CONservation hooligan charities like the Woodland Trust, RSPB etc are
coining it in with their idea of theme park conservation, where they
attract millions of visitors into fragile habitats, where they
slaughter millions of animals as proclaimed pests, like foxes, deer,
etc and yet still claim wildlife and habitat is not disturbed.

Can you imagine the disturbance caused by killing deer, rabbits and
foxes to habitat? can you imagine the disturbance that millions of
visitors cause to habitat, not to mention pollution with fumes from
cars, burning fossil fuels etc?

Can you now see the CON in conservation?

It's important we question before it's too late, people are earning
fortunes from wildlife and we are rapidly losing m,any species.

It's time these tabletop conservationists had their wings clipped, we
need to ask questions and demand answers. The RSPB, WT etc refuse to
answer any questions on sensitive subjects, I wonder why?


found at.


http://www.imaja.com/change/environm...edHabitat.html

Wildlife Need Habitat Off-Limits to Humans!

Michael J. Vandeman, Ph.D.

October 12, 1997

The Problem

Human beings think that we own, and have the right to dominate, every
square inch of the Earth. That, besides being an absurd idea, is the
basic reason why we are losing, worldwide, about 100 species per day.
Habitat loss is at the top of every list of the primary reasons why
species have become extinct or are in danger of becoming extinct.

Outright destruction of habitat (for example, paving it or turning it
into farms, golf courses, housing developments, or parks) is not the
only way that an area can become untenable (useless) as habitat.
Anything that makes it unattractive or unavailable to a given species
causes habitat loss. Have you ever wondered why most animals run away
when we come near? It certainly isn't because they love having us
around! Many animals simply will not tolerate the presence of humans.
The grizzly bear and mountain lion are just two examples. The grizzly
needs a huge territory, can smell and hear a human being from a great
distance, and will avoid going near a road.

Humans are the ants at every other species' picnic. One of the first
things that children learn about wild animals is that most of them run
(fly, swim, slither, hop) away whenever we get close to them. (A few,
such as mosquitoes, like having us around.) Some are more tolerant of
us than others, but in any given area, there are at least some that
don't like having us around.

Let's take as a premise that we do not want to cause any extinctions.
I think that most people agree with that. But what follows, is that we
have to set aside adequate habitat for all existing species, and that
much of it must be human-free. That is not understood by most people,
even most biologists. We claim to believe in the Golden Rule, but we
apply it only to fellow humans. It has been said that "The measure of
a culture is how well it treats its least powerful members". By this,
our own measure, human society is a failure in its relations with the
rest of creation.

In 4 million years of human evolution, there has never been an area
off limits to humans -- an area which we deliberately choose not to
enter so that the species that live there can flourish unmolested by
humans. There are places called "wildlife sanctuaries", where human
recreation, hunting, logging, oil drilling, or even mining are usually
allowed. There are a few places where only biologists and land
managers are allowed (e.g. California's condor sanctuary). There have
been places called "sacred", where only priests could go (in other
words, they were "sacred" only to ordinary people). But to my
knowledge, there has never been any place, however small, from which
the human community has voluntarily excluded itself.

There has been a lot of talk in recent years about looking for life on
other planets. For its sake, I hope we never find it! Why, after the
inconsiderate way we have treated wildlife on this planet, should we
be allowed to invade the even more fragile habitats that may be found
in other places? While the thought of finding such life is intriguing,
I haven't heard anyone suggest that we consider its feelings and
wishes, e.g. the likelihood that it would want to be left alone (quite
reasonable, considering our history!). How are we going to communicate
with intelligent life on other planets, when we can't even communicate
with the intelligent life on this planet? Besides, since the laws of
physics and chemistry are universal, it is unlikely that any such
organisms would be dramatically different from those on Earth.

What scientific evidence do we have that wildlife need to be free of
human intrusion? Not much, probably because scientists are people, and
like the rest of us are instinctively curious about every thing and
every place, and don't care to be excluded from anywhere. For most of
us, travel is just entertainment, but scientists probably see their
livelihood and success as depending on being able to travel to any
part of the globe and "collect" (i.e., kill) any organism they find
there. I doubt that there are many scientific studies of the
environmental harm done by the pursuit of science.

(As recently as 1979 (Wilkins and Peterson, p. 178), we find
statements like "Populations of wild animals can have the annual
surplus cropped without harm". Insect field guides, e.g. Powell and
Hogue (1979), also recommend collecting insects as "an exciting and
satisfying hobby for anyone" (p. 359). Does that mean that collecting
grizzlies or tigers is also an acceptable "hobby"?)

