an animal conscious of the changes it was making. This consciousness, we note, is yet to be effectively translated into action to ward off the worst consequences of these changes. Too many still pursue economic and industrial development without considering the long-term cost to planetary health.

7. The Anthropocene blames all humans equally for the global environmental crises.

The Anthropocene assigns neither blame nor credit; it simply recognizes a great, abrupt and more or less permanent change to the course of Earth history. There is no doubt that some humans, societies, institutions and nation-states have driven far more change than others, and that the benefits and costs of change have been and are unevenly distributed. The societal value of the Anthropocene epoch is that it announces the unambiguous scientific evidence showing that humans have permanently changed the global environment. And it might encourage us to recognize that we all must deal with the rapid, permanent, global changes that are underway.

8. The Anthropocene signals defeat in our efforts to mitigate environmental change.

The first step in solving problems is to diagnose them. We cannot return the Earth to the conditions in which our grandparents or any other Holocene generation lived. But we can make wiser decisions about the future that will ameliorate and mitigate change. That’s realism, not defeatism.

9. Naming the Anthropocene after humans is hubristic.

The planetary transformation that ushered in the Anthropocene epoch was caused by humans. It could have been called a lot of things, but Anthropocene caught the imagination of many because its meaning is evident and accurate.

If only that were true. Accepting that we are no longer living in a Holocene world is a first step in addressing the issues facing humans and non-humans in the immediate future.

These myths have persisted in the scientific community despite being systematically refuted in scientific papers by the Anthropocene Working Group and others. This suggests that, like all myths, they are reactions based on ideology, conviction or personal philosophy rather than evidence. These misconceptions lie at the heart, too, of the recent formal rejection of the Anthropocene epoch by the hierarchy of international stratigraphy.

Why has the Anthropocene been misunderstood and mythologized in so many ways? Probably because it’s deeply uncomfortable to many. It’s very brief (so far). It includes smelly landfill sites as strata to “foul up” a geological time scale that is sacrosanct to many geologists. And it raises the specter that the calm abstractions of geological time have come up against the tough predicaments we face in the present and future.

Change is hard, and the Anthropocene is an uncomfortable concept. It is hard to accept that we as a society have gained so much power to change the Earth and have thought so little about how to use that power. Scientific knowledge can transform our perspectives (think of heliocentrism and evolution)—so it’s not surprising that the Anthropocene is hard to accept. But, recognizing our role in suddenly, recently driving the Earth towards a new future is a necessary first step to engaging with the planetary changes we have set in train.

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In South Africa, Tigers and Other Captive Predators Are Still Exploited for Profit. Legislation Offers Pitiful Protection

The captive predator industry threatens the welfare of thousands of big cats kept for entertainment, hunting, and commercial trade of live animals and their body parts. The post In South Africa, Tigers and Other Captive Predators Are Still Exploited for Profit. Legislation Offers Pitiful Protection appeared first on The Revelator.

