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Reviving Europe’s biodiversity with exotic animals

POSTED BY: NIKI2
UPDATED: Wednesday, January 16, 2013 05:25
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Tuesday, January 15, 2013 11:32 AM

NIKI2

Gettin' old, but still a hippie at heart...


This is long, but I think it's really neat:
Quote:

With its tiny houses nestled along the main road and its red-brick church, Töpchin — just 25 miles outside of Berlin — is a traditional-looking Brandenburg village. But heading east through the marshland that borders the village, a visitor encounters the unexpected: five huge Asian water buffaloes.



The species was native to Europe until 10,000 years ago, when hunting shrunk its range to the continent’s far southeast. So Germans know these beasts only from pictures of them in fields and rice paddies in Asia. “Some people are really confused when they see the water buffaloes,” says Holger Rössling, the man who set the animals free in Töpchin in the summer of 2011. But the black creatures with massive horns and an impressively muscular build appear to be very much at ease in their new home. And they are meant to stay.

Rössling is a project manager with the Brandenburg Nature Conservation Fund, a government agency in the federal state surrounding Berlin. The group brought in the water buffaloes from a special breeder in France so they would graze threatened tracts of fens and remnant inland salt marshes, as German cows have long since lost their affinity for grazing in such wet or nutrient-poor environments.

The Töpchin project is an example of a growing conservation trend in Europe — using large, exotic herbivores to enhance the diversity of native flora and fauna. Many people still believe that nature conservation is all about leaving native plants and animals alone, or restoring their habitats to a wild state. But in a world dominated by humans and rapid environmental change, things have become more complicated. The answer isn’t always to strive for a regionally “pure” mix of native species. A growing number of conservationists now seek to employ exotic species for managing native biodiversity.

What is happening in Germany is complementary to so-called “rewilding,” a global movement that aims to expand core wilderness areas, connect them via corridors that allow humans and animals to co-exist, and protect and reintroduce top predators. One initiative, Rewilding Europe, led by conservation groups such as WWF, aims by 2020 to rewild 1 million hectares (2.47 million acres) of land spread across 10 reserves, from Spain, to the Danube, to the Carpathian Mountains. By contrast, the projects in Germany aim to restore and create biologically enriched landscapes shaped by humans.

Within a short time, a number of similar projects like the one in Töpchin have sprung up across Germany. Only a few kilometers west of Berlin, the Heinz Sielmann Foundation has set free 19 Przhevalsky horses, natives of Mongolia, along with 41 European bison, in the Döberitzer heathland, a former military training ground. The goal is for the wild horses and European bison to regularly graze the area, cropping tree saplings and encouraging the spread of heat-loving species found in the heathland.

A third project near Berlin that uses large herbivores for conservation is set in another truly anthropogenic landscape — a former sewage treatment farm. In the 1980s, the sewage farm was shut down and discussions ensued about what to do with the property. Since 2011, the result is a project that aims to create one of the largest sylvan pasture areas in Europe.

Schulze uses yet another mix of herbivores for the grazing: Koniks — ponies supposedly derived from the ancient European wild horse — as well as British cattle varieties like the White Park and the Scottish Highland, which are more robust and thus cope better with rugged and wet terrain than ordinary German cows. In Holland’s Oostvaardersplassen nature reserve, a similar mix of koniks and other herbivores is used to keep biodiversity levels high.

Unlike in the tropics, large parts of Europe’s biological diversity of animals and plants occur outside of forests: on meadows, in fens, and on heathlands.

“We need the buffaloes to remove biomass, otherwise these sites would loose their special plants and be overgrown by ubiquitous species,” says Rössling from the Brandenburg Nature Conservation Fund. And what of German cows? “Buffaloes are very resilient, they have strong hooves and munch away on nearly all kinds of plants, whereas modern cows are simply not adjusted any more to living in marshlands,” he says.

Currently, European consumers eat meat and drink milk mainly from cows kept in large, industrial facilities and fed with imported soy from rainforest nations.

“We can’t continue like this and have to learn again how to obtain milk and meat from a biologically diverse landscape,” he says. The German projects showcase how nature conservation and meat production could go hand in hand. “The current projects should be viewed as an important reality tests for a much broader application,” Reichholf says.

“We can’t continue like this and have to learn again how to obtain milk and meat from a biologically diverse landscape,” he says. The German projects showcase how nature conservation and meat production could go hand in hand. “The current projects should be viewed as an important reality tests for a much broader application,” Reichholf says.

He says the key in reintroducing species that disappeared long ago is intensive monitoring of the effect of these large herbivores on the landscape. “Many projects are started with good intentions, but then there is a lack of scientific data to see what has happened,” says Wiegleb. The projects around Berlin are too new to have been effectively studied.

