‘Blatantly wrong’
‘Blatantly wrong’
It’s frightening when someone in authority says something blatantly wrong.
In the Sept. 5, 2016, story, “Is mosquito eradication the answer?,” (Tribune-Herald) Dr. Kenneth Kaneshiro, program director at UH-Manoa’s Center for Conservation and Research Training, made a shocking statement, “Eradication of mosquitoes wouldn’t cause any other problems because they’re not native to Hawaii. They’re an invasive species that doesn’t belong in the native Hawaiian ecosystem.”
Nobody likes mosquitoes, which are a health hazard to humans and animals. But some animals eat mosquitoes, including the endangered Hawaiian hoary bat. Environmentalists know that, while a species can be a pest to humans, it can also be an important part of the food chain. We don’t like flies, for example, but killing all flies would starve birds, lizards, insects and every other creature that eats flies or eats other species that eat flies.
Dr. Kaneshiro claims none of that matters. If a species is non-native, then it is expendable with no ill effects on the native Hawaiian ecosystem. But what exactly is the “native Hawaiian ecosystem”?
Many native species are now extinct in the Islands. Climate change has altered Hawaii’s ecosystems during the past 300 years. Modern agriculture, roads, buildings, land usage and development and sources of pollution define modern Hawaii.
The past is gone. Eliminating introduced species will not return past ecosystem conditions.
Removing mosquitoes might relieve humans and animals of their pestilence and might benefit people. But you cannot judge the environmental impacts on Hawaii’s past, as though the present is merely a mistake that must be, or even can be, erased.
We must protect today’s Hawaii and its ecosystems, and stop neglecting impacts on species simply because they were not here 300 years ago. That’s bad science and bad environmental policy.
Sydney Ross Singer
Pahoa