In South Africa, an insatiable desire for lions — whether to view the big cats in captivity, interact with cubs, hunt them for sport, or trade in their body parts — has created an explosion in their captive populations. Approximately 8,000-10,000 lions are now kept in captivity across the country, compared to the estimated 3,490 wild lions across our reserves and national parks. Activists and the media have given extensive attention to this cruel, inhumane industry, but significantly less is known about the other exotic cat species bred, kept, traded, and even hunted for this burgeoning industry built on greed and cruelty. For instance, in 2022 the Minister of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment confirmed that at least 70 captive facilities kept 463 tigers across South Africa. Yes, tigers — the same endangered Asian big cats subject to intense conservation efforts, with a wild population estimated at just 5,500 animals. Those of us working against this captive trade suspect the actual number of tigers in the country is much higher, as the department does not require captive facilities to register the big cats. The data provided by provincial authorities is only as accurate as the information provided by willing facilities. And tigers are just one element of this industry. Across the country approximately 400 captive facilities keep indigenous and exotic cats of multiple species for tourism activities, breeding, trading in live animals and their body parts, and hunting. Captive African lion. Stephanie Klarmann, Blood Lions The Blood Lions documentary and subsequent campaign — I’m part of the team and the campaign coordinator — has been instrumental in exposing the cruel realities of the captive predator industry. Our work focuses on conducting research and lobbying in both public and government spheres to influence policy. An important and necessary challenge we now face is not only pushing against the captive lion industry and all its associated activities, but also addressing the proliferation of other big cat species in captivity for commercial gain. South Africa’s Contribution to the Legal and Illegal Trade in Body Parts Tigers bred in South Africa don’t always stay here. From 2012 to 2022[1], South Africa exported a minimum of 397 live tigers and 101 tiger body parts and hunting trophies, according to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species trade database.[2] And that’s just the so-called legal trade. I recently spoke with Karl Ammann, an environmental photographer and investigative filmmaker who has spent years uncovering the ties between South Africa and the international wildlife trade. Through his work in Vietnam, he’s interviewed dealers who sell tiger “cake” (boiled-down tiger bone) for use in traditional medicine. They’ve revealed that their stock is primarily imported from South Africa. Some were even able to provide shipment dates when they expected stock to arrive, all without legitimate documentation. The demand for wildlife products like this threatens multiple species. With tiger bone supplies dwindling and an ever-increasing demand for bones for medicinal purposes, traffickers have turned to lion bones sourced from captive-bred lions in South Africa as substitutes. Meanwhile the trade in live tigers bred in South Africa and destined for Southeast Asia is thriving, according to Ammann. His investigations show that Southeast Asian breeding farms lose a significant number of cubs to inbreeding, making the live trade from South Africa necessary to supplement the captive gene pool. This shouldn’t be allowed, as tigers are protected under CITES Appendix I, which restricts virtually all trade in the species. But exporters game the system by using the CITES Z code, which declares the animals they’re shipping are destined for zoos and public display. “The fact is, they are all for primarily commercial purposes, which should not be possible,” says Ammann. Concurrent Legislation Hampers Regulation of the Captive Industry South African authorities have announced their intent to close the commercial captive lion industry. But conservationists and welfare advocacy groups remain concerned. We worry that this will turn increased attention to the breeding, keeping, and trading of exotic big cats like tigers, jaguars, black leopards and pumas. South African law currently considers these big cats “alien species” due to their natural occurrence outside of South Africa; but possessing, breeding, trading, and controlling these species is still considered a restricted activity under Chapter 7 of our Threatened or Protected Species Regulations (TOPS). 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In January 2023 a privately owned tiger escaped its cage before attacking one person and killing two dogs in Walkerville. Later that same month, a second tiger escaped in a residential area in Edenvale. In 2021 two tigers were found kept in a residential back garden constrained by nothing more than a fence, despite the obvious safety hazards this posed to neighbors and the children. An inbred white tiger. Stephanie Klarmann, Blood Lions As for hunting exotic species, that’s considered a restricted activity under the National Environmental Management: Biodiversity Act and requires a TOPS permit. But communication with the provincial authority in the North West revealed that the province does not issue hunting permits. For exotic big cat species, a hunt can occur if written permission is provided by the landowner. Hunting clientele coming to South Africa for a big game trophy hunt can bag an exotic big cat bred and raised in captivity with nothing more than the landowner’s consent. Even on the national level, the registration and subsequent permitting for exotic species does not provide regulations for the welfare, well-being, and husbandry needs of the animals, according to Karen Trendler, an animal welfare expert from Working Wild and an NSPCA board member. Overall the regulations are completely inadequate, especially for exotic species being kept, bred, traded and hunted in South Africa. False Justifications for the Captive Industry One commonly touted justification for keeping exotic big cats in captivity is that they provide educational and conservation value. Despite these claims, breeding and keeping wild cat species for commercial purposes does nothing to aid their conservation in wild habitats. In fact, many exotic species kept in captivity in South Africa are endangered in their home ranges. Realistically, how can tigers kept in captivity in South Africa contribute to conservation in India or other countries? Due to inbreeding and hybridization (or the breeding of two different species), captive tigers could never be used for wild conservation projects. Given that tigers occupy less than 6% of their historical range, it’s more urgent than ever that genuine conservation be prioritized. As for education, Trendler asserts that “there are better ways of educating than keeping animals in sub-standard welfare conditions.” Although the conditions in public-facing facilities are better than those away from the public eye, Trendler warns that the public are often unaware of an animal’s complex needs and the many ways in which facilities fail to provide for them. All of which makes South Africa’s continued embrace of the trade more perplexing and discouraging. South Africa is a signatory to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, which declares that captive facilities holding tigers need to support conservation of wild Asian big cats. But the minister has stated the opinion that we do not need to comply with that, since South Africa is not a range state for Asian cats such as tigers. Captive jaguar. Stephanie Klarmann, Blood Lions Her choice to ignore the CITES decision indicates the industry’s lack of commitment to genuine conservation and prioritizing commercial interests instead. Captive-industry claims regarding educational and conservation value continue to fail and undermine genuine conservation efforts by misdirecting attention and funds away from those working to protect species and habitats on the ground in their native habitats, according to Dr. Ullas Karanth, conservation zoologist and tiger expert. What Does the Future Hold for These Big Cats? The same attention lions have received now needs to be given to all predator species, both indigenous and exotic, that are being exploited in captivity. According to South African law (Section 56 of NEMBA), the minister may declare “any species” — native or not — as “critically endangered, endangered, or vulnerable.” That means it lies firmly within the minister’s power to grant other big cat species increased protection under South Africa’s legislation. According to Trendler, exotic wildlife needs to be recognized as deserving of a high standard of well-being, regardless of their country of origin and conservation status. White tiger cub kept separated from its mother. Stephanie Klarmann, Blood Lions The Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment is in a position to effect change, for once, in the animals’ favor. The minister has the power to prohibit activities that affect “the holistic circumstances and conditions of an animal, which are conducive to its physical, physiological, and mental health and quality of life, including the ability to cope with its environment.” Any animal in South Africa, regardless of its indigenous or exotic status, needs to receive consideration for its well-being in terms of its management, conservation, and sustainable use. The commercial captive predator industry won’t do this on its own. These breeders, owners and traders have continuously demonstrated that commercial gain trumps all welfare and ethical considerations. To them, big cats exist for nothing more than a trophy, bones, or trivial entertainment. It’s past time for that to change. [1] 2022 CITES Trade Data may be incomplete. [2] The CITES Trade Database is subject to the accuracy of submitted forms. Some exported animals and derivatives were not properly declared, so exact numbers were not recorded. Get more from The Revelator. Subscribe to our newsletter. Previously in The Revelator: The Last Lions of India The post In South Africa, Tigers and Other Captive Predators Are Still Exploited for Profit. Legislation Offers Pitiful Protection appeared first on The Revelator.

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How Should Colorado Handle Its Booming Moose Population?

