Dear All,



        I find this topic very funny. It is a shame that scientists are busy with things as this article, while a child knows that humans and nature do not go together.

There was a book in this sense on oysters and New York. Or look in National Geographic from november 2011: you have two nice articles there, one on people and the great lakes region in Africa, and one where there is a nice demonstration on what happened with America's Wild Rivers.

One of the tasks of shell collectors is to document areas that are going to be occupied by humans. Cities systematically destroy nature "intensively". Between the centre of Cebu and Carcar in the south and Liloan in the north, virtually nothing is left. Because people are there. All the rivers are polluted. All the shells and many other types of animals are gone. Today one has to document the Argao area and the Danao areas, as nothing will be left there in a decade from now. The one woman one child policy is the only thing that can save nature. But there is only one country trying to apply that.

No need to make studies. It is obvious.

So, we have an important task and scientists should push in this sense: study what's left and try to protect that. When humans arrive on the place, things go fast away.

One remark also: often people think that nature was more intact "before". This is definitely not true. But the memory keeps it that way, if not life should be insupportable. We forget the bad things and glorify the best of the memory. I was on Sanibal in 1980 and didn't see one good shell on these beaches: only funny dead shells to put as decoration in a bathroom.

And don't forget that nature is very strong in recovery: remember all the bombs in 1940-45 in all seas of the world, systematically killing millions of animals, just to destroy one submarine....

Or remember this month where for one month the temperature in the central Philippines drops 5 degrees. The waves are constantly high and we got about 3 sunny days.... but nature will recover also from this, and no need to make a study: millions of animals died from that.

Sincerely Yours,

Guido

----------------------------------------------------------------------
[log in to unmask] - a forum for informal discussions on molluscs
To leave this list, click on the following web link:
http://listserv.uga.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=conch-l&A=1
Type your email address and name in the appropriate box and
click leave the list.
----------------------------------------------------------------------