Assisted migration is essentially moving a species to a new environment in response to the climate changes happening all over the world. Many of these climate changes are caused by “anthropogenic emissions of gases including carbon dioxide and methane and of industrial gases like hydrofluorocarbons” (Marris, 74). With all of this emission happening, the world has become a much hotter place and some places even changed their rain patterns. This directly affects species that cannot survive in warm temperature. Through assisted migration, ecologists want to move these struggling species into a new environment where these species can survive. In other words, if the species can only survive in the cold, the ecologists can move it north.
It seems that assisted migration is a controversial topic to some people. People argue that the organisms could die upon moving to the new environment because the new environment could be lacking “some specific soil microbes or microclimatic condition” (77). Other people say it may create an invasive species and take over the native species. There are even people who say that these species can adapt to the new environment instead of continuing to live in the same environment. While many people do not want assisted migration, Marris actually points out that humans are already doing it unintentionally. According to the Marris’s researchers, the “commercial movements [of plants] may help these species adapts as the climate changes” (83). In addition, the species that we are moving may have been “moved” already. According to Marris, it is completely possible that Garry oak savannas in Canada are a human production. Despite it being a human production, “people are worried that it is unnatural to save them by having humans move them north” (87). In addition, people seem to be very picky with assisted migration. People only seem to assist those species that are considered important. It is very unlikely for people to move “all the beetles and microbes [which is] the vast majority of biodiversity” (89).
Assisted migration can be applied in urban ecology. According to Puth and Burns, there were fewer studies that report species richness in New York’s metropolitan region. They also described that“[most] studies that report trends in species richness [declined]” (17). Furthermore, some of the studies that report an “increasing or stable species richness reflected increases in exotic species” (18). Puth and Burns concluded that there was still an overall decrease in species richness in New York’s metropolitan region. This essentially means that there are fewer unique species in the area. Most of the declines were reported to be from anthropogenic causes including habitat loss and invasive species. Assisted migration can prevent some of the extinction of these species. However, it is rather unpredictable how much assisted migration can save these species. People can also use assisted migration to move species into the urban environment. Perhaps some species are better adapted to the urban environment and they can live with humans in peace. Assisted migration definitely has potential, but it should not be overused since the effect of assisted migration is still rather unpredictable.