Roughly 3,000 animals now roam the state's mountain ranges

The forest ranger had a troubled look on his face. It was the summer of 2022 and my kids and I were trudging up a steep trail in the Indian Peaks Wilderness, near Denver, when we encountered him. He stood amid a small grove of subalpine fir, clutching a walkie-talkie tightly in his hand. As we came closer, he brought one index finger to his lips and pointed with the other into the distance. “Moose,” he whispered. Below us, perhaps 100 yards away in a flower-strewn meadow, a cow and her calf munched grass without concern. “Cute!” exclaimed my teenage daughter. “Go that way,” the ranger said gruffly, pointing up a steep slope covered in boulders. We walked on, weaving through a crowd of curious onlookers. Some inched closer to the moose for a better look. Others held cellphones, swiping fingers across screens to bring the animals into better view. Few creatures evoke American wilderness like Alces americanus, the American moose. It is the largest member of the deer family and the second largest land animal in North America behind the American bison (Bison bison). Its imposing size is undercut by its goofy countenance—the wide fan of horns, the thin legs that suspend a hefty body, the face like a hand-puppet fashioned from a worn-out sock. Despite their ungainly appearance, moose are formidable and, at times, graceful, reaching speeds of 35 miles per hour at full gallop. Growing up in Colorado in the late 1980s and early ’90s, I took trips with my father into designated wildernesses in the northern part of the state—the Flat Tops, Mount Zirkel, the Rawah—hoping to glimpse a moose. We never did. These days I often encounter them when out hiking. For a while, I thought my luck had changed. But I’ve since learned that these experiences are nothing particularly special. Though moose are notoriously hard to count, the Colorado Parks and Wildlife Department estimates that there are now around 3,000 scattered through the state’s major mountain ranges. That figure, however, does not adequately describe their growing presence here. The comment sections for dozens of hikes in Colorado’s Front Range and the San Juan, Sawatch and Elk Mountains on the popular AllTrails app are a litany of moose sightings. Several moose have even made their way into the suburban sprawl of metro Denver, the state’s capital and largest city, browsing in greenbelts, sauntering across golf courses, loitering in mall parking lots. As Colorado’s human and moose populations have grown in tandem, so have the number of conflicts. Over a two-week span in spring of 2022, moose attacked people in three separate incidents. One of those occurred near the mountain town of Nederland, where a mother moose trampled and severely injured a hiker and a dog; a police officer shot her, and wildlife officials took her calf into custody. In September 2022, a moose gored and nearly killed a bowhunter in northern Colorado after the hunter’s arrow whistled wide of its mark. More often than not, however, moose come out on the losing end of these clashes. According to the Colorado Department of Transportation, cars struck and killed 59 moose in 2022. In 2012, the number was just four. As human and moose populations grow in Colorado, so too have their interactions: Both moose attacks on humans and car strikes on moose have increased dramatically in recent years. David Dietrich Despite the increase in dangerous encounters, the moose has emerged as a potent symbol and ambassador of the wild in a state enamored of its outdoor places—depicted in murals and statues in many mountain towns. A large painting of a moose even graces Coors Field, the home of the Colorado Rockies baseball team. There’s just one problem. As much as Alces americanus seem to belong in Colorado, the species’ native range is in more northerly latitudes and doesn’t extend into the state. Colorado’s wildlife department introduced moose from Wyoming and Utah beginning in the 1970s to put money into its own coffers through the sale of hunting licenses. In that bygone era of wildlife management, the will of a few high-ranking state officials was enough to set a great ecological experiment into motion. To be sure, human values have always helped shape wildlife policy. In Colorado and elsewhere in the American West, game animals, including mountain goats, elk and bison, have been introduced to places where they never lived or have been sustained in unnaturally high numbers to satisfy hunters and wildlife watchers. Those efforts have frequently caused dramatic environmental changes. Indeed, now that moose are flourishing in Colorado, they are behaving in unexpected ways, challenging management paradigms and emerging in new environments. As moose occupy an ever larger part of Colorado’s natural present, biologists are working to understand their effects on native plants and animals. All of which leads to an all-consuming question: In an environment increasingly altered by agriculture, urbanization and the ever-expanding footprint of human infrastructure, do moose have a place in the state’s ecological future? A light dusting of snow covers a moose. David Dietrich In the winter of 1978, a handful of state wildlife staff huddled together one morning in the Uinta Mountains in northern Utah. Led by chief of big game, Dick Denney, the team had traveled there to search for moose, a smallish subspecies known as Shiras (pronounced SHY-rass) found in the Rocky Mountains. Deep snows coated the peaks and filled the valleys. To fight off the chill, the officials wore government-issue olive drab winter gear—all save one, an older gentleman with a pompadour of white hair in a bright red snowsuit. This was the signature attire of Marlin Perkins, zoologist and co-host of “Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom,” who had traveled to Utah to capture the event for an episode called “Moose Airlift.” As the capture got underway, a pair of helicopters cruised over the landscape. A man with a rifle under his arm sat perched in the smaller of the two aircraft, which descended toward a cow moose and her yearling calf in a snowy meadow. There was a sharp report, not from a bullet but a tranquilizer dart, and the cow took off at a run. Within minutes, her legs went wobbly, and the crew landed and set to work. They placed a blindfold over the animal’s eyes and drew her blood, testing to ensure she was not infected with brucellosis or leptospirosis, two diseases that can pass to (and from) domestic cattle. The team then fitted the cow moose with a telemetry collar and an ear tag, and carefully slid a specially designed sling under her belly, attached by a rope to one of the helicopters. For a moment, as the pilot eased into the air, the moose lurched, drawing her legs upward as her feet left the ground—“a common reflex,” as Perkins described it in his folksy narration. At last, the animal appeared to relax as she soared over the rugged valley, bound for her new home—a vast expanse of sagebrush and willow between two major mountain ranges in northern Colorado, known as North Park. Moose were rarely seen south of Yellowstone National Park before the early 1900s. Their populations grew in Colorado following their airlifted transport to the region in the 1970s. Courtesy of Denver Public Library She would not, technically, be the first moose to set foot in the state: The animals appear in a few scattered accounts from settlers in the mid-1800s. One of the best-known comes from Milton Estes, a member of the family that founded the northern mountain town of Estes Park, who killed a bull moose in that area in the 1860s as it mingled with a herd of elk. Biologists today believe moose like the one Estes killed were transient, perhaps dispersing juveniles entering the state from Wyoming, and officials generally agree that Colorado never supported a breeding population. To make their case for introducing moose to the state’s mountains, Denney and his colleagues had argued that moose would have eventually migrated to and thrived in Colorado on their own, had people not blocked the way. Settlers and Indigenous hunters were “undoubtedly the primary limiting factor in Colorado moose establishment,” Denney wrote in an article for Colorado Outdoors in 1977. “Practically every moose that has come into Colorado has ended up by being eaten or shot and abandoned.” That’s a plausible explanation, according to noted Colorado State University wildlife conservation expert Joel Berger. Moose were rarely sighted south of the lands that would become Yellowstone National Park, in northwestern Wyoming, before the early 1900s, he said. Then, after settlers extirpated predators from the