Rupturing Salish Wildlife Communities

Wild animals reposition their ranges and realign their associations, generally gradually. But spontaneous shape-shifting communities manifesting on their own terms are in steep decline. Civilization’s razed land, pollution, noise and overpopulated unwild human presence give some animals an artificial edge to overtake others, deteriorating wild homeostasis.

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Douglas squirrel (Tamiasciurus douglasii)

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Eastern grey squirrel (Sciurus carolinensis)

In 1909, Vancouver Park in BC intentionally introduced the prolific and adaptable grey squirrel, and development paved a path for the civilization thriving squirrel to spread. Since introduction, the indigenous Douglas squirrel range has shrunk to inner forest protective nooks as the nonnative eastern grey squirrel spanned into both remaining forests and the expanding cityscapes. The main impact has been decline in Douglas squirrel reproduction. Ecological impacts are immense, including displacing native birds of nesting habitat, and eating the birds’ eggs and nestlings. While they are immune to squirrel pox, they carry it and infect native squirrels and other animals, for whom infection can be deadly. The colonizing squirrel bites out the tips of the acorns, weakening oak tree regeneration, and damages and kills trees by stripping the bark. Eastern grey squirrel made the top ten worldwide invasive species list.

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Eastern cottontail (Sylvilagus floridanus)

In 1927 and 1931 colonizing humans also introduced the eastern cottontail to western Washington. Like the eastern squirrel, eastern cottontails are a generalist, highly adaptable to the human razed landscape, thriving both in farm and development sprawl. The prolific rabbit seems to prefer urban to forest living, impacting humans’ homescapes and gardens. Rapid increase in cottontail is food for the much-feared coyotes, which may bring rise to their numbers, and correlating rise in small pet deaths. Ecological disequilibrium is immense. For example, in the case of rare Salish oak prairies:

Cottontail herbivory damages plants of Garry oak ecosystems, including oak seedlings and wildflowers including lilies. They can kill mature shrubs and trees by eating all of the inner bark from around the trunk and chewing exposed roots. Cottontail herbivory also threatens plants at risk, including golden paintbrush (Castelleja levisecta), yellow montane violet (Viola praemorsa) and possibly white-top aster (Aster curtus = Sericocarpus rigidus). Rabbits can change the composition of plant communities by over-grazing their preferred species such as plants with higher nutritional content, thus allowing less palatable plants to increase in relative abundance, and by dispersing seed in their faecal pellets. Before the introduction of eastern cottontails, European rabbits and grey squirrels, very few species of small mammals inhabited island Garry oak ecosystems. These introductions may have caused increasesin populations of some native raptors and aided the range extension of barred owls (Strix varia) into these areas.

In the 1960s, colonizing humans introduced the US eastern cottontail across the ocean to northern Italy for hunting purposes. Despite the killings, rabbits escaped and are wreaking havoc on another novel ecosystem.

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Western screech owl (Megascops kennicottii)

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Barred owl (Strix varia)

As civilization spreads and degrades, species more tolerant of it have co-spread, sometimes densely overpopulating. Such is the case with the barred owl remaining within its native eastern US habitat until the early 2000’s, finally landing in Salish lands. Barred owls impact wildlife communities through predation, niche habitat displacement, and competition for food and space. These fierce owls are not only infamously a threat to endangered spotted owls, their increase in numbers correlates with decline in the Western screech owl population. This invader not only overtakes habitat and outcompetes for food, but stalks, captures and kills screech owls.

Modern humans driving and paving paths for animal introductions into habitats to which they have not co-adapted causes enduring, exponential rupture of indigenous wildlife struggling to survive. Long-lasting effective restoration needs to be first embedded in a change of mindset: replace supremacy with compassionate reconnection with wildness. It is then that authentic healing can begin to undo the harms of civilization.