The Importance Of Outdoor Recreation On The Environment

Volcanoes are an important part of my life. As soon as I learned that my husband was being stationed in Hawaii I knew that I needed to hike Diamond Head. Aside from volcanoes, I am also hugely passionate about education and conservation which makes maintaining the integrity of Diamond Head a critical goal of mine. Selfishly, I want to be able to hike Diamond Head for years to come. This paper will discuss how the demographics of recreationists and their environmental impacts on Diamond Head can possibly be addressed by management approaches.

Luckily, humans have put in efforts to understand and sometimes reverse the damage done. Wilcove describes ecosystem restoration, where usually humans put concentrated effort into recreating original habitats to restore indigenous populations. This is, unless “a very different assemblage of species has taken hold of the land and cannot be dislodged,” also known as a new “steady state” (Wilcove, 2000, p. 12). Wilcove himself joined the effort by studying the impacts humans have caused on woodland critters. He surveyed an area in Maryland to detect predators by setting cardboard coated in masonry powder to record footprints. He concluded that there were “six predators: opossum, raccoon, striped skunk, dog, cat, and blue jay. All are animals that benefit mightily from their association with people”(Wilcove, 2000, p. 42). He also mentions how extensive data can only be collected when looking at the observations of many people over the generations. He talks about “generational blindness,” which means how observers of a current generation cannot make conclusions on populations without the help of data collected from the past (Wilcove, 2000, p. 13).

I boarded the Amtrak the early morning of November 5th, 2016 from Davis, California to the Peytonia Slough Ecological Reserve (Peytonia Reserve) in Suisun, California. The trip to this brackish and saltwater reserve was to help me analyze the relationship between humans and wildlife in urban settings. Urban environments depend on the rehabilitation and protection of small natural areas like the Peytonia Reserve. At the Peytonia Reserve, both humans and native/non-native species live in cohabitation, which paints an accurate representation of reconciliation ecology. Humans use these natural areas, the Peytonia Reserve in this case, for recreational activities like hunting and fishing. This, in turn, benefits the wildlife that lives in the area because hunters and fishers want the environment to be well maintained in order to support their activities. I came up with the conclusion that even though humans have more to benefit from wildlife, wildlife also depends on humans to help protect and conserve their habitats.

The article discussed the changes in many habitats due to anthropogenic activity. Anthropogenic is an adjective that describes changes in nature due to the people. Next, this article discussed climate change and the impact that it is having on species like clams, and fish due to ocean temperatures rising. The article also addressed carbon dating of fossils to look for cause of extinctions. Human development and agriculture have had a tremendous impact on the population of many species that are terrestrial. Deforestation is a big problem that has caused a decline in the bird species. Commercial fishing in many areas has led to a decline in fish populations. Furthermore this article

However, the author of “Earth has lost half of its wildlife in the past 40 years,” states, “We have lost half of the animal population and knowing this is driven by human consumption, this is clearly a call to arms and we must act now… The earth must be protected from development and deforestation, while food and energy have to be produced sustainably” (Damian Carrington). The population of animals has decreased for many reasons that all point back to favoring industries rather

It examines the how browsers can encourage positive conditions for temperate forest soils, such as providing extra nitrogen in the soils as a fertilizer. They found evidence that deer populations promote plant species biodiversity because it promotes invasive species that thrive off of degradation and habitat disturbance. Also, researchers found one cost about deer browsing was that even though it promotes plant biodiversity, it also decrease the amount of palatable, or edible, plant species. This is useful in my paper because it provides a different outlook of the effects of deer because most articles are negative towards deer browsing. The authors of this paper all work for the United States Department of Agriculture Forest Service as research ecologists, all have their doctorates in ecology and/or biology. This finding sharply contrasts with the negative impact that deer have when their populations kill and over browse, harming native plant

In today’s world, hardly any species of wildlife become extinct from natural causes. Europeans hunt animals to such an extent that we classify it as overhunting. We destroy their habitat, and introduce other animals that are a threat to endangered animals or are competition for resources and food. Habitat destruction is the greatest threat to both animals and plants.