Yellowstone area, a member of the Shoshone tribe encountered a moose on the east side of the Wind River Mountains, in central Wyoming. “He didn’t know what it was, because they hadn’t occurred there before,” said Berger. The Red Desert, a vast expanse of arid land in southwestern Wyoming, was also likely a formidable obstacle. In total, between 1978 and 1979, Colorado’s wildlife department airlifted a dozen moose out of the Uintas—along with a dozen more from Wyoming’s Tetons—and hauled them to North Park. There, they remained in a small enclosure for several days before being released into the rolling high plains along the Illinois River. A young biologist named Gene Schoonveld was among the officials with the Colorado Division of Wildlife who orchestrated the process. An avid moose hunter, Schoonveld had moved from Canada to Colorado in the late ’60s to attend graduate school at Colorado State University. When he wasn’t in class, he spent days exploring the mountain valleys and basins of the Rockies, marveling over the copious stands of willow and aspen, favorite food sources for moose. After landing a job at the state wildlife department, he immediately pestered Denney, his supervisor, to pursue moose introduction. “I knew that moose could live down here and I let Dick know how I felt,” he told me when I reached him by phone in the fall of 2022, shortly before his death from a long illness. Dick Denney, former Colorado chief of big game, displays the antlers of an adult moose. Courtesy of Denver Public Library The idea of introducing moose to Colorado had been kicked around for decades, but ranchers in rural communities who feared moose would compete with their cattle for forage resisted those plans, and they never materialized. Denney’s 1976 “proposal” to introduce the half-ton animals is a mere 54 pages and includes no comprehensive studies of their potential ecological impacts. And although Schoonveld and Denney interviewed residents of northern Colorado about the releases, they dismissed the opposition as unfounded. After all, moose wouldn’t be feeding on hay bales or grass, Schoonveld said; they’re browsers that subsist almost entirely on willow, aspen and other woody material. “We brought them to Colorado because we could,” he said, “because we had the space and the habitat for them.” Amid North Park’s rich willow stands, the two dozen transplanted moose kicked into reproductive overdrive. In 1980, nearly one in five gave birth to two offspring at once—a phenomenon called “twinning” that often occurs among ungulates when food is especially plentiful. By the winter of 1988, a decade after introduction, the moose population had grown to around 250. The animals proved so successful and so popular with residents and visitors that, between 1987 and 2010, wildlife officials transplanted more moose to other parts of Colorado, where they thrived in a variety of habitats. On the semi-arid slopes of Grand Mesa near the state’s western border, for example, where moose were introduced in 2005, moose subsist mainly on Gambel oak rather than willow. They’ve also adjusted to high-elevation valleys of the San Juan Mountains near Colorado’s southern border, where they were introduced in the early 1990s. That makes them the southernmost moose herd in the world, according to Eric Bergman, a research scientist and moose specialist with Colorado Parks and Wildlife. The species may be pushing still farther southward. Last fall, a moose was spotted in the mountains of northern New Mexico, near Taos, presumably after crossing the Colorado border. “Biologists generally expected them to do well,” Bergman said of the introduction, “and they certainly did.” Dust drifts up between two moose. David Dietrich Rocky Mountain National Park, just east of North Park, is among the places that have witnessed that rapid growth. Park biologists estimate that 40 to 60 moose now wander the western side of the park. On the more touristed east side, moose now inhabit every drainage and are likely increasing. And little wonder: The 415-square-mile preserve has some of best moose habitat in the state, with deep glacially carved valleys and willow-thick stream bottoms. Last April, I sat down with landscape ecologist Will Deacy in his office at Rocky Mountain National Park headquarters as he called up a satellite map on his computer. The park service has fitted 23 moose with telemetry collars, and Deacy showed me one of their routes. The path, transmitted over the course of a season, looked like a child’s scribble, moving to and fro with little regard for the ragged topography. Animals have been known to traverse the entire park in just a few days, hinting at the expansive size of their overlapping ranges, which have been shown elsewhere to cover areas as large as 50 square miles. Deacy next pulled up an infrared image of a mountainside covered in dark trees, gathered by an aircraft mounted with an infrared camera. A closer look revealed several white silhouettes, like small Bullwinkles, scattered amid the pines: moose going about their mysterious business. “They are a new species in a new context,” Deacy said. These supremely adaptable animals could behave very differently in Rocky Mountain than they do in, say, Yellowstone or Glacier National Parks, he explains. “There is so much we just don’t know.” One of those unknowns is just how moose will affect a landscape already heavily browsed by native elk. Settlers once hunted elk nearly to extinction in this part of the state, but in 1913, officials reintroduced them within the protective boundaries of the national park, where hunting was banned. By the latter half of the 20th century, elk here also no longer faced predation by wolves or grizzlies, both of which were extirpated from the state by hunters and trappers. The local herd ballooned to as many as 3,500 animals by the early 2000s—far more than the maximum of 2,100 that the park service deemed sustainable. The elk rapidly chewed through willow stands, particularly along streams, and the park’s mature willow plants declined by 96 percent between 1999 and 2019. Under the auspices of the park’s Elk and Vegetation Management Plan, officials called in sharpshooters to cull some elk and constructed tall fences called “exclosures” around more than 200 acres of sensitive aspen and willows along creeks, wetlands and rivers, to keep large ungulates out. They also set in motion surveys of hundreds of scattered plots to monitor browsing and the health of the park’s willows, foundational plant species along its streams. The fragrant shrubs stabilize soil and prevent erosion, while providing food and sanctuary for hundreds of species of mammals, insects, fish and birds. On a brisk morning during my April visit to the park, I followed Deacy and biological technicians Nick Bartusch and Kim Sutton to one of those plots, in a meadow near the headwaters of the Fall River. Our feet crunched through a thick layer of frost, and deep snow still blanketed the 12,000- to 13,000-foot peaks of the Mummy Range towering above. Sutton swiped a metal detector across the matted grass until she found four markers. Then, Bartusch strung orange thread between them, forming a crude square, and began to evaluate the plants within. Though the spring bloom was approaching, the limbs remained leafless, making evidence of herbivory easier to see. Bartusch looked for signs, gently caressing the plants. The largest in the plot had clearly been browsed, with buds missing and limbs chewed to ribbons. As the team recorded their findings, I wandered around the plot’s perimeter. Impressed into a semi-frozen patch of mud was a single, six-inch-long hoofprint. I showed Deacy. “Looks like moose,” he said. Currently the park has no equivalent of the elk plan for its moose. Though moose arrived here in 1980, just two years after the North Park releases, visitors and researchers rarely encountered them prior to 2015, said Bartusch. “Now it’s almost daily.” That sudden prevalence complicates existing efforts to recover park vegetation. A single adult moose can eat up to 60 pounds of willow per day, far more than an adult elk, which consumes roughly a third of that amount of forage, only a fraction of which is willow. In other words, too many moose could create new problems for the host of other creatures that depend on this critical plant. For example, Berger, the Colorado State University wildlife biologist, conducted research in riparian zones in the Grand Teton and Yellowstone National Parks and found that neotropical migratory songbirds, such as warblers and flycatchers, occur at much lower densities where there are large populations of moose, particularly where moose don’t face