UPDATE Dec 2 2007: I have taken a second look at the work addressed by this somewhat regretted post, following a reading of the paper itself kindly sent by the authors Erle Ellis and Navin Ramankutty. You can find that second look, along with a response by the authors, here.

If you took an organismal biology course, you probably had to wade through the 30 biomes with their mind-numbing characteristics. Of course when you really look at them, in depth, one by one they’re fascinating, but textbook presentation is usually pretty lacking in a survey course. Apparently the focus by ecologists on biomes as pristine environments is also out of date.

Eurekalert, which I scan through every coupla days, offered me this today. I don’t know how long that latter popup is stable or viewable, so here’s the summary in its entirety:

Environmental researchers propose radical ‘human-centric’ map of the world
Humanity has greater impact on global environment than ‘natural’ forces, they say

This release is also available in French.

Ecologists pay too much attention to increasingly rare “pristine” ecosystems while ignoring the overwhelming influence of humans on the environment, say researchers from McGill University and the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC).

Prof. Erle Ellis of UMBC and Prof. Navin Ramankutty of McGill assert that the current system of classifying ecosystems into biomes (or “ecological communities”) like tropical rainforests, grasslands and deserts may be misleading. Instead, they propose an entirely new model of human-centered “anthropegenic” biomes in the November 19 issue of the journal Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment.

“Ecologists go to remote parts of the planet to study pristine ecosystems, but no one studies it in their back yard,” said Ramankutty, assistant professor in McGill’s Department of Geography and the Earth System Science Program. “It’s time to start putting instrumentation in our back yards – both literal and metaphorical – to study what’s going on there in terms of ecosystem functioning.”

Existing biome classification systems are based on natural-world factors such as plant structures, leaf types, plant spacing and climate. The Bailey System, developed in the 1970’s, divides North America into four climate-based biomes: polar, humid temperate, dry and humid tropical. The World Wildlife Fund (WWF) ecological land classification system identifies 14 major biomes, including tundra, boreal forests, temperate coniferous forests and deserts and xeric shrublands. For their part, Ellis and Ramankutty propose a radically new system of anthropogenic biomes – dubbed “anthromes” – which includes residential rangelands, dense settlements, villages and croplands.

“Over the last million years, we have had glacial-interglacial cycles, with enormous changes in climate and massive shifts in ecosystems,” said Ramankutty. “The human influence on the planet today is almost on the same scale. Nearly 30 to 40% of the world’s land surface today is used just for growing food and grazing animals to serve the human population.”

The researchers argue human land-use practices have fundamentally altered the planet. “Our analysis was quite surprising,” said Ramankutty. “Only about 20% of the world’s ice-free land-surface is pristine. The rest has some kind of anthropogenic influence, so if you’re studying a pristine landscape, you’re really only studying about 20% of the world.”

“If you want to think about going into a sustainable future and restoring ecosystems, we have to accept that humans are here to stay. Humans are part of the package, and any restoration has to include human activities in it.”

Also embedded in the above summary is this link to a ten-minute interview with Prof. Ramankutty, and more interestingly, a link to Anthropogenic Biomes.

Haven’t listened to the interview yet, and I’m still getting over the heebie jeebies over this take, but I’m trying to be fair. There could be some value here, in the sense that you’ve gotta know what you’re up against. I’ve looked at their google earth workup (available here, through the latter link), and while it’s not so great at high resolution, it may well provide a point of view that’s practical, if not ethically defensible.

(BTW - if you don’t have a good fast connection - don’t even think about the google earth aspect. While Google Earth, and the uses to which it’s being put, is pretty amazing, you do need a fast connection. If you have that, it’s great, though there are a few glitches you might encounter.)

Here, for instance, is a screenshot of much of the western portion of the Northern Hemisphere, as portrayed from the “anthropogenic” view. (I’d call it “anthropocentric”, the basis for my own private chilly willies, but that’s just me.) The capture links to a larger screenshot more readable. The legend, with its single lonely reference to anything resembling something not having to do with humans, and such a pastel green that you can hardly detect it on the map, tells it all:



I’ve also used google earth to scan over the Amazon, Madagascar, India, and Arnoldsville. You probably didn’t need the warning, but I’ll let you enjoy the horror of it all.

The Anthropogenic Biomes page is a part of The Encyclopedia of Earth, which in turn is an extraordinarily homely child of its parent, The Earth Portal. From all indications The Encyclopedia of Earth has a lot to offer, but they really should fire whoever designed their front page. It’s truly ghastly. Even I can see that.

Addendum: As Glenn pointed out, and I already knew, my heebie jeebies come through in the post, but not the reason for them.

I’m so effing tired of everything having to revolve around humans in order for anything to be valid. You can’t, for instance, merely argue for the conservation of tropical rainforest for its own sake, you must *defend* your arguments by invoking the drugs, or food value, or genes, or hitherto undiscovered benefits that the biome might confer upon humanity. It goes on and on and on in this manner, wherever we look.

It was, I think, the promotion of this effort that bothered me, more than the results. Had it been presented as a complement, it would be fine. But it was presented as a new, necessary paradigm, something *better*: we might as well get with the program - all these ecosystems are going to be gone, don’t bother teaching or researching the remaining 20%, it’s irrelevant. Had it not been presented that way, I’d have thought this a fine addition to our understanding.

So I suppose I’m reacting more against the self-promotion, rather than the content.