Pando, the Most Massive Organism on Earth, Is Shrinking(nytimes.com)
nytimes.com
Pando, the Most Massive Organism on Earth, Is Shrinking
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/17/science/pando-aspens-utah.html
45 comments
> the other being the "wild" horses that we're too stupid to cull.
I'd like to hear more about your take on this. This past August I had an opportunity to take a ride with a lady who had adopted and trained several of these wild horses through an adoption/auction program run by the State of Oregon. To my ears it sounded very effective - the state rounds up the horses to keep them off public grazing lands and cares for them until they can be sold off. Felt like a win-win for nature, the horses, the state, and horse owners.
I'd like to hear more about your take on this. This past August I had an opportunity to take a ride with a lady who had adopted and trained several of these wild horses through an adoption/auction program run by the State of Oregon. To my ears it sounded very effective - the state rounds up the horses to keep them off public grazing lands and cares for them until they can be sold off. Felt like a win-win for nature, the horses, the state, and horse owners.
It's wonderful that some are rounded up and sold to people who want them, and it was even better back when there was more demand for cheap horses so that more were sold. The misguided meddlers who ended horse slaughter in USA (against the recommendation of every single association of veterinarians) destroyed the market for cheap horses, so it's no surprise that those numbers are lower. There's no guarantee that any particular mustang will make a good riding horse, so fewer people are willing to deal with that risk. The slaughter ban was bad for lots of domesticated horses about 8-10 years ago (one could drive around and see fields full of starving and neglected horses), but that level of owner is largely without horses at this point. If it's too big a risk to keep a few domesticated horses around, it's certainly too big a risk to buy mustangs.
That's only part of this particular issue, however. Even if five times the current numbers were sold to willing owners, feral horses would still be destroying the environment. They aren't native and they are uniquely suited to disrupting the life cycle of native plants. The American hunter is probably not ready to control this population in the way that e.g. deer and elk populations are controlled. The best solution is probably sterilization, but even that would be very difficult at this scale. That is especially the case given the level of interference that could be expected from the Humane Society, ASPCA, etc.
That's only part of this particular issue, however. Even if five times the current numbers were sold to willing owners, feral horses would still be destroying the environment. They aren't native and they are uniquely suited to disrupting the life cycle of native plants. The American hunter is probably not ready to control this population in the way that e.g. deer and elk populations are controlled. The best solution is probably sterilization, but even that would be very difficult at this scale. That is especially the case given the level of interference that could be expected from the Humane Society, ASPCA, etc.
In my experience less than 1/10 of the wild horses can reliably be sold for this kind of use. In the southwest at least many of the wild horses are simply undesirable for any realistic use case more complicated than the glue factory.
In NM that's pretty good. I'm willing to bet if he was given ownership of some of that land he could improve it to the point it wasn't insane to do.
No, I'm not suggesting that my competitors be "given" vast amounts of capital goods. b^)
You're right that it is pretty good for that state. He said the rule of thumb was one head per square mile per (inch of rain per year). He was bragging about being from some blessed place where they got 12" rather than 8". But the point is that the vegetation is sparse. Even if he raised the capital to purchase land, the desert will only support so many cattle.
You're right that it is pretty good for that state. He said the rule of thumb was one head per square mile per (inch of rain per year). He was bragging about being from some blessed place where they got 12" rather than 8". But the point is that the vegetation is sparse. Even if he raised the capital to purchase land, the desert will only support so many cattle.
Fair, and I'd want the land to be sold, at a fairly steep price to encourage people to do something with it.
I'm with the amount of costs the federal government is passing to Utah for wildfire management on federal land anyhow, so that's def biasing my opinion.
I'm with the amount of costs the federal government is passing to Utah for wildfire management on federal land anyhow, so that's def biasing my opinion.
Sad news, but while Pando is definitely one of the largest organisms on Earth, far larger is a single fungal colony in eastern Oregon that covers 964 hectares[1]
1: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/strange-but-true-...
1: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/strange-but-true-...
In this case, the title is exact in a subtle way: Pando is the largest known organism by mass, but there are only estimates on the mass of the fungal colony.
Sure, though it isn't like we've weighed Pando either - I would say we just have better estimates of its mass (and of course "largest" is ambiguous as to whether it means area or mass here).
Right, but both the title and the body of the article use the unambiguous "most massive" not "largest."
Depends on how you measure it. Volume, width, wet weight vs dry weight, energy flows, number of living cells, etc.
Fungus covers a large area, but each strand is rather tiny.
Fungus covers a large area, but each strand is rather tiny.
Another giant Fungus exists in Michigan: https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/humongous-fungus
"Quivering"? Who calls them "Quivering Aspen"? I have only ever heard Quaking Aspen. Is that not right? Is this a Berenstein Bears situation?
>Populus tremuloides - American aspen, American poplar, aspen, aspen poplar, golden aspen, golden trembling aspen, leaf aspen, mountain aspen, poplar, popple, quaking asp, quaking aspen, quiver-leaf, trembling aspen, trembling poplar, Vancouver aspen, white poplar
https://www.fpl.fs.fed.us/documnts/TechSheets/HardwoodNA/pdf...
https://www.fpl.fs.fed.us/documnts/TechSheets/HardwoodNA/pdf...
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Of course it's fucking cattle. OF COURSE.
We need to get a leash on these ranchers who are making millions plundering our natural heritage and belching massive amounts of CO2 into the air.
Too much of OUR land and too many of OUR resources are handed to these people for them to chop it up and sell it back to us. It needs to end.