pressure from predators. Four bird species that he expected to see during that study didn’t occur at all, Berger said, “because moose browsing had been so intense.” And because national parks ban hunting, moose tend to congregate within their borders, achieving densities almost five times higher than outside of them, Berger added, meaning Rocky Mountain National Park may see magnified effects over time. Scientists conduct willow surveys to assess the impact of moose populations on park vegetation. Moose can eat up to 60 pounds of willow per day, significantly impacting local plants and other wildlife that rely on them. Jeremy Miller Meanwhile, the moose here are exhibiting new and surprising behaviors that could affect the park’s ailing vegetation. Moose tend to be solitary animals, said Bartusch. In 2019, however, he had an encounter in the park that challenged that notion. He and a crew member were working on the park’s west side when they spotted a couple of moose in a large meadow. “We weren’t worried about it because they were a long way off,” said Bartusch. “So we went about our business and suddenly we realized we’d somehow managed to get surrounded. My partner and I counted 33 individual moose.” According to Deacy, groups of moose sometimes “yard up” in the winter to stomp out a comfortable spot in deep snow. But such congregations are rare in summer. In this case, said Bartusch, the animals seemed to be moving in a herd. If the behavior became commonplace among Rocky Mountain’s moose, it could concentrate their impacts. “People love their moose,” said Elaine Leslie, former chief of the National Park Service’s Biological Resource Management Division. But too many animals could very well threaten “the primary purpose of the park, which is the preservation of resources.” What might a Rocky Mountain National Park moose management plan look like? First of all it requires sound scientific data on moose populations. If they determine there are too many moose, Leslie said, options include working with the state to increase moose hunting on Rocky Mountain’s periphery. She also mentioned dosing animals with contraceptives delivered via darts. The worst-case scenario, she said, would be having to conduct a moose cull, as other parks have done periodically to bring down their elk populations. Further complicating management is the degree to which Rocky Mountain’s ecosystems have already been modified by people. Before the park was established, ranchers and farmers plowed willows under to provide forage for horses and cows; others dewatered and altered stream channels and meadows to make way for roads, parking lots, visitor centers and other bits of infrastructure. Directly restoring the park’s beleaguered willow stands and wetlands, therefore, would go a long way toward making the environment more resilient against future moose damage. To that end, the park is attempting to coax beaver back within its boundaries from surrounding waterways to build ponds and raise the water table. That, in turn, would help willows regenerate and grow. Park staff are counting on the exclosures to do double duty, protecting beavers and their handiwork from any boost in elk or moose numbers that willow regrowth might bring. Leslie sees another potential solution in Colorado’s wolf reintroduction, which brought ten animals to Grand County, in the Central Rockies, in December 2023. Wolves are the main predator of elk and moose, and they could help ease pressure on the park’s willow and aspen if they recolonize the area and reduce populations or induce herds to keep moving. That’s what happened in Yellowstone after the federal government restored wolves, and as grizzly bear and other struggling predator populations rebounded. A moose wades through the water. David Dietrich On a bright late-July morning last year, I visited State Forest State Park, in the same region where officials originally released moose in 1978. Today, as many as 700 roam the area, comprising nearly one-fourth of the state population. “It’s the last frontier,” said Tony Johnson, a State Forest law enforcement ranger, “where there are no chain stores, but moose on every corner.” I headed to a campground and trail that Johnson identified as a “moose hotspot.” “There is a moose there that goes from being a very neat encounter to a potentially dangerous situation pretty quickly,” he had told me. At the trailhead, as if on cue, a large juvenile male emerged from a stand of pines. It stood mere feet from the dirt path, munching on willows as a procession of ultra-marathoners plodded by. Some stopped to gawk. Others glanced at the animal as if it were a hallucination—understandable, perhaps, given that the runners were about 15 miles into a punishing 65-mile race. Even though moose pose potential threats to native ecosystems and people, local communities are learning to co-exist with the animals. In Walden, 25 minutes north, moose have become such frequent visitors that a sign on the way into town proudly proclaims it “The Moose Viewing Capital of Colorado.” “We have them in town quite often,” said Josh Dilley, State Forest’s park manager, who met me on the trail. They especially like to congregate around the elementary school, Dilley explained, “so we’ll go sit strategically between the moose and the kids while they’re going to school.” When moose loiter too long in front yards and public parks, wildlife officials haze them away with firecrackers or non-lethal rubber buckshot. On rare occasions, they sedate an unruly moose with a dart and transplant it elsewhere by truck. Along the trail, Dilley and I encountered dozens of hikers and several bags of dog poop, which Dilley dutifully retrieved. Dogs, Dilley explained, present one of the greatest sources of conflict with moose. Moose do not distinguish a Pomeranian from a gray wolf. And rather than run away, an adult moose will stand its ground or chase an unleashed dog back to its owner, often attempting to gore a dog with its antlers or crush it with its hooves. A week later, at State Forest’s annual “Moose Fest,” I spoke with Trina Romero, a wildlife viewing coordinator with Colorado Parks and Wildlife, who said that moose attacks in the state now outnumber bear and mountain lion attacks combined, even though moose numbers are significantly lower. Despite growing pains as Coloradans figure out how to co-exist with this large, non-native ungulate, the state has become something of a de facto refuge for the species. Moose populations in much of their native range across the northern U.S. are plummeting. In New Hampshire, they declined by nearly half between the mid-1990s and late-2010s, owing to habitat loss from clear-cutting and warming temperatures, which have triggered a sharp rise in ticks. Wyoming also used to be a moose stronghold, but today Colorado has more moose than its neighbor to the north. And there are signs that Colorado’s moose numbers may be naturally stabilizing. “We have some evidence that our moose population is expressing characteristics of being at or near carrying capacity, such as lower pregnancy rates and animals skipping breeding,” Bergman said. Because biologists don’t have great information on the long-term trajectory of state moose populations, Bergman said, his agency is conservative when it comes to apportioning moose tags to hunters each year. “We could probably use [hunting] as a tool to bring down density … but we also face social pressure to maintain high densities of animals. People love seeing moose, so it really is about finding trade-offs and middle ground.” Others are not so optimistic. Moose “are one of my favorites,” said Elaine Leslie. “But I’m worried about what is happening at the ecosystem level, especially in Rocky Mountain National Park. That is a very biodiverse area right now.” Moose gather together. David Dietrich For the sake of Colorado’s moose and the ecosystems they inhabit, Leslie said, the state’s ardor must turn to more research, rigorous population counts and science-based management. “You have to look at the big picture, at what happens 20 and 30 years down the road.” Otherwise, Colorado residents may find sorrow after sorrow: increasingly denuded streambanks, more frequent attacks and car collisions, and greater numbers of moose in the crosshairs. “It’s partly everybody’s fault, the state and the feds, because we don’t think into the future very well,” Leslie said. “And we don’t learn from history. Unless everybody gets on the same page, it’s going to get ugly.”This story originally appeared in bioGraphic, an independent magazine about nature and regeneration powered by the California Academy of Sciences. Get the latest Science stories in your inbox.

