The Biodiversity Assessment Handbook really did a great job of providing an understandable and detailed account of biodiversity in New York City as a whole. The sequence in which the authors try to make their points are also set up well as the handbook starts off with telling the audience about all the positive impacts of biodiversity and then giving examples of those positives that exists within NYC. There were two benefits that the authors mentioned that I never really realized and those were “the natural insurance policy” and “a source of inspiration and ideas” on page 5. The natural insurance policy was something new that I never heard of and actually makes a lot of sense because the more diverse an area is, the less likely it is to be affected by different kinds of external factors such as new diseases or natural disasters. Even though the authors mention at the end of that section, that some people think that biodiversity should be preserved solely for its intrinsic value, I believe that if more people understand how many positive effects biodiversity can have on our lives, the more willing they will be to preserve the environment.
Even though many people won’t think as NYC as a center of rich biodiversity, the handbook really shows that that might not be the case. I was surprised about the amount of different wetlands and bedrock reside in NYC and also how much impact the soil in New York makes regarding the species surrounding it. We don’t really pay attention to the soil when we are outside, but in reality slight changes to the soil can make huge differences for the environment surrounding it.
The section about threats to NYC biodiversity showed how many factors can have a negative impact on NYC biodiversity and I found the sections about non native species and pollution to be the most interesting. I didn’t really think that introduction of new species to an environment could be so harmful to that certain area, but as the authors mentioned, sometimes these new and invasive species can decimate the biodiversity of a certain environment if not properly managed. The authors also mention “overabundant” species and how the increase of population of those species decreases the populations of other species, but in my opinion, should we really do anything about this because isn’t this just nature going on its course. What gives us the right to try and limit a certain type of species in order for another one to prosper? Light and noise pollution also was an interesting factor that could harm the environment, and I found the example about birds crashing into skyscrapers because of artificial lighting to be alarming. In the end, I still believe that education at a very early age might be the most important factor for getting more people to take the necessary steps to save our environment. If everybody knew about these wonderful uses of our environment and also some of the more hidden consequences resulting from our actions, we can pool our efforts to improve the environment around us.