“The horses’ and bisons’ positive effect on the heathland is already measurable after a very short time,” says Peter Nitschke, head of the Döberitz heath project. The foundation is financing the project in part with entrance fees for a wildlife compound that has become popular for Berlin families.
In Töpchin, local residents have warmed to their exotic neighbors. “At first, we were very skeptical,” says Kerstin Simon, who runs a farm with her husband Detlef. “We thought conservationists wanted to set more land aside for nonuse.”

Soon, however, the Simon family discovered that the buffalo project was a great opportunity for them. They have allowed the animals to graze on their land, too, and they can slaughter an animal from time to time. Later this year, the Simons will start marketing meat and sausage from water buffaloes. “We reckon Berliner city dwellers will like it as a taste of the wild,” says Kerstin Simon.Excerpts from http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Making-a-difference/Change-Agent/2013/0
114/Reviving-Europe-s-biodiversity-with-exotic-animals


As a conservationist, it always concerns me when mankind tries messing with things. But I hope it succeeds, it's a new idea to help restore areas we've destroyed, and that can only be a good thing. Won't change anything in the long run, but nice to know SOME are trying...

I had a water buffalo "friend" while I worked at Marineworld--I'd visit his paddock every morning as soon as I got there. He was a real sweetheart (I know, many are NOT) and would come right over to snuffle my hand (messsssy!) and push his head into my chest. Through him I came to like and respect water buffalo. Would be neat to think of his 'brethren' helping to reclaim some of Europe's man-made disaster lands.

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Tuesday, January 15, 2013 1:12 PM

AGENTROUKA


I don't think "disaster lands" is in any way an appropriate term. Even the former sewage treatment site could have been used in other ways, they just settled on this one, and marshes and similar landscapes are hardly man-made disasters. Especially in the case of heathland, it's a form of protecting already existing man-made landscapes by preventing nature from taking over in the form of other plants.

It's not about restoring anything that was destroyed. That's misrepresenting what these projects are about. They are a form of maintenance with a side order of experimentation.

If you want actual disaster areas in Germany, look at recultivation of open pit coal mining sites, some of which are being turned into lake landscapes.

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Tuesday, January 15, 2013 1:44 PM

BYTEMITE


Oh. I'd read about this before and I thought it was intended to restore a balance between sylvan, grass, and marshlands across Europe by introducing large herd animals. Much like a correct balance of woods and meadowlands have been restored in the US by reintroducing threatened predator species.

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Tuesday, January 15, 2013 3:12 PM

RIONAEIRE

Beir bua agus beannacht


If they're bringing in animals that are supposed to be there, that historically were there, then I'm fine with that. But don't introduce new (invasive) species, its just dumb and we've all seen how that turns out, pythons in the Everglades, rabbits in Australia, ivy in my area which chokes out the native plants. Etc.

"A completely coherant River means writers don't deliver" KatTaya

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Wednesday, January 16, 2013 12:20 AM

AGENTROUKA


There have been a a number of involuntary introductions into the European wild. Raccoons, South American river rats and grey squirrels particularly come to mind. None are necessarily considered problematic. Well, the grey squirrel maybe. (Grrr, displacing the red squirrel!) The former two simply escaped farms where they were kept for their fur. But they are all relatively small, quick and capable of hiding and reproducing fast.

The large mammals being introduced in these projects aren't really what you could call native anymore. Hence they are generally kept in enclosed land. Plus, they are large enough that an uncontrolled, uncontrollable population explosion in the wild could just very likely not happen at all. One single bear caused an uproar when it was noticed wandering in from Poland. Authorities are also well aware of the returning wolf population. Big animals stand out and it's the reason they could have gone extinct from hunting in the first place.


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Wednesday, January 16, 2013 3:48 AM

GEEZER

Keep the Shiny side up


One hopes there will be sufficent fencing to keep these large animals off the roadways. Running into a half ton of water buffalo at any speed would be bad for both car and beast.


"When your heart breaks, you choose what to fill the cracks with. Love or hate. But hate won't ever heal. Only love can do that."

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Wednesday, January 16, 2013 3:53 AM

FREMDFIRMA


Quote:

Originally posted by AgentRouka:
One single bear caused an uproar when it was noticed wandering in from Poland.


They should be glad it wasn't Wojtek!
http://www.badassoftheweek.com/voytek.html

-F

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Wednesday, January 16, 2013 4:47 AM

AGENTROUKA


Quote:

Originally posted by Geezer:
One hopes there will be sufficent fencing to keep these large animals off the roadways. Running into a half ton of water buffalo at any speed would be bad for both car and beast.



Indeed. But we already have free-roaming deer and wild hogs to fill that quota a plenty.



Frem - holy crap! :D Methinks THAT bear would have fared a lot better than the other one did. Go Wojtek!

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Wednesday, January 16, 2013 5:25 AM

BYTEMITE


Or Iorek Byrnison. But that's pretty cool too.

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