Alien Species Essay

457 Words2 Pages
Alien Species The Pattern in Figure 3 shows that species near the Americas, transfer to Europe, and species in Europe, transfer to Americas. They follow trade and shipping lanes showing that they get caught in the ballasts of ships and dumped at the ports at the end of the trade. It’s also obviously easiest for marine species to transfer and migrate to other areas of the world because the seas are all joined. The disruption of ecosystems can take place via energy loss through respiration. There are also good impacts especially to the moving species as they have enhanced survival rates, and also lack native predators. As a result of alien species, it can be difficult to control. They are easily established and spread fast so can become out of control. The threats of invasive alien species in forest systems can be best understood at local and global levels. At the local level, the introduction of specific pathogens or pests from one continent to another has led to dramatic reductions or losses of species in forest ecosystems. For example, alien European and Asian organisms have led successively to the decline of six dominant forest species or groups of species in the eastern USA - first oaks (caused by gypsy moth), then five-needle pines (by a blister rust), then the American chestnut (first by Phytophthora and then by chestnut blight), then firs (by the Balsam wooly adelgid), then hemlocks (by the Hemlock wooly adelgid) and the American elm (by Dutch elm disease). All of these declines have led to marked changes in forest composition and their consequent ability to deliver forest services. At the ecosystem level, there are a number of ways in which invasive alien species affect ecosystem stability and function. These include creating unstable ecosystems (where "invasive-species monocultures" are highly susceptible to population collapses); establishing
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