Is any place safe anymore?

[JohnP]

I am glad I visited the Amazon Basin of Ecuador in February 2011, it looks like the oil companies are set to destroy even more than they already have in the Amazon.

Watch the video in this news report.

http://www.guardian....ting-rainforest

Just a few shots I took on my visit.

This is Sani Lodge where I stayed for five days.

Out for a days birding with a local guide.

[Guest Lee]

That's a good set of images showing an area that looks damned good, shame they have to spoil it for money.

[JohnP]

I take it this was of no concern to anyone judging by the number of views and only one comment... I realise that there is nothing we can do about it but I find hard to accept what is happening to our planet. Creatures are dying out at an alarming rate and the human population is increasing at an alarming rate also... but not for much longer... nature is going to give the human race a huge bite on the ass soon.

[Guest DaveW]

Can you really condemn them for doing what we did in the past whilst living your present lifestyle? Britain was once covered by climax forest and had it not been cleared in past ages you would not have your present house to live in, a place to work, towns or roads to run your cars on. You can claim we did not know any better at the time I suppose, but do many of them since they simply aspire to have what the West has like your I-phones and I-Pads through growing crops to export? However it would be great if we could conserve what's left, but the public in the West does not want to significantly reduce it's lifestyle to pay them not to have to destroy their trees and raise crops to get foreign exchange to buy the same digital cameras and I-Phones we have. http://www.rfs.org.uk/learning/wildwood http://south-coast-central.co.uk/wildwood.htm

[JohnP]

Dave... I agree with you up to a point but as long as oil can be drilled for cheaper than utilising other forms of energy then nothing will change. It doesn't do away with the fact the human race will bring about it's own destruction and that process will happen eventually for sure.

[Guest DaveW]

I suppose it's simply a case of what will eventually destroy the human race John? Like the dinosaurs we will not continue for ever. The question is will we be gone before the sun eventually swallows the earth or some other catastrophe overtakes us, whether that be natural or man made? Even an asteroid hitting the earth could do for us as it supposedly did for the dinosaurs. Volcanic eruptions have put more greenhouse gasses and soot in the atmosphere than man ever has. http://news.nationalgeographic.co.uk/news/2010/01/100922-volcanoes-eruptions-neanderthals-science-volcanic-humans/ http://rense.com/general31/overdue.htm A natural disaster like that would do more to wipe out Amazonian rain forests than man has ever done. However I agree we should not try and speed up our end, but let nature decide that for us. When populations get too large anyway, as with all animals, natural checks come into play like disease and famine that reduce any animal species back to a sustainable level and we are only a "naked ape" anyway . The Black Plague reduced the worlds population back to more sustainable levels in the past, needing less food and having less effects on the environment and even modern medicine may not be able to prevent similar pandemics in future when the population grows to excessive levels.

[Guest]

I take it this was of no concern to anyone judging by the number of views and only one comment...

Post a link and most people, me included, won't go further. Tell us what it's about and maybe we'll care.

[JohnP]

Post a link and most people, me included, won't go further. Tell us what it's about and maybe we'll care.

The subject matter is in the first sentence... perhaps you couldn't be bothered to read that either.

Most of what I post doesn't get much comment... I'm used to it and getting to the point of thinking why do I bother.

Edited January 16, 2013 by JohnP

[Guest]

The subject matter is in the first sentence... perhaps you couldn't be bothered to read that either.

No need to be rude John.

You mentioned Oil and the Amazon basin, doesn't tell me a lot. They explore for oil all over the place including around Britain. Is it OK to explore for oil here but not the Amazon?

Point is this is a photography site. I don't come here to read about other things, the papers and the TV carry news so I look there. What I said at first still stands. Tell us what it's about; some vague comment about oil is not going to get my attention on a photography web-site.

[Guest DaveW]

This may take the pressure off for the US to explore for oil elsewhere. Whether that will help others environment I don't know. I would have thought shale gas replacing coal in the US power stations would be a help regarding carbon emissions though?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2013/jan/16/peak-oil-theories-groundless-bp

[NannyFerret]

I prefer to look at the shots, which are very nice.

