Word: ecosystems
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...promised land, but they have merely produced a network of devastation. The soil that supported a rich rain forest is not well suited to corn and other crops, and most of the newcomers can eke out only an impoverished, disease-ridden existence. In the process, they are destroying an ecosystem and the millions of species of plants and animals that live in it. An estimated 20% of Rondonia's forest is gone, and at present rates of destruction it will be totally wiped out within 25 years...
Diversity is the raw material of earth's wealth, but nature's true creativity lies in the relationships that link various creatures. The coral in a reef or the orchid in a rain forest is part of an ecosystem, a fragile, often delicately balanced conglomeration of supports, checks and balances that integrate life-forms into functioning communities. Given the complex workings of an ecosystem, it is never clear which species, if any, are expendable...
...only open after being exposed to intense heat. Ecologists expect the fires to help restore the park's depleted stands of aspen trees and increase the wide array of insects, birds and mammals that have found Yellowstone's aging forests increasingly inhospitable. "It's part of living in an ecosystem that is basically wild and uncontrollable," says Louisa Willcox of the Greater Yellowstone Coalition, which supports the natural-burn policy...
Last month, however, Lilly suddenly announced that it would not sell Spike to Peru or the U.S. Government. Reason: the herbicide had not been fully tested in Peru. The company was undoubtedly reacting to protests by environmentalists, who claim that use of the herbicide on the Andes' delicate ecosystem could turn it into a desert. Just after Lilly's announcement, Walter Gentner, a recently retired research scientist at the U.S. Department of Agriculture, complained that he had been pressured by the State Department to condone use of Spike in Peru before its impact had been assessed...
Others are also skeptical. Michael Pace, a scientist at the Institute of Ecosystem Studies in New York, who reviewed the report before it was released, found it "hard to believe" that airborne sources were so important. "The numbers are very soft," said Pace. "They are only rough estimates...