A new study states that there has been a major decline in the “apex” predators’ population. These are predators such as lions, tigers, sharks, wolves, big big animals like them. Because of this decline, thare are more smaller predators called “mesopredators”. This has lead to economic and ecological disruptions. Studies shows that North America’s large predators have been becoming fewer and fewer for the past 200 years. The mesopredators have expanded their land by 60%. The scary thing is that scientists have found very few solutions to this blobal problem. Sharks are in serious decline because of overfishing. In some places this has led to an increase in the populations of rays, which in turn caused the collapse of a bay scallop fishery and causes both ecological an economic losses. To read more click here
This is really important because the decrease of these large predators has mostly to do with us humans and how we live. We over hunt, over fish, and this causes problems for the economy, but more importantly the ecosystem. Large predators are carnivores, but mesopredators are usually omnivores and can cause plant and crop damage. Something needs to change.
Although most scientist have claimed there are few solutions to this decline of top predators, we know that they are trying. Many people have asked wilderness experts and said, “What do we do” and the most common reply has been, “Well it is most important to understand that these issues are complex!” It is great to know they are trying.
The article I read is a serious issue and I am certain that experts in this field are trying to help out as much they can. It’s great to know that we are gaining animals, but these animals are not going to improve our economy. Instead they will keep populating and eventually cause a great disturbance which in the long run will not be good
Excellent post schobeef. It’s going to be interesting to see how the scientists try to solve this economic and ecological problem. To see how a loss of just one animal can affect a whole ecosystem is just a puzzling site. The fact that mesopredators have expanded their land by 60% is astonishing. If we want to maintain a stable and profitable ecosystem, we are going to need more apex predators to keep species counts sustainable.
Although the number of apex predators are decreasing, we can at least be thankful that we aren’t losing mesopredators at the same rate. Without mesopredators, all of the higher predators in the food chain would not be fed. So as we can hope that scientists find the answer to saving the apex predators, be happy that things aren’t as bad as they could be.