Andrew Benesh’s Reviews > Out of Eden: An Odyssey of Ecological Invasion > Status Update

Done! The last chapters were a good bookend on the escalating uncertainty. I particularly liked the attitude that ecosystems necessarily change, and the question should be less about stopping change and not about how and how much. The NASA chapter is a clever inversion of the theme that could be it's own book.

The green crab studies are the kind of research I wish was more common. They also illustrate the problems of science-based policy. The same can be said of the ballast research - the complexity is intense.

The smaller the organism, the more horrifying ballast water invasives become. Between the links to red tires in Florida and the spread of Cholera internationally, the issues of diatoms, viruses, and bacteria can't be safely overlooked. At the same time, the persistent question of inoculation success rates does provide a small comfort.

The detailed discussion of the cryptogenic species concept and problems with ecological invasion prediction and definition have been done of my favorite parts of this book. The isomorphism with non-biological systems is worth exploring.

The degree of macro and microscopic hitchhiking is incredible. I like how the author attend to the academic intergenerational patterns, and competing systems of organization.. This section provides an interesting challenge to the very notion of stable ecosystems and niches in a way prior chapters only hinted at.

The problems of invasive species in the ocean remind me a lot of the problems of understanding cetacean behavior and ecology - we interfered too much before recording data. The examination of microfauna transit is brilliant and terrifying - ballast water and ship hills seem like a totally ignored threat, especially compared to the attention to planes and people.

The mini island ecosystems are cool. I wish there were more depth in the discussion of the challenges of defining invasion, and how that impacts conservation strategies.

Lava flows + invasive species = bad news

I'm not sure what to think about the chapter on native Hawaiians and their relationship to introduced pigs. It felt a lot like a NIMBY argument that's more about anecdotal evidence for personal preference than real facts.

The soil entomology and drosophila chapter is exciting. I'm curious to see what difference exist between the exclusion zone and feral pig land.

The question of how to define the boundaries of an ecosystem could fill an entire book. But this was a nice summary.