Invasive Aliens. Dan Eatherley
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economic or social. Again, there is much debate, but the number one ‘environmental’ charge against invasives is that they harm natives, through predation, competition or, perhaps, by spreading disease. Invasive species are increasingly listed alongside habitat destruction, pollution and overhunting as key threats to wildlife. The 2005 Millennium Ecosystem Assessment says they’re a major driver of biodiversity loss. A recent review of 247 kinds of plants and animals around the world that had vanished since 1500 found invasives to be the second most common cause of extinction (hunting, fishing or harvesting came first). For the amphibians, mammals and reptiles on this list of the disappeared, invasives were the number one culprit. Among the most frequent offenders were rats, cats and goats, along with diseases, such as avian malaria and chytridiomycosis, a fungal condition that is wiping out amphibians around the world.
Many of the most often cited cases of extinctions caused, or at least hastened, by introduced species come from islands. Famous examples include a near-flightless wren wiped out by the lighthouse-keeper’s cat on New Zealand’s Stephen Island; the dozen sorts of birds thought to have been extirpated by the brown tree snakes on Guam in the Pacific; or the eight varieties of endemic rodent dispatched on the Galapagos Islands by ship rats. A well-known non-island case comes from Lake Victoria in East Africa where the Nile perch was released by colonial Brits for sport-fishing in the late 1950s. This fast-growing predator has since been blamed for the loss of two-thirds of the lake’s 300 types of endemic cichlid fish, although the introduction may merely have delivered the coup de grâce to dwindling populations already threatened by decades of over-harvesting and pollution.
Back here in Britain, concrete evidence for extinction is scarce, but we can’t ignore two examples where introductions have threatened other species and could lead to their demise. While grey squirrels don’t directly interfere with native red squirrels, they outcompete them for food, especially in deciduous woodland, and also pass on a lethal virus. The red’s population crashed in the wake of the grey’s arrival, so it’s hard to avoid the conclusion that grey squirrels are a big part of the problem. Disease is also a reason that signal crayfish, brought from North America in the 1970s for aquaculture, are displacing Britain’s white-clawed crayfish (which, as mentioned, may or may not be a true native). In this case, the signals pass on a fungal-like pathogen to the white-claws, which die within weeks of being infected. To be fair, ‘crayfish plague’ was already expunging the white-clawed population before signals came on the scene. Indeed, it was the signal’s resistance to the plague that had recommended the crustacean to fish farmers in the first place.
There’s no doubting, however, that even where an introduced species doesn’t kill off a native, it can contribute to significant population declines. And if the impacts are only felt locally, it’s still a concern. For instance, pirri-pirri burr, an Antipodean plant invader which reached Britain at the beginning of the twentieth century, probably as a hitch-hiker in sheep fleeces, will never trigger a national emergency, but in certain places – notably, Minsmere in Suffolk, and Lindisfarne island off the Northumberland coast – it threatens local wildlife.
Another problem, as some see it, wrought by invasive species is hybridisation. Even if non-natives seldom exterminate our home-grown wildlife, the tendency of many to interbreed with them is beyond the pale. Perhaps the best outcome is when the offspring prove sterile, although this represents, for the native, a waste of valuable breeding effort. More serious are cases where viable progeny arise and in turn back-cross with the indigenous species; this sort of thing can erode the gene pool, reducing the population’s genetic variation and leaving it vulnerable to extinction. Hybridisation between native red deer and smaller introduced sika deer – an Asian variety – in parts of Scotland is a well-known example. Over time as the genes mix, red deer are starting to get smaller and sikas larger. As the two deer approach each other in size, this facilitates further hybridisation and risks accelerating negative impacts. Occasionally, hybridisation results in a more vigorous strain, as seems to be happening with the bluebell. Half the entire global population of this much-loved wildflower is found in this country, but a fertile hybrid has also established here, the result of a cross between the native bluebell and a Spanish variety introduced by horticulturists in the late nineteenth century. Many bluebells in Britain’s gardens and urban areas turn out to be this hybrid, although even experts struggle to tell the difference and, for now at least, the hybrid bluebell does not seem to be invading woodlands. Indeed, recent research suggests that the Spanish bluebell is less fertile, and sets fewer seeds, than its British counterpart.
Ecologists also fear that invasive organisms could alter ecosystems in far more profound ways. These could include anything from changing water quality or soil nutrient levels to disrupting food webs, reducing pollination rates and generally messing about with the ‘balance of nature’. Examples at random from around the world include the Mediterranean tamarisk tree, blamed for drying up marshes and salinising the soil in California, or zebra mussels altering nitrogen and phosphorus levels in freshwater habitats. One school of thought suggests that since ecosystems are dynamic and ever-changing, perhaps we shouldn’t be too bothered. Such an attitude is simplistic and defeatist. Much of what humans – the most ‘invasive’ species of all – have done, from cutting down rainforests to spilling oil into the sea, from landfilling toxic waste to pumping out carbon dioxide, has upset ecosystems, and we need to understand and combat those negative effects however subtle. Right now – not for want of research – our understanding of how ecosystems function, how different organisms interact, and what makes these complex systems more resilient, or less, remains limited, with plenty of knowledge gaps left to fill. We are instinctively concerned each time a species is lost from a natural system through our actions (or negligence); we should also perhaps feel a similar disquiet whenever we cause a new one to be added.
If the invaders left people alone and restricted their impacts to the degrading of natural ecosystems, that would be bad enough – not least as we ultimately depend upon these systems for our survival and wellbeing. But some non-natives harm us directly. Notwithstanding the odd pinch on the privates from a crayfish, the obvious threat is their role as agents of disease. The most notorious example in history is offered by the Black Death, inflicted by a strain of bacteria originating in Asia which, from the fourteenth century onwards, has killed tens of millions across Europe, the Middle East and North Africa. While nothing on that scale has recently been visited upon us here in Britain, new parasites and pathogens are on the radar, many transmitted by mosquitoes and other biting insects. At the moment, it’s a bit chilly for these to get a foothold here, but with climate change all bets are off.
Judging by the growing scientific literature devoted to the economic impacts of biological invaders, these species hurt our pockets too. Much of the cost arises from direct impacts such as insect pests reducing yields from agriculture and forestry, fish stocks wiped out by disease or the erosion caused when signal crayfish or Chinese mitten crabs tunnel into river banks. To the ledger we must add the eye-watering sums spent on preventing, monitoring and eradicating invasives. In excess of £5 million is spent every year in Britain removing Japanese knotweed alone. Various indirect impacts, trickier to calculate but just as real, and many times greater than the direct costs, can also be attributed to invasives. This is a complex area, but it boils down to the loss of valuable ecosystem services like nutrient cycling, pollination or flood prevention.
Overall costs incurred by invasive non-native organisms are estimated to amount to 5 per cent of the global economy. Across Europe, invasives inflict some £9-billion worth of damage every year. In the UK alone, the figure has been put at about £1.7 billion annually. Although these are ballpark estimates, resting on plenty of assumptions and subject to much debate, governments the world over are taking notice as never before. Invasive species are fast becoming public enemy number one. In 2016, the European Union banned 37 of the most problematic plants and animals from being kept or traded without a permit. These include signal crayfish, raccoons and American skunk cabbage. On this side of the Channel, the Great Britain Non-Native Species Secretariat was set up a decade ago and tasked with detecting and containing invaders, as well as helping to predict and prevent future incursions. Tackling troublesome non-natives is complex: the measures taken can be extraordinary and sometimes cause more problems than they solve, even hurting the very ecosystems they’re intended to protect.
An emerging school of thought is suggesting