If you listen to a particular radio talk-show host, you've probably heard that tree-hugging environmental wackos are all wet because there are more trees now than when the pilgrims arrived. What the radio personality doesn't tell you, however, is that he and the "wackos" are talking about two different things: forests versus trees. Even if there truly were more trees today (a doubtful proposition), trees alone do not make a forest.
Forests have a diversity of organisms, from bacteria and fungi to
plants, birds, and mammals, interconnected in complex ecological communities. On the
other hand, tree plantations, presumably responsible for the idea of more trees than in
aboriginal America, are biological deserts. Indeed, this describes virtually all
monocultures where a single species is grown over an extensive area. The Chihuahuan
Desert is, in many ways, the natural opposite of a monocultural situation. The vast
diversity of habitats, changing rapidly through space, insures that biological
diversity reigns supreme. We may lack lowland forests, but we have a wealth unmatchable
by the best of tree farms.
Contributor: Arthur H. Harris, Laboratory for Environmental Biology, Centennial Museum, University of Texas at El Paso.
Desert Diary is a joint production of the Centennial Museum and KTEP National Public Radio at the University of Texas at El Paso.