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Scientists Uncover How Saturated Fats Trigger Alzheimer’s

This research, conducted by Universitat Rovira i Virgili, advances our knowledge of how obesity, type 2 diabetes, and Alzheimer’s disease are interconnected. A study conducted...

A recent study by the URV has shown that a diet high in saturated fats accelerates Alzheimer’s development by affecting blood and brain molecules, opening new avenues for treatment and prevention.This research, conducted by Universitat Rovira i Virgili, advances our knowledge of how obesity, type 2 diabetes, and Alzheimer’s disease are interconnected.A study conducted by the URV has uncovered the process by which a diet high in saturated fats contributes to Alzheimer’s disease. This research centered on the impact of such a diet on specific molecules present in the blood and other tissues like the brain, which serve as indicators and controllers of the disease.The study was headed by Mònica Bulló, professor at the Department of Biochemistry and Biotechnology and member of the Metabolic Health and Nutrition unit and the Environmental, Food and Toxicological Technology Centre (TecnATox) of the URV, in collaboration with the Pere Virgili Health Research Institute (IISPV), CIBERobn and the University of Barcelona. The results have been published in the journal Nutrients.The research was conducted on mice models who developed Alzheimer’s disease in adulthood. Previous studies in these animals had already shown that after a diet high in saturated fats the mice developed Alzheimer’s much earlier than mice on a conventional diet. However, the mechanisms that led to the onset of Alzheimer’s remained unknown. That is, until now. Key Findings on Molecular ChangesThe researchers analyzed the expression of 15 miRNAs, small molecules of RNA that play a crucial role in genetic regulation in both plasma and brain tissues. The team examined changes in insulin-related miRNAs in mouse models predisposed to Alzheimer’s not on a diet low in saturated fats.A picture of the research team. Credit: Universitat Rovira i VirgiliThe results demonstrated that their metabolism worsened after being on this diet for six months: their body weight increased significantly and their response to glucose and insulin decreased. These same characteristics can also be found in people with obesity or type 2 diabetes. Furthermore, researchers found changes to various miRNAs in both the blood and the brain. These changes were related to processes that can cause brain damage, such as the accumulation of β-amyloid plaques (protein deposits that form in the brain and which are markers of Alzheimer’s), excessive production of the tau protein (which can damage brain cells when it gets out of control) and inflammation in the brain.“The results of this study are a step forward in our understanding of this disease and may explain the relationship between obesity, type 2 diabetes, and the onset of Alzheimer’s. The findings also offer new targets for the possible prevention and treatment of the disease”, said researcher Mònica BullóThe study not only provides new data on how a high-fat diet can affect the health of the brain, but also opens the door to future research into dietary strategies as a means of treating Alzheimer’s. The results underline the importance of a balanced diet in preventing neurodegenerative diseases and highlight miRNAs as targets for therapeutic interventions.Reference: “Effects of a High-Fat Diet on Insulin-Related miRNAs in Plasma and Brain Tissue in APPSwe/PS1dE9 and Wild-Type C57BL/6J Mice” by Melina Rojas-Criollo, Nil Novau-Ferré, Laia Gutierrez-Tordera, Miren Ettcheto, Jaume Folch, Christopher Papandreou, Laura Panisello, Amanda Cano, Hamza Mostafa, Javier Mateu-Fabregat, Marina Carrasco, Antoni Camins and Mònica Bulló, 25 March 2024, Nutrients.DOI: 10.3390/nu16070955

Animals

Food

Health

Wondering what Australia might look like in a hotter world? Take a glimpse into the distant past

The fossil record suggests Australia may be much wetter, and look far different, in centuries and millenia to come.

ShutterstockCurrent concentrations of carbon dioxide (CO₂) in Earth’s atmosphere are unprecedented in human history. But CO₂ levels today, and those that might occur in coming decades, did occur millions of years ago. Wouldn’t it be useful to go back in time and see what Australia looked like during those periods in the distant past? Well, scientists – including us – have done just that. These studies, which largely involve examining sediments and fossils, reveal a radically different Australia to the one we inhabit. The continent was warmer and wetter, and filled with unfamiliar plant and animal species. It suggests Australia may be much wetter, and look very different, in centuries and millennia to come. Studying fossils helps us understand past climates. Shutterstock Then and now: measuring CO₂ Atmospheric CO₂ is measured in “parts per million” – in other words, how many CO₂ molecules are present in each million molecules of dry air. The concentration of CO₂ influences Earth’s climate. The more CO₂ present, the warmer it gets. Right now, atmospheric CO₂ is about 420 parts per million. This concentration last occurred on Earth between 3 million and 5 million years ago – a period known as the Pliocene. If humanity keeps burning fossil fuels at the current rate, by mid-century CO₂ concentrations will be around 550 parts per million. This level was last approached 14 million to 17 million years ago, in the mid-Miocene period. In both these periods, Earth was warmer than it is today, and sea levels were far higher. In the Pliocene, research shows CO₂ was the cause of about half the elevated temperatures. Much of the rest was due to changes in ice sheets and vegetation, for which CO₂ was indirectly responsible. In the mid-Miocene, the link between CO₂ and warmer temperatures is less certain. But climate modelling does suggest CO₂ was the primary driver of temperature increases in this period. By examining the plants and animals that lived in Australia during these epochs, we can gain insight into what a warmer Australia might look like. Obviously, the Pliocene and mid-Miocene far predate humans, and CO₂ concentrations in the atmosphere in those periods increased for natural reasons, such as volcanic eruptions. Today, humans are causing the CO₂ increases, and it’s happening at a much faster rate than in the past. Read more: Humanity is compressing millions of years of natural change into just a few centuries Today, humans are the cause of high CO2 levels in the atmosphere. Shutterstock Australia in the Pliocene The fossil and sediment record from the Pliocene period in Australia is limited. But the available data suggest much of the continent – and Earth generally – was more humid and warm than today. This helped determine the species that existed in Australia. For example, the Nullarbor Plain, which stretches from South Australia to Western Australia, is today extremely dry. But studies of fossilised pollen show during the Pliocene it was home to Gymea lilies, banksias and angophoras – plants found around Sydney today. Similarly, the western Murray-Darling Basin is today largely saltbush and grassland. But fossil pollen records show in the Pliocene, it was home to araucaria and the southern beech – rainforest trees found in high-rainfall climates. And preserved remains of marsupials dating back to the Pliocene have been found near Hamilton in western Victoria. They include a dorcopsis wallaby – the nearest living relative of which lives in New Guinea’s ever-wet mountains. The nearest relative of the dorcopsis lives in New Guinea. Shutterstock Hot and moist in the mid-Miocene A rich fossil and sediment record exists from the mid-Miocene. Marine sediments off WA suggest the west and southwest part of Australia was arid. In contrast, the continent’s east was very wet. For example, the Riversleigh World Heritage area in Queensland is today a semi-arid limestone plateau. But research has found in the mid-Miocene, seven species of folivorous ringtail possums lived there at the same time. The only place more than two ringtail possum species coexist today is in rainforests. This suggests the Riversleigh plateau once supported a diverse rainforest ecosystem. Similarly, McGraths Flat, near Gulgong in New South Wales, is today an open woodland. But mid-Miocene fossils from the site include rainforest trees with pointed leaves that help shed water. And mid-Miocene fossils from the Yallourn Formation, in Victoria’s Latrobe Valley, also include the remains of rainforest plants. Before colonisation it supported eucalypt forests and grasslands. This evidence of rainforest suggests far wetter conditions in the mid-Miocene than exist today. Read more: If warming exceeds 2°C, Antarctica's melting ice sheets could raise seas 20 metres in coming centuries Dry parts of Australia were once rainforest. Shutterstock An uncertain future You may be wondering, when climate change projections tell us Australia will be drier in future, why we are suggesting the continent will be wetter. We concede there is a real contradiction here, and it requires further research to unravel. There’s another important point to note. While conditions in the Pliocene or Miocene can help us understand how Earth’s systems respond to elevated CO₂ levels, we can’t say Australia’s future climate will exactly replicate those conditions. And there are lags in the climate system, so while CO₂ concentrations in the Pliocene are similar to today’s levels, Earth hasn’t yet experienced the same extent of warming and rainfall. The uncertainty comes down to the complexities of the climate system. Some components, such as air temperature, respond to increased CO₂ levels relatively quickly. But other components will require centuries or millennia to fully respond. For example, ice sheets over Greenland and Antarctica are kilometres thick and as big as continents, which means they take a long time to melt. So, even if CO₂ levels remain high, we shouldn’t expect a Pliocene-like climate to develop for centuries or millennia yet. However, every day we add CO₂ to Earth’s atmosphere, the climate system moves closer to a Pliocene-like state – and it cannot be easily turned around. Tim Flannery is affiliated with the Australian Museum Research Institute and Ambassador to Regen Aqua, water treatment company, and Odonata, biodiversity restoration on private landsJosephine Brown receives funding from the National Environmental Science Program and the Australian Research Council.Kale Sniderman receives funding from the Australian Research Council

