If there’s one core concept of ecology, everything is interlinked. Whether directly or distantly, how one organism interacts with another has ripple effects on its environment, or how one organism interacts with its environment can dramatically change the lives of many organisms.
For example, let’s visit the Pacific coast of the United States. In the kelp forests that grow in the cold waters of the Pacific Ocean, how a sea star (specifically, Pycnopodia helianthoides) interacts with sea urchins plays a strong role in maintaining kelp forest health. The sea stars eat the sea urchins (which eat kelp), which leaves the kelp forests in place to support the livelihoods of thousands of other species.
For another example, let’s spend time with beavers and how they interact with water systems. Specifically, they dam rivers, creeks, and other waterways by deftly (and gnawingly) taking trees, reeds, and branches and blocking water flow. By modifying the environment that way – restricting water flow and making ponds – they create habitat for hundreds of other species. Some conservationists have called for bringing beavers back as an effective ecological restoration method!
That idea of how individuals (individual species made up of individual organisms making individual actions) can have massive cumulative effects on their community is energizing and sobering. It’s energizing because it means that we can make our shared spaces better for people and wildlife even at a small scale, whether adding a 50-square-foot wildflower garden or a single Texas Ebony tree. It’s sobering because every action we make matters, adding weight to our choices.
As we head into the close of another year, here are some small actions that, when added together by individual people out into our growing Rio Grande Valley community, make a big difference.
Small Steps, Cumulative Benefits
Start Composting: This is nature’s way of recycling organic matter (food scraps, tree trimmings, lawn clippings) to keep our soils healthy and waste out of our landfills. A personal benefit to composting is that you can grow happier and healthier plants in your garden!
Grow Native Plants: Native plants in the Rio Grande Valley are often very drought tolerant (helping to conserve municipal water supplies), able to withstand our occasional freezes, and provide habitat for pollinators and other wildlife. If you don’t have much space, try container gardening!
Recycle Plastic, Aluminum, and Tin: All these items can take hundreds of years to decompose or break down in a landfill. As much as possible, stick to aluminum when you can (pun intended) – recycling aluminum uses as little as 5% of the energy it took to make the original product.
Remember the 7 R’s: They are to reuse, rethink, reciprocity, reduce, recycle, repurpose, and reforest.
Follow Quinta Mazatlán on social media and visit us for more inspiration on opportunities to take positive action for our communities.
