When I was searching for documentaries for the Applied Plant Ecology Film Festival, I struggled between two films which I thought best provided information and cleared up misconceptions about plant. I ended up choosing an episode from Battleground Everglades about invasive species, but a close second was “A Fragile World.”
With a duration of 51 minutes and 40 seconds, this documentary immediately begins by establishing the interconnectivity of different living systems on Earth and how important it is to the survival of life to maintain this delicate balance between living organism in an ecosystem. Human influence is directly identified as the culprit in causing massive extinctions we are currently facing by altering our environments to suit our needs. As a result of this human influence entire ecosystems have disappeared. This is significant to establish right away the human impact is the cause of all the loss of biodiversity and climate change as there is sometimes to false conception that climate change is simply a part of the natural cycle of the Earth’s temperature cycle. In countries where they depend on land to grow their food and provide their livelihood; these areas also high biodiversity areas. The during of the land to clear it leads to the loss of ecosystems and biodiversity. Tropical rainforests are homed to half the species of man but only cover 6% of the earth’s surface. This is the most sensitive area for the conservation of biodiversity conservation. Human impact has resulted in the loss of 60% of the temperate forests and 30% of the coniferous forest. 45% of rainforest is wasteland and 70% of dry tropical forest have been cut down. The rainforests impacts are wide reaching (e.g. the equatorial rains) and its lost impacts life outside of itself as well, influencing the water and atmosphere.
One of the case study areas the documentary chooses to focus on is Madagascar, an island of independent evolution. The species that live here are isolated and independent from the rest of the world. The species were not subject to the same selective pressures as the rest of the world. The isolation has given rise the plants which are distinct from those around the planet and the biodiversity here is high. However, due to its unique ecosystems, it’s also an extremely fragile existence which must be protected. Species living on Madagascar may not exist anywhere else in the world. Any external influences that alter the fragile niches here may result in the loss of the species forever. This had the biggest impact on me because I had no idea that such uniqueness still existed in the world today. I thought that many of the organisms living on Madagascar would have some differences to those on continental Africa. I had not anticipated the differences would be such that this may the only habitat of some organisms. The theme of species interdependency arises here again and stresses the importance and vitality of each organism to the survival of the entire ecosystem. Unfortunately, man’s impact as stretched here as well and half of the Madagascan jungles are been destroyed.
Applied Plant Ecology Winter 2020 