Animals

Climate

CO2

A Father Consumed by the Question of What to Teach His Children

Neel Mukherjee’s new novel explores the reality that no decision—particularly as a parent—is perfect.

When I got pregnant last year, I began reading online about parenting and found myself confronted with an overwhelming quantity of choices. On social media, how-to graphics and videos abound, as do doctrines about the one true way to discipline your children, or feed them, or get them to sleep through the night. Parent forums, blogs, and product-recommendation sites are full of suggestions for the only swaddle that works, the formula that tastes milkiest, the clicking animatronic crab that will get your tummy-time-averse baby to hold her head high. Scrolling through all of this advice can make it seem as though parenting is largely about informed, research-based decision-making—that choosing the right gadgets and the right philosophy will help parenting itself go right.This logic can feel particularly visceral for a parent considering how to be a good steward of the environment. (Do I genuinely need a special $160 blender to avoid giving my baby prepackaged food? Or can I just mash steamed veggies with a fork?) Worrying about waste can turn into a variation on the pursuit of perfect parenting—but not worrying about it is illogical. Our children will inherit the climate crisis. Personal decisions cannot undo that fact; can, indeed, hardly mitigate it. Deciding to be a parent anyway means you had better hope that our species and societies can work out a new way to thrive on a changing, warming, conflict-riddled planet—because if not, what have you done?Choice, the Booker Prize–nominated writer Neel Mukherjee’s fourth novel, addresses this question head-on. It’s a triptych novel in the vein of Susan Choi’s Trust Exercise and Lisa Halliday’s Asymmetry, which use their three parts to repeatedly surprise and challenge readers. Compared with these novels, Choice is both more ambitious and less successful, harmed by the fact that its second and third sections just cannot compete with its blistering first.But that first section is a barn burner. Mukherjee starts Choice with the story of Ayush, an editor at a prestigious London publishing house, whose obsession with the climate crisis lands somewhere between religious fervor and emotional disorder—especially as far as his kids are concerned. Ayush and his economist husband, Luke, have twin children, Masha and Sasha, and his portion of Choice is a beautiful, horrifying, detailed, and messy evocation of parenthood, full of diapers and dirty dishes and “Can you help Daddy make dinner?” It also presents having children as a moral crisis, a stumbling block Ayush can’t get past. He tries bitterly to lessen his family’s consumption—we see him measuring the exact amount of water in which to cook the twins’ pasta, boiling it in the electric kettle because he’s read that it uses less energy than a stovetop pot —but he can’t get away from the belief that Masha and Sasha are “not going to have a future anyway.” His conviction that they’re doomed weighs more and more heavily on his parenting decisions, eventually convincing him that he can no longer parent at all.Readers meet Ayush in a scene nearly too painful to read. Home alone with his kindergarten-age twins, Ayush skips their bedtime story in favor of a documentary about an abattoir. Mukherjee describes this moment in vivid visual detail, contrasting the children’s sweet bedroom decor (cherries on the bedding; sea creatures on the night-light) to the laptop screen, which shows slaughtered pigs on a floor “so caked with layers of old solidified blood and fresh new infusion that it looks like a large wedge of fudgy chocolate cake.” Unsurprisingly, the twins sob hysterically as the video plays; their distress upsets Ayush so acutely that he cannot talk. But rather than comfort them once he regains speech, he doubles down on the decision that he has to teach them about cruelty to animals—and about their complicity in it. He puts his children to bed not with an apology or a lullaby, but with the stern reminder that “what you saw was how our meat comes to us.”[Read: The books that help me raise children in a broken world]Ayush seems like a monster in this scene—and not an unfeeling one, which signals to the reader that he may be as much tortured as torturer. Mukherjee swiftly makes it apparent that this is the case. We see him begging Luke to help teach their too-young children to weigh the morality of “things that don’t appear to be choices,” such as eating meat; Luke, in turn, begs Ayush to examine the roots of his unhappiness and anxiety, his compulsion to conserve energy far beyond what could reasonably be useful. Ayush yearns to “shake off his human form” and become one with nature—or, more ominously, vanish into it. At one point, Ayush takes his children to explore some woods outside London, an activity that many parents might relate to: He wants to share the wonder of the natural world with his children, both as a bonding activity and as a lesson in ecological stewardship. But he can’t focus on Masha and Sasha. What he hears instead is that the “great trees are breathing; Ayush wants to still his heart to hear them.” Mukherjee only implies this, but it seems that all Ayush’s experiences lead to this paradox: His love for the Earth makes him want to erase himself from it.Ayush’s relationship with his children is also shaped by a desire to remove himself, as well as a significant amount of attendant guilt. He is the twins’ primary parent, despite the fact that he never wanted children—a revelation that Mukherjee builds to slowly. Ayush’s anxieties about choosing parenthood are legion. He’s upset by the ecological impact of adding to the Earth’s human population, and believes that his twins will face a future of walled cities and climate refugeeism. Having grown up South Asian in Britain, he’s frightened of exposing children to the racism he’s faced his whole life; he also has a half-buried but “fundamental discomfort about gay parenting,” of which he is ashamed. Most of all, before having children, he didn’t want to have a baby who could become like him—“a consumed, jittery, unsettled creature.” His own unhappiness, he feels, should have precluded him from having children. Yet he acquiesced, a choice he partly disavows by suppressing his memory of why he did. Not only does he go along with having children; he takes daily responsibility for raising them.On the surface, this is the case because Ayush earns less than Luke, a dynamic the novel explores with nuance. In straight partnerships, the question of who parents more is very often gendered, which Mukherjee acknowledges: At one point, Luke, who has a big job and generational wealth, dismisses Ayush with a sexist reference to the “pin-money” he earns in publishing. But there are more layers here. Ayush, it seems, takes responsibility for his children in order to atone for not having wanted them. Luke, who pushed for fatherhood, is the more patient and