However, there is recent research (e.g. Knight and Gutzwiller, 1995)
showing that recreation, even activity traditionally thought of as
harmless to wildlife, can be harmful, or even deadly: "Traditionally,
observing, feeding, and photographing wildlife were considered to be
'nonconsumptive' activities because removal of animals from their
natural habitats did not occur.... nonconsumptive wildlife recreation
was considered relatively benign in terms of its effects on wildlife;
today, however, there is a growing recognition that wildlife-viewing
recreation can have serious negative impacts on wildlife" (p. 257).
"Activities [involving] nonmotorized travel ... [have] caused the
creation of more ... trails in wildlands.... These activities are
extensive in nature and have the ability to disrupt wildlife in many
ways, particularly by displacing animals from an area" (p. 56).
"Recreational disturbance has traditionally been viewed as most
detrimental to wildlife during the breeding season. Recently, it has
become apparent that disturbance outside of the animal's breeding
season may have equally severe effects" (p. 73). "People have an
impact on wildlife habitat and all that depends on it, no matter what
the activity" (p. 157). "Perhaps the major way that people have
influenced wildlife populations is through encroachment into wildlife
areas" (p. 160). "Recreationists are, ironically, destroying the very
thing they love: the blooming buzzing confusion of nature.... The
recreation industry deserves to be listed on the same page with
interests that are cutting the last of the old-growth forests, washing
fertile topsoils into the sea, and pouring billions of tons of
greenhouse gases into the atmosphere" (p.340). (Note: wildlife have a
hard time distinguishing between biologists and recreationists!)

In other words, if we are to preserve the other species with which we
share the Earth, we need to set aside large, interconnected areas of
habitat that are entirely off limits to humans ("pure habitat"). Our
idea of what constitutes viable habitat is not important; what matters
is how the wildlife who live there think. When a road is built through
a habitat area, many species will not cross it, even though they are
physically capable of doing so. For example, a bird that prefers dense
forest may be afraid to cross such an open area where they may be
vulnerable to attack by their predators. The result is a loss of
habitat: a portion of their preferred mates, foods, and other
resources have become effectively unavailable. This can reduce
population sizes, cause inbreeding, impoverish their gene pool, and
impair their ability to adapt to changing circumstances (such as
global warming). It can lead to local (and eventually, final)
extinction. Small, isolated populations can easily be wiped out by a
fire or other disaster. Other species are not as flexible as we are.
We can survive practically anywhere on Earth, and perhaps other places
as well!

What Wildlife Need

Wildlife are not that different from us. Chimpanzees, for example, are
genetically 98% identical with us. Therefore, we should expect that
they need just what we need: a place to live that contains all
necessary resources (food, water, shelter, potential mates, etc.). It
is not too hard to tell when animals are dissatisfied -- they vote
with their feet; they die, or leave. The key is to look at things from
the wildlife's point of view. As simple and obvious as it sounds, it
is rarely done. For example, how often do road builders consider how
wildlife will get across the road? My cat communicates clearly what he
wants: when he wants to go out, he whines and then goes to the door
and stares at the doorknob; when he is hungry, he leads me to the
refrigerator or his dish. We are proud of our power of empathy, but
rarely apply it to wildlife. We don't want to be bothered by wildlife
in our homes; wildlife apparently feel the same.

"Pure Habitat"

Go to any library, and try to find a book on human-free habitat.
Apparently, there aren't any! There isn't even a subject heading for
it in the Library of Congress subject index. I spent two days in the
University of California's Biology Library (in Berkeley), a very
prestigious collection, without success. The closest subject is
probably "wilderness", but wilderness is always considered a place for
human recreation. So-called "wildlife sanctuaries" encourage
recreation, and often allow hunting, logging, oil drilling, or even
mining. The category "animal-human relationships" should contain such
a book, but doesn't. The idea is conceivable, because I just did it,
but apparently no one has even considered it important enough to write
about, since we "own the entire Earth".

I once read Dolores LaChapelle's Sacred Land Sacred Sex (1988), hoping
to learn what sacred land is. I didn't find an answer in the book, but
I took the fact that sacred land is often restricted to the
"priesthood" to imply that sacred land is honored by not going there!
So we could say that human-free habitat is "sacred" land, except to
priests and scientists (a type of "priest"), who are always allowed to
go there. (This is another indication that science desacralizes
whatever it touches. Ironically, it is science that has proven the
need for sacred land!) Probably the simplest term is "pure [wildlife]
habitat", but "wilderness" and "wildlife sanctuary" should be
synonymous with it. ("Wildlife" is "all non-human, nondomesticated
species", and thus doesn't include us.)

(Note: I am not talking about de facto human-free habitat, that is
off-limits simply because it is difficult to get to, such as the
inside of a volcano or the bottom of the ocean. Such areas will all be
visited in time, as technology becomes available that makes them
accessible. The key is the conscious decision of the human community
to restrain itself from going there.)

