ECO-TRIVIA: Increase Your Party Appeal!
Sound like a Cosmo cover story? Could be. After all, the idea is to increase
your appeal as a coveted dinner party guest. You know, the kind that is
funny, charming, and always has the most interesting and important things
to say. We can’t help you with the funny and charming part, though
no doubt you are both and more, but we can divulge some little-known, remarkable
facts about the very stuff on which we supp. For example:
• There are more life forms in one square metre of temperate rainforest
(Clayoquot Sound), than in one square mile of tropical rainforest—
many too small to be seen by the naked eye, but no less critical to the
web of life.
• Although the extinction of various species is a natural phenomenon,
the rate of extinction occurring currently is exceptional—as many
as 100 to 1,000 times greater than normal—
Dr. Donald A. Levin, American Scientist magazine.
• Unless we change our ecounfriendly behaviors, half of all living
bird and mammal species could well be gone within 200 or 300 years.
• A distinct species of plant or animal becomes extinct every 20
minutes—
Phillip S. Levin, National Marine Fisheries Service Biologist, and expert
on the demography of fish, especially salmon.
• In global history, there have been five mass extinctions. We are
currently experiencing the sixth. The earth took several million years
to recover from each of the first five, but what now when not just the
species (man included), but their habitats too are destroyed?
• The Clayoquot Sound Biosphere is the largest intact example of
temperate rainforest left on earth. It is, in effect, an upside-down rainforest.
Where, unlike tropical rainforests where wildlife is concentrated in overhead
canopies, all the action takes place at and below ground level.
• Maintaining wild salmon stocks is as critical to temperate rainforest
health, as is the flow of fresh water. Salmon are a major food source for
whales, seals, black bears and eagles, but also, through their cycle of
spawn and decay, contribute (via bear migration) nitrogen rich fertilizer
to inland habitats.
• Organics are the new old-fashioned alternative. Prior to WWII,
there was virtually no such thing as
‘conventional’ (non-organic) farming in North America. Today, over
90% of crops are grown using synthetic and chemical pesticides. Immune system
and reproductive health improve in direct proportion to consumption of organic
food.
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