Reintroduction of wolves brought about recovery of plants and animals in Yellowstone National Park. In 1990s, deer were overpopulated due to absence of its predator, wolves. Regardless of people’s efforts, the number of deer kept increasing. As a result,

Whitetail deer have come to be known as a keystone species, species known for affecting other organisms in an ecosystem. Deer are known as a keystone species in forest habitats such as in the Eastern United States because they are capable of destroying potential forest habitat of other organisms (McShea and Rappole, 1992). For example, deer have a negative impact on forest ecosystems by trampling and over browsing over vegetation, without creating any habitat for other native species. Throughout the eastern United States, the abundance of white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) has increased dramatically over the last century (Taggart and Long, 2015). Population increases could be due to increased habitat fragmentation from land development, reduced predators and/or hunting pressure. Individual deer ranges varied during seasonal times, deer movements are usually greatest during the peak breeding months from late fall through winter (Williams et. al, 2012). Regardless of the cause, high deer densities can have significant effects on plant communities such as plant decay and/or even death. Deer consume a large amounts of plant biomass (leaves, buds, flowers and fruits) and directly reduce the growth, reproduction, and survival of herbaceous and woody plant species (Shen et. al, 2016). The impacts of white-tailed deer on forests along the Eastern United

An abundance of deer initially seems to indicate healthy habitats and flourishing wildlife; however, overabundance actually leads to severe problems for ecosystems. One of the reasons deer populations have been able to grow so exponentially is because many forested suburban areas allow for deer habitats with low risk of predation (Boulanger 174). In correlation with their suburban living, overpopulated deer end up crossing more roads and highways, posing as more pressing issues towards automobiles and trains and causing more frequent collisions. Next, and quite obviously, overabundance creates overcrowding in habitats. Less apparent, however, is the idea that with increased browsing of new tree seedlings, overpopulated deer decrease species diversity in forests and reduce tree growth, which leads to a lack of protection from erosion and floods (Côté 117). Deer also forage selectively, meaning certain species of plant will be eaten more frequently than others, often resulting in less diversity, ground coverage, and competition between plants (Côté 124). This, in turn, makes ecosystems less suitable to other species, in particular the foliage. Steeve Côté quotes Hobbs and Paine, who explain, “By affecting competitive interactions among plants with varying levels of chemical defenses and by altering successional trajectories, deer alter ecosystem processes that include energy transfer, soil development, and

Do deer populations have a negative effects on ecological systems? In several scientific articles this is the question being asked. Dose deer overabundance modify plant diversity, vegetation decomposition and structure, soil characteristics, growth and survival? Do they have cascading effects on other species such as insects and other mammals? These questions need to be asked so, projects can be implanted to help maintain deer population and preserve the ecological systems.

Forests have been cut, crops planted, pastures seeded, and urban areas paved. One of the most troubling consequences of human modification of ecosystems is an ongoing loss of species and therefore a loss of biodiversity around the world. The current extinctions have a human cause: habitat loss (such as clearing of tropical rainforests); the introduction of invasive species; unregulated hunting and fishing; and pollution of water, air, and

Bill Freedmen, author of “Endangered Species—Human Causes Of Extinction and Endangerment” notes, “scientists approximate that present extinction rates are 1,000 to 10,000 times higher than the average natural extinction rate.” These distressing numbers should be acted upon to save the endangered species and avoid the catastrophic change to this planet if these species were to become extinct. In order to produce change, people need to recognize that habitat loss, climate change, and poaching are all factors in why our animal species are going extinct.

The scale and pace of change is dramatic; for example, the extinction of species is occurring at around 100-fold pre-human rates4. The population sizes of vertebrate species have, on average, declined by half over the last 45 years5. More than 2.3 million km2 of primary forest has been felled since 20006. About

The health of the earth degrades with the destructive activity of human beings. A recent study by a group of scientists looked at twenty four different services that the earth’s ecosystems provide for humans, ecosystem services, and found that fifteen of them are in need of desperate help (Gazette 31 March 2005). These services are vital to the survival of both human and nonhuman life and include filtering water and providing nutrient rich soils and ocean waters. Many of the members of these various ecosystems are also decreasing in numbers. In a British survey of bird populations found that in the 200 birds of Britain tracked there was about a 54% population decrease between the 1968-1971 tacking period and the 1988-1991 tacking period. In two other surveys of 254 native plant species from the same area there was a decrease of about 28% during the past 40 years. Humans are pushing the sixth mass extinction (Gazette March 19, 2004).