Stockton, CA, a city most notable for not being San Francisco, is plagued by water hyacinth, one of the most invasive weeds in the country. There are problems with it clogging rivers all over the South and who knows what magic got it out to the San Joaquin River in California but now they clog that one as well.
Naturally, the answer to fixing one ecological disaster from a non-native species is to bring in some other non-native species. At first Stockton officials wanted to import manatees from Florida and that's really not such a bad idea. Sure they're protected but expanding their habitat in that way could be an exceptionally good thing for them. That wasn't allowed so officials needed a more creative solution.
"Heya, Claude, How about we get us some of them hippos from Africa? They eat them water hyacinth, right?"
(Ed: are you serious?)
Yep. Here's a report from Rachel Maddow and she's got pics. MSNBC: California orders unprecedented water rationing to combat drought
The genius of this one is really spectacular as a manatee is a benign creature that does nothing in life except float around eating weeds and serving as targets for irresponsible pleasure boat owners. Hippos, however, kill more people in Africa than any other creature. They aren't just dangerous, they're incredibly dangerous. Probably the plan is to cull them to prevent the number of them getting out of control and that always works well, doesn't it ... at least until some escape.
It gets better. If two non-native species are good then what can be better than to bring in another one so they imported capybaras from Brazil. A capybara is kind of an overgrown guinea pig and, you may fondly recall, guinea pigs breed almost as fast as hamsters. So, once they eat up all the water hyacinth, what do you suppose they will find to eat after that.
All they need to make this perfect is to import some cane toads from Nicaragua. I believe that's where Australia got them to create in Queensland one of the most glorious problems with non-native species on the planet.
The whole story is someone's idea of an April Fools Joke. That's the day when every amateur in the country thinks he's a comedian. I may see an April Joker on The Tonight Show someday but, after sixty-four years, it hasn't happened yet.
Naturally, the answer to fixing one ecological disaster from a non-native species is to bring in some other non-native species. At first Stockton officials wanted to import manatees from Florida and that's really not such a bad idea. Sure they're protected but expanding their habitat in that way could be an exceptionally good thing for them. That wasn't allowed so officials needed a more creative solution.
"Heya, Claude, How about we get us some of them hippos from Africa? They eat them water hyacinth, right?"
(Ed: are you serious?)
Yep. Here's a report from Rachel Maddow and she's got pics. MSNBC: California orders unprecedented water rationing to combat drought
The genius of this one is really spectacular as a manatee is a benign creature that does nothing in life except float around eating weeds and serving as targets for irresponsible pleasure boat owners. Hippos, however, kill more people in Africa than any other creature. They aren't just dangerous, they're incredibly dangerous. Probably the plan is to cull them to prevent the number of them getting out of control and that always works well, doesn't it ... at least until some escape.
It gets better. If two non-native species are good then what can be better than to bring in another one so they imported capybaras from Brazil. A capybara is kind of an overgrown guinea pig and, you may fondly recall, guinea pigs breed almost as fast as hamsters. So, once they eat up all the water hyacinth, what do you suppose they will find to eat after that.
All they need to make this perfect is to import some cane toads from Nicaragua. I believe that's where Australia got them to create in Queensland one of the most glorious problems with non-native species on the planet.
The whole story is someone's idea of an April Fools Joke. That's the day when every amateur in the country thinks he's a comedian. I may see an April Joker on The Tonight Show someday but, after sixty-four years, it hasn't happened yet.
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