Drop the subsidies for the meat industry. Tax the real cost. Tax the carbon. Driving up the cost of meat will incentivize people to eat less of it.
We need to get a leash on these ranchers who are making millions plundering our natural heritage and belching massive amounts of CO2 into the air.
Too much of OUR land and too many of OUR resources are handed to these people for them to chop it up and sell it back to us. It needs to end.
Drop the subsidies for the meat industry. Tax the real cost. Tax the carbon. Driving up the cost of meat will incentivize people to eat less of it.
Most USA beef is raised by people who own or rent the land they use. Only in the West do unsavory types like Cliven Bundy get such a sweet deal from the federal government. Even then they barely make ends meet, because the land is so unsuited to grazing. We should end the whole shoddy pretense of grazing fees enabling environmental destruction, but it would take a political miracle to get that through the Senate.
Note: many of these families would HAPPILY buy and maintain the land themselves but the government has decided that holding the land in "trust" and allowing a tragedy of the commons to destroy the landscape is a better idea.
i doubt they have the finances to buy these vast amounts of land... even at $500/acre you'd need millions in cash available to win an auction or sale.
while on the subject, i doubt "many" want to buy, it's much easier to rent, scam and complain.
while on the subject, i doubt "many" want to buy, it's much easier to rent, scam and complain.
Pound* a steak through the heart of Big Beef!
* Pound based on 16oz sirloin precooked weight.
* Pound based on 16oz sirloin precooked weight.
Who says we should save it?
Perhaps having 47,000 clones with zero genetic diversity has resulted in a population that is unable to adapt, especially vs. species with more genetic diversity.
Why does this population deserve saving rather than allowing new populations to grow & flourish?
Perhaps having 47,000 clones with zero genetic diversity has resulted in a population that is unable to adapt, especially vs. species with more genetic diversity.
Why does this population deserve saving rather than allowing new populations to grow & flourish?
Same reason for preserving any other thing in nature. It's interesting enough that some might say that the heaviest known organism is a natural treasure, just like the tallest Redwood, or the oldest Joshua Tree, or Bald Eagles, or entire national parks and forests. Even conservation done in the name of something as practical as ecological sustainability ultimately boils down to preserving a slice of nature that we collectively treasure and value.
We kill groves of trees all the time and most of us never think about. It's the nature of our modern society. This mass of trees has a name though. We kill it, and present and future generations won't have another Pando to enjoy.
Personally, I don't like the part of me that says we should kill natural treasures to preserve the economic interests of ranchers, but that's just who I am. It's up to us as a society to decide what kind of creature we want to be and what we want to be driven by.
We kill groves of trees all the time and most of us never think about. It's the nature of our modern society. This mass of trees has a name though. We kill it, and present and future generations won't have another Pando to enjoy.
Personally, I don't like the part of me that says we should kill natural treasures to preserve the economic interests of ranchers, but that's just who I am. It's up to us as a society to decide what kind of creature we want to be and what we want to be driven by.
> The grove of 47,000 quivering aspen trees in Utah is being diminished by mule deer, foraging cattle and human mismanagement.
any forest would eventually die off under these conditions. it has little to do with Pando being one organism or many.
any forest would eventually die off under these conditions. it has little to do with Pando being one organism or many.
Some forests would have access to evolution via natural selection, but this forest does not. One possible result of selection would be to favor variants that had more bitter compounds in new leaves, to discourage browsing.
And yet those forests with access to natural selection are also destroyed by human agriculture.
Perhaps because as the article states, Pando is considered a keystone species, because of that, if Pando ceases to exist, it will take species dependent on it with it.
While as you say other organisms will fluorish, we must consider the change in biodiversity and not just abundance
While as you say other organisms will fluorish, we must consider the change in biodiversity and not just abundance
>we must consider the change in biodiversity and not just abundance
Why?
Why?
It's one organism with 47k appendages. This is my opinion and I stand by it. There's probably way more to learn from Pando than we think, don't delete data that you don't understand.
> Perhaps having 47,000 clones
It's not 47,000 clones, that's off by 46,999. It's one organism.
It's not 47,000 clones, that's off by 46,999. It's one organism.
Couldn't you make this argument about all endangered species?
yes and I'm sure he does.
Maybe cool things are worth saving?
The tree is too big to fail? That's it. I'm done with 2018.
This was the thing that made you give up on 2018? You’re tougher than I.
It's good to hear mule deer are doing better though. Montana mulies were getting very rare as a kid because of escaped red deer and hunting pressure (live above treeline mostly vs black tails which live lower on average).
do all of you commenters pay for nytimes? or is there an easy way to get around the paywall when i click links from HN?
Use archive.fo
https://archive.fo/3pftd
https://archive.fo/3pftd
Foraging cattle in Western USA are one of the two primary threats to the ecosystem, the other being the "wild" horses that we're too stupid to cull. It's criminal that Western ranchers are allowed to destroy land that belongs to everyone in order to barely eke out a meager existence with the tiny herds that land can support, while only occasionally paying pitifully low "grazing fees". Meanwhile the vast majority of American beef is raised in the Central Timezone, by people who own or rent the land they use for pasture. [0]
Any fiscally responsible person would see Cliven Bundy and family in prison. They're already paying a pittance to destroy the environment of the West, and then they cry about even that?
[0] A guy I met from New Mexico a month ago was bragging that they could run 12 head per square mile. We can easily run ten times that density, and more if conditions are right.