“Every fourth day we are adding one million human beings to our population”. After hearing this statement, how you have felt? That’s the burden we the human beings are putting on the natural resources of our planet. We have already made many animals extinct and driving rest to the extinction. The unplanned growth has resulted in cutting down of forest, blasting off of mountains, mining of minerals and metals, using up of petroleum resources at a very fast rate and last but not the least, an exponential increase in pollution.
The question is what we are going to leave for our future generations – the barren lands, vehicles but no petrol, factories with no power to run them, mountains of concrete and jungles of sky touching building? Can it be recognized as development? Is this development that can be sustained? We all are aware of the negative answer.
However, the other two- animals and flora have suffered to the extent that many of the animals have already become extinct or are on the verge of extinction. Similarly, jungles have been leveled up to build roads, setup factories and build houses. Mountains have been blown-off to pave the way for highways or railways. All this is happening in the name of development for the human beings only and at the cost of the other two constituents- animals and flora. But the question is whether this lopsided development is sustainable?
Can we survive with what we have been doing? Isn’t it that after wildlife and forests, it’s our number next? We are very much part of the ecological system that constitutes the other two. We all are a part of the same food chain. Some are at the higher rungs and others at the lower ones. We can’t survive without each other. If the ecological balance has been disturbed, then there is no guarantee of human lives also. “We haven’t inherited this planet from our ancestors but we have borrowed it from our future generations”. Shall we be able to pass on the same Mother Nature to them or we will be blamed for our shortsightedness?
The precise and unpleasant answer is ‘yes’. Imagine your visit to zoo. The teacher told you- Look at that animal- its Mammoth. It’s not found any more. Same way, a day will come when the teacher will show a picture of Petrol can and tell that it’s no more found. How you plan to run your vehicles?
The increased pollution levels are already serious matters of concern. During peak traffic hours, one might see some people wearing pollution masks. This is in contrast to what we felt at mountains. We are responsible for such high levels of pollution in air and in water.
Growing pollution has also been a cause of Global Warming. The result- Mountains are becoming snow less; even at North Pole the polar cap has melted. This melted snow is causing rise in sea levels, floods in rivers and catastrophes like Tsunami. Isn’t our lopsided development responsible for this? When we disturb the ecological balance by killing animals and cutting down trees, we are destabilizing the food chain cycle and doing a great disservice to humanity.
With our combined efforts, we still can restore the right balance of ecology. Only with a green earth, we can hope for a sustainable development.
Ecology
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Ecology
* Here is a song I created to help my 6th grade students study. I hope you enjoy.
All the life we have seen
Interactions we study
The air, sand, water in a stream
Abiotic that we see
Now trees, animals, you know
They’re all biotic if it grows
Organisms we’ve been told
All same species, young and old
Population-same kind in place
Community-(pop’s) populations in same space
Ecosystems so you know
Nonliving and all that grows
Animals fighting for it all their life
They are struggling so they don’t die
That’s how an organism stays alive
Producers and consumers
Webs and chains, decomposers
Competition for space and food they fight
Predation it is to take a life
And then there’s symbiosis all three kinds
Mutualism, parasitism
Third in chain, commensalism
Adaptations they will thrive
All that helps them to survive
Behavioral to hunt at night
Physical-fur, teeth, large eyes
Organisms have a role
A niche that they do call their own
Animals fighting for it all their life
They are struggling so they don’t die
That’s how an organism stays alive
Producers and consumers
Webs and chains, decomposers
Competition for space and food they fight
Predation it is to take a life
And then there’s symbiosis all three kinds
Mutualism, parasitism
Third in chain, commensalism
Producers and consumers
Webs and chains, decomposers
Mutualism, parasitism
Third in chain, commensalism
Symbiosis interactions at least one bestowed
Mutualism both are happy something gained by both
Parasitism benefits parasite not host
Commensalism, one helped, other neutral
It’s like a lion or shark hunting for a soul
Predation, prey and predator-populations controlled
Competition is the struggle to survive I’m told
Like food, water, shelter, watch them battle
Animals fighting for it all their life
They are struggling so they don’t die
That’s how an organism stays alive
Producers and consumers
Webs and chains, decomposers
Competition for space and food they fight
Predation it is to take a life
And then there’s symbiosis all three kinds
Mutualism, parasitism
Third in chain, commensalism
Producers and consumers
Webs and chains, decomposers
Mutualism, parasitism
Third in chain, commensalism
Animals fighting for it all their life
They are struggling so they don’t die
That’s how an organism stays alive
Ecology Song
Ecology