Out of Eden

One of the oddest things I learned about when I became a Texas Master Naturalist is the idea of an invasive species.

Naturalists, I learned, want to get rid of invasive species. Naturalists loathe invasive species. Naturalists despise invasive species.

This is a very odd concept to me.

This book explains why naturalists loathe, despise, and want to get rid of invasive species. The author first looks carefully at the brown tree snake, a species of snake that has almost completely wiped out the native bird population of Guam, and it now appears to be making inroads on other islands, including Hawaii. This is startling and frightening. Now I see.

Alan Burdick goes on to explore other places that other invasive species are causing havoc, including the oceans of the world, where the ability to eliminate invasive species almost seems impossible.

Burdick talks about the idea of what makes a species an invasive species, and shares suggestions from other scientists that there is, perhaps, no true native species of a habitat.

This is a very readable account of invasive species, a great introduction for the amateur, but thought-provoking enough for the specialist.