Why Create Pure Habitat?

Some wildlife are sensitive to the presence of people. In order to
preserve them, we need to create areas off-limits to humans.

It's educational. Publicity about areas where people aren't allowed
teaches people about what wildlife need, and how to preserve them.

Some animals are more dangerous to people or livestock than humans are
willing to accept (e.g. tigers or grizzlies). The only way we can
preserve such species is to grant them a place to live where there are
no people or livestock. Otherwise, whenever they attack someone, we
kill them, as recently happened to a tiger that attacked a zoo
employee in India.

The more accessible an area is to people, the less it is respected.
"Sacred" land is accorded the highest respect. "Terra incognito" was
not even mapped. A map tells people (nonverbally) that it is okay to
go there. So do trails. Roads, which are built by bulldozer, "say"
that we can do anything we want to the land. Many park trails are now
created by bulldozer. Even when bikes aren't allowed there, it is hard
to keep them out, because the use of a bulldozer indicates that the
land is not important, and that rough treatment won't hurt it. Part of
being sacred is the feeling of mystery. Mapping, roads, and other aids
to human access destroy much of that feeling of mystery. For example,
a map trivializes all areas and reduces them to a few lines and colors
on paper. Beauty (except for some "scenic highways") and biodiversity
are generally ignored.

Wildlife generally prefer human-free habitat. Since they are so
similar to us (98%, in the case of the chimpanzee, and probably a
similar large percentage for every other species), we have very little
excuse to treat them differently. If we deserve to be unmolested in
our homes, so do they.

There are too many species on the Earth, and too little time, to study
them all and determine their precise habitat requirements. The only
safe course is to assume that they all need at least the habitat that
they now occupy, and preferably, access to their traditional
territory. Or, as Aldo Leopold said, we need to "save all the pieces".

Obviously, we need to experience wilderness in order to appreciate it.
But equally obviously, we need to practice restraint, if we are to
preserve that wilderness. Having areas completely off-limits to humans
will remind us of that need to practice restraint. It is a reminder of
the importance of humility, like the practice of saying grace before
meals.

It is the right thing to do. Why not ask for what we want?





Cheerio.
..







************************************************** ***********************************
Yes, madam, I am drunk. But in the morning I will be sober and you will still be ugly.
- Sir Winston Churchill


The Eagle Has Landed.


/T /I
/ |/ | .-~/
T\ Y I |/ / _
/T | \I | I Y.-~/
I l /I T\ | | l | T /
T\ | \ Y l /T | \I l \ ` l Y
__ | \l \l \I l __l l \ ` _. |
\ ~-l `\ `\ \ \\ ~\ \ `. .-~ |
\ ~-. "-. ` \ ^._ ^. "-. / \ |
.--~-._ ~- ` _ ~-_.-"-." ._ /._ ." ./
--. ~-. ._ ~-" "\\ 7 7 ]
^.___~"--._ ~-{ .-~ . `\ Y . / |
__ ~"-. ~ /_/ \ \I Y : |
^-.__ ~(_/ \ ._: | l______
^--.,___.-~" /_/ ! `-.~"--l_ / ~"-.
(_/ . ~( /' "~"--,Y -=b-. _)
(_/ . \ : / l c"~o \
\ / `. . .^ \_.-~"~--. )
(_/ . ` / / ! )/
/ / _. '. .': / '
~(_/ . / _ ` .-_
/_/ . ' .-~" `. / \ \ ,z=.
~( / ' : | K "-.~-.______//
"-,. l I/ \_ __{---._(==.
//( \ ~"~" //
/' /\ \ \ ,v=. ((
.^. / /\ " }__ //===- ` Roy!/ASC
/ / ' ' "-.,__ {---(==-
.^ ' : T ~" ll
/ . . . : | :! \\
(_/ / | | j-" ~^


So, you dont like reasoned,
well thought out, civil debate?

I understand.

/´¯/)
/¯../
/..../
/´¯/'...'/´¯¯`·¸
/'/.../..../......./¨¯\
('(...´...´.... ¯~/'...')
\.................'...../
''...\.......... _.·´
\..............(
\.............\..


GOOD SIGS wanted. APPLY WITHIN.






Please Note: I am not the forger-troll Derek Moody who posts with



and who continues to stalk me, ensuring he is at the top of my hit list
and who also published child porn websites and kinky sex outlets in the UK, not to mention deviant holidays.


You've not heard of the Geneva Convention, then?

Our enemies sure haven't.

Oh jimminy, now we've got someone trolling mickeys ignorant crap from
backcountry groups...

PS, bob jumped just to get away from mickeys stupidity...


snip of vandimaniacs typical ignorant spew...