affectionate parent, while Ayush is busy fretting over the environmental impact of disposable diapers. Luke is also much kinder and more open to Ayush than Ayush is to him: Although Luke is an economist, with a genuine belief in the rationality that undergirds his discipline, he’s motivated far more by his emotions than his ideas.Ayush believes himself to be the opposite. His domestic decisions are often logical (or logical-seeming) responses to climate anxieties, but this impulse becomes more disturbing as it influences his child-rearing. Sometimes, he seems to care more about raising Masha and Sasha as environmentalists than he does about any other aspect of their upbringing—almost as though he wants to offset having had them to begin with. He doesn’t necessarily want to be this way: After the somewhat-failed forest outing, Ayush takes the twins on a walk around London and teaches them to come up with similes and metaphors to describe what they see, making a game of comparing dandelions to egg yolks and lemons. Here, he successfully keeps his attention on his children, but he still spins a tender moment into one of moral exigency. “Will this remain in their memory,” he wonders, “make them look up and out, make them notice, and, much more importantly, notice again?” For Ayush, this qualifies as optimism. He’s trying to control his children’s way of seeing the world, but he is also trying to offer them the gift of coexisting, happily, with the Earth.[Read: The book that captures my life as a dad]Mukherjee does give Ayush one way of communing peacefully with nature: his relationship with his dog, Spencer. The writer Joy Williams has said that any work of fiction should have an “animal within to give its blessing,” which Spencer certainly does in Choice. Mukherjee describes Ayush’s devotion to his dog in lush detail; the book’s most beautiful passages have Spencer in them. Ayush’s heart breaks when he realizes that Luke does not see “you, me, and the dog” as family enough; it breaks far more deeply when Spencer grows too old to “bound to the door … surprised by joy, impatient as the wind, when any member of his family comes in.” Among Ayush’s most treasured memories is a spring morning with Spencer: Then a puppy, he had rolled in wild flowers so that his “silky golden throat and chest had smelled of violets for a brief second, then the scent had disappeared. Ayush had sat on the ground, sniffing Spencer’s chest for another hit of that elusive perfume, but it was gone.”Ayush plainly sees Spencer as his child, and yet the dog also gives him a way to experience the “elusive perfume” of a pleasurable connection with the planet. As Spencer ages and that link is harder to sense, Ayush’s unhappiness grows. He understands that he is grieving preemptively for Spencer, but the approaching loss of his dog—an event he cannot control or avoid—does not motivate him to snuggle with Spencer or prepare his children for the loss. Instead, it makes him want to leave his family when Spencer does—as if, without the connection to nature that the dog offers, he can no longer bear to be caged in his family home.By the end of his section of Choice, Ayush has completely lost the ability to make rational decisions. He betrays Spencer in a scene perhaps even more painful than the book’s opening, thinking that he’s doing his beloved dog a service; he also betrays his children, his husband, his life. All of his efforts to control his family’s ecological impact, to do the right research and calculations, to impart all the right moral lessons, lead directly, maybe inexorably, to this tragic point. At the novel’s start, he tells Luke that he wants their kids to understand “choices and their consequences.” But it ultimately becomes clear that he can’t accept the consequences of his choice to have children. He can’t save the planet for his children; nor can he save it from them—and so, rather than committing to guiding them into a future he can’t choose or control, he abdicates his responsibility for them.Mukherjee leaves Ayush’s family behind rather than linger on the aftermath of these betrayals. He moves on to two narratives the reader will recognize as parts of books that Ayush edited: first a story about a young English academic who begins meddling in—and writing about—the life of an Eritrean rideshare driver, then an essay by a disillusioned economist who describes the misery that ensues when an aid organization gives a Bengali family a cow that is meant to lift them from poverty, but radically worsens their situation instead. Mukherjee imbues these sections with a propulsive mix of anger and grace, but neither is especially complicated. Emily, the academic, has no one who depends on her, and her odd choices concerning the rideshare driver, Salim, have no real consequences for anyone but herself. Sabita, the mother of the family that gets the cow, is so wholly at the mercy of her material conditions that choice is hardly a relevant concept to her—something that she understands, though the cow-providing “people from the city” do not.Emily’s section primarily serves as a portrait of choice amid abundance. Sabita’s, meanwhile, underscores the central idea of Ayush’s: that our efforts at control are, by and large, delusions. For parents, this can be especially painful to accept. We want our choices to guarantee our children’s safety, their comfort, their happiness. For Ayush, who believes fervently that his twins will grow up to inhabit a “burning world,” the fact that he can’t choose something better for them drives him away from them. By not showing the consequences of Ayush’s actions, Mukherjee leaves incomplete the book’s exploration of parenting. What his abdication means to Masha, Sasha, and Luke is hidden. What it means to the reader, though, is clear. In Choice, there is no such thing as a perfect decision or a decision guaranteed to go right. There are only misjudgments and errors—and the worst of those are the ones that can never be undone.

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Cookies help us run our site more efficiently.

What Myths About the Anthropocene Get Wrong

1. The Anthropocene fails to represent all human impacts.

2. The Anthropocene is too short to be a geological epoch—just one human lifetime.

3. The Anthropocene is just a blip in Earth history.

4. Anthropocene strata are “minimal” or “negligible.”

5. The geological record is too complex and gradational to draw one single boundary for the Anthropocene.

6. Other animals have affected the environment and caused geological change, so there’s nothing special about the Anthropocene.

7. The Anthropocene blames all humans equally for the global environmental crises.

8. The Anthropocene signals defeat in our efforts to mitigate environmental change.

9. Naming the Anthropocene after humans is hubristic.

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Join us to forgea sustainable future

sign up for our mailing list to stay informed on the latest films and environmental headlines.

Join us to forge
a sustainable future