Trappers

Schneider points to an interesting dichotomy in his section of fur trappers. He describes how he sees the fur trapping industry explaining, “ For most trappers the Adirondacks and elsewhere the ability to go into the woods day after day and year after year to collect furs for fun and profit gives them a greater stake in preservation of the land. The ecological truth is that the threat to terrestrial species come more from loss of habitat rather than hunting and trapping,” (Schneider 74). It pointed a finger at wealthier individuals who may oppose trapping but have two homes as  urbanization leads to fragmentation of ecosystems. Schneider attempts to illustrate the point that fragmenting a “cute” animals habitat is more damaging than trapping. These patches or islands of land that urbanization often leads to can have devastating effects on forest health. These blocks in an ecosystem increase edge habitat. Edge habitat, adjacent to non forest, are biologically different than interior habitat and have different species. Often edge habitat can be susceptible to invasive species which can in turn destroy the interior’s ecosystem. It also decreases connectivity within populations. Species often struggle to live in these new smaller environments that often leave them more susceptible to predation.  Fragmentation leads to decreased biodiversity and is thus significantly more damaging than heavily regulated trapping.

This argument really made me think. Before doing these readings I think I too thought trappers were “bad” because I was uneducated of all angles of the argument. I didn’t understand the issues associated with the overpopulation of the beaver and how trapping beavers to manage their population surge could actually help the environment. I didn’t really consider it as something that could leave people with a greater drive to protect the environment. I also didn’t consider the hypocrisy of some of my own lifestyle habits that may be equally bad for the environment- like having two residences (school and home) which greater drives fragmentation. I’m not going to go as far as to say I like trappers/trapping but I would say it has made second guess my previous quick judgements.