In “Designer Ecosystems” Marris discusses how humans can change environments in order to fit the needs of the environment. The typical approach is to return to the historical baseline, but Marris argues that manmade approaches can possibly lead to ecosystems that are healthier and more efficient. To back up the idea that the manmade has already become mixed into our idea of what natural is, Marris starts with the example of our mental image of a stream, which is not as close to what Nature creates on her own as we might believe. It seems like such projects can be quick fixes for small areas, but as Marris points out, many complex ecological processes may be too far damaged for us to restore with this method. I agree with Marris’ idea that we may have to rethink our approach to lands that are infested with invasives or changed beyond hope of restoration. Wasting money on hopeless causes is silly, and as in the examples of the pesky rats and nonnative grasses in Australia, I think it makes sense to consider alternative methods of bringing the ecosystem into a more desirable state rather than always pushing for the historical baseline. However, I would not want to argue for these ideas in combination with her beliefs about rewilding and accepting invasive species. The possibility of having a chance to build a successful designer ecosystems then could become a way out, excusing mistakes with those projects. I mean a “it’s okay if we mess up the ecosystem here doing this, because we can simply fix it into something better afterwards.” kind of thought pattern. I rather think that the “design”ing should be a perspective used for those lands which have already been changed by past errors. I’m not really sure how Marris feels about these things because she continues talking about possibilities, sprinkling lots of “maybe”s and “likely”s, at the end of the chapter when discussing how far we may take designer ecosystems. She even says that the relations from organisms which have developed over millions of years from natural selection will probably outperform anything humans attempt to create. I’m not sure where her confidence about introducing proxy species and moving around life strategically like chess pieces comes from if she thinks Nature is more likely to be better than us, even “up to hundreds of years in the future”.
Chapter 9, especially the latter half, involves more everyday situations of how we can make more nature everywhere. There is a lot of content in this chapter, but I think most of the discussion about what regular citizens in this chapter is pretty self-evident and nothing really new. People are already being resourceful and trying to bring spots of nature all around them, whether in parks or in gardens or streets. To my experience, people usually do seed a mixture of aesthetically pleasing plants and native plants when they want more green. As for the rest of the chapter, I’m not that sure how well the idea of corriders could work in our world where land is valued so much as private property, but I do think allowing nature more space, and encouraging plant growth in our cities’ nooks and crannies (as well as in set apart places, like parks and gardens) where we have previously built over whole ecosystems is a good, agreeable thing.