I think people will read what they are interested in. It's just a matter of personal choice.

I sign lots of petitions online to save endangered species of animals and places as well as those to stop cruelty to animals all over the world. That's the only way that I can help and it is my own choice, so each to their own and lets keep it pleasant here.

[Guest]

John you berate the oil companies for exploring for oil in the Amazon, if they find it it will make the area very rich and may mean they can afford to preserve the rain forest instead of having to destroy it to build hotel complexes for people who wish to burn huge amounts of oil by flying half way around the world to stay there?

great set of pictures though :)

[Guest DaveW]

It may not be oil soon, America now has it's own and may soon be an exporter of oil and gas. It's China and Saudi Arabia that seem to want to grow raw materials and crops around the world where your virgin forests presently are. For once it is not the poor West with its balance of payments deficits that can afford it, but the new countries with balance of payments surpluses and who have cash to spend:- http://www.economist.com/node/13692889 Mind you Japan bought up tracts of timber abroad in the past.

[JohnP]

Regardless of all the debate... I'm damn glad I was able to visit this fantastic place and enjoy it as it is now, I will never ever forget my visit there and I look forward to visiting some other similar places before either they are ruined or I pop my clogs... At 66 years old I need to get on with it, I was the oldest member of the group on this trip.

[Guest DaveW]

Being a plants man John many of the habitats my plants inhabit are being destroyed, but whilst farmers are allowed to burn them, plough them up, use herbicides on them and industrial complexes can be built on them, or mining grub them up, not to mention hydroelectric schemes flooding them, many governments will not allow them to be collected and exported since it would be an embarrassment to them, therefore CITES was invented to restrict trade in endangered species by making it virtually impossible to obtain a licence to save such threatened plants and bring them into cultivation. I am afraid government agencies may start off with the best intentions but soon become highly politicised, inept or corrupt:-

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/8606011.stm

It should also be remembered some extinction of species is natural and has occurred since life began. At no time in evolution have we had a steady state where new species were not evolving and old ones going extinct. If some species don't go extinct new ones cannot evolve to fill their niche. The problem is man is hastening this process because basically the human race is breeding too fast and invading habitats formally populated by other species.

Climate change is also playing apart, both natural and man made. For instance the north of Chile where some of the plants I am interested in come from is naturally becoming more arid due to climate change and the plants are dying out (evidence suggests that the Atacama may not have had any significant rainfall from 1570 to 1971 so this is not a recent occurrence, the plants rely on being watered by mist from the sea to survive, which is gradually moving further south.) There would therefore be no point in trying to recolonise these areas with plants as the climate would no longer support them unless artificially watered.

Though we know man is contributing to Global Warming we still cannot be sure how much of it is down to humans and how much is cyclic since it has also happened in past history when man had less impact. The truth is probably somewhere in between. We may be getting a natural cycle of Global Warming, but man may be speeding it up with his contribution, though some claim long term we are in a natural cycle of Global Cooling. The fact is nobody really knows since it may need about 500 years of data to prove it either way, so everybody may be partially right. However that does not stop us taking sensible precautions so as not to add to it more than we need:-

http://www.ldeo.columbia.edu/res/div/ocp/drought/science.shtml

As one of my links earlier said, the last Ice Age removed most of the trees in Britain, but when the Romans came the trees had recolonised most of Britain and the forest was so dense it covered all the UK. Man's lifespan is merely a moment in time of the earths history and who knows what will happen to the Amazon Rain Forest even if man were not here. The earths history indicates it will eventually disappear to be replaced by new flora and fauna as the planets tectonic plates continue their drift. It's simply that with our tiny human life spans we find this hard to comprehend. What is clear though is rapid change is always more destructive than the almost imperceptible change to us humans where plants then have the ability to migrate to similar environments as their old habitat changes.