Confronting Our Persistent Inability to Thwart Invisible, But Potent, Forest Invaders
A new pest is poised to devastate beech groves even as America's salamander bounty remains at risk. Can we overcome inertia facing wave after wave of novel pathogen?
If you subscribed to my Sustain What dispatch in the pre-Substack days, you may have seen my warning about a globe-trotting fungus, Batrachochytrium salamandrivorans (Bsal, for short), that remains poised to extinguish the extraordinarily diverse and abundant array of salamander species in forest floors across the lower 48 United States: A Healthier Pet Trade Could Prevent a Looming American Amphibian Apocalypse. I wrote about this fungus repeatedly at The New York Times as well.
One impediment to mounting a serious response to this threat is that salamanders are a hidden wonder except when they’re roaming in autumn heading to winter hideaways (as was the case with this spotted salamander on our Maine road) or when the first warm rains of spring stimulate them to emerge.
The consequences, should bsal arrive here, will be profound. This map shows how the United States, surprisingly to me, is the hottest hot spot for salamander species diversity on Earth.
I don't mean to pummel you, but I now have to urge you to read the latest Substack post from the great environment writer
- on a mysterious, rapidly-spreading disease that threatens to wipe out the American beech, one of the botanical bulwarks of forests across the eastern United States and Canada.
It’s worth marveling at a healthy specimen in Ohio to see what’s at stake (here via marqqq CC BY-SA 3.0).
This map posted by the Maine Forest Service shows the speed at which the disease has spread from early sightings in the Midwest.
I hope you go beyond reading Gabe’s story. Subscribe to his newsletter like I did and make sure to share the post with relevant officials and constituencies (hikers, hunters, nature lovers...).
As Gabe writes, "Time and again we're told we're in an extinction or biodiversity crisis. And yet time and again, when a new biodiversity threat appears, we hardly muster a response.... It’s not clear how many more times we can repeat this movie before there are no more trees left to lose."
Oh, and if you’re in relevant regions and come across a tree with suspect signs (learn them via New York’s environmental agency), don’t just see something, say something - in this case via iMapInvasives.org.
