How much impact is acceptable?

[Fadcode]

I think where you might be mistaken is in assuming that there is only a finite number of species that ever can exist during the lifetime of the planet.
It's not a case that 99% have become extinct, leaving just 1% and that 1% will get smaller as more species die until there's none left.
It's a case that as one species dies out another replaces it.
It is likely that there will always be a rolling 99%/1% ratio, since the planet can support only so many species (for various reasons) at any one time.
That's what evolution is all about - as the environment changes so do the species inhabiting it. One species may die out but another replaces it - leaving us with a ratio of roughly 99%/1% (actually, by the very nature of the maths, that ratio will change - but during our lifetime it will appear about the same compared with the time span of the Earth).

I'll take your word for it..................who will replace Vera Lynn then......

 

[Broch]

Well you are entitled to doubt it, but if we only have 1% of species left(about 8.5 million) and 99% are gone, then it obviously hasn't happened, if a system kills or allows 99% of life to be killed it's not a very good system, land erosion, underwater volcanoes , rain washing away the limestone etc, big problems.and i am not sure we can depend on self healing.

If I had the time I would explain it to you - but Wander has instead.

 

[Fadcode]

If I had the time I would explain it to you - but Wander has instead.

Sit down and relax, you seem to be getting your threads mixed up
lay off the sheep dip.

 

[Broch]

Sit down and relax, you seem to be getting your threads mixed up
lay off the sheep dip.

I was pulling your leg - it actually takes a lot to wind me up these days - the local sheep dip is not bad but I do prefer the Scottish version.

 

[Fadcode]

So you do know i lost my legs in Afghanistan then...............................................................................................thats me pulling yours.

 

[santaman2000]

I can’t speak for the Australian fires but in the case of California (and most of the American West) the fires we see today aren’t completely due to undermanagement But rather the opposite. We spent almost a century believing that all wild fires were bad and nearly eliminated them. Unfortunately those wild fires were important to remove the understory in the forests before it became so thick as to fuel fires hot enough to threaten the older growth as well. However it is true that had previous administrations allowed more controlled logging that act would have also cleared the dangerous understory.

 

[punkrockcaveman]

I can’t speak for the Australian fires but in the case of California (and most of the American West) the fires we see today aren’t completely due to undermanagement But rather the opposite. We spent almost a century believing that all wild fires were bad and nearly eliminated them. Unfortunately those wild fires were important to remove the understory in the forests before it became so thick as to fuel fires hot enough to threaten the older growth as well. However it is true that had previous administrations allowed more controlled logging that act would have also cleared the dangerous understory.

I read that too in Oliver Rackham's 'woodlands' book, fire is what some of the forests in Aus rely upon to be healthy

He mentioned that some trees almost want to burn, whilst others really don't. Amazing how evolution works, two seeming similar things using two completely different life cycles to reproduce and thrive.

 

[Paul_B]

Lack of management was the blame put on flooding in the West country or Somerset levels I believe. The drainage channels / rivers weren't being dredged often enough so heavy rain overwhelmed it's ability to handle high rainfall. Being a lowland area where drainage has been used for a very long time this was a big problem.

I just think we manage land to deal with natural land processes like flooding and fires. Then money becomes an issue so we cut back on this management budget until there's a major event and failure of the management. The California fires might not be quite like that but usually land management is about taking away nature's systems of coping with exceptional conditions. Unfortunately if you want to use land unnaturally then you need to manage it and the exceptional events. Fire or floods have worse consequences if you take nature's land management away so humans simply have to put more resources towards managing the situation they in created.

 

[Woody girl]

The thing with the somerset levels is that they always flooded. It's a wet land environment.
Somerset is a corruption of summer lands. The area was only occupied for the most part ..apart from a few higher areas such as glastonbury... during the summer, and even then you got around by boat rather than land.
I'm not sure when the big drainage works started but as it was fertile land and the peat started to be extracted drainage was instigated with deep reens (ditches)and actually much of what many take for rivers are actually massive drainage ditches.
Then people started to build live and work in these areas that would normaly have been under water for a vast part of the year.
If the drainage is not continually maintained then you get serious flood problems.
The lesson was learned a couple of years ago when the levels flooded badly as the reens and drainage channels had not been maintained due to government cut backs.
Some of those roadside ditches have six feet of water in even in the summer. Not a great idea to go off the road into a ditch along those roads!

 

[Paul_B]

That's exactly what I was talking about. If you take away the natural order of the land through drainage projects or whatever then you can't skimp on doing it from then on. Kind of the construction of those drainage channels equates to a tipping point.

There's many areas of reclaimed land that haa been returned to seasonal flooding I believe as a means to reduce issues with flooding, coastal erosion or simply because there isn't an economic argument to maintain the reclaimed land. Gives nature a good habitat too.