On anti-commercial bias

John V. Calhoun bretcal at gte.net
Sun Sep 28 16:32:11 EDT 1997


Anne Kilmer wrote:
  ... and what about a friend of mine who
> sees no reason why the pipevine swallowtail shouldn't exist in Palm
> Beach County ... any reason he shouldn't bring some down from North
> Florida (not needing any permits from the USDA) and try to establish
> them here?
> I think it's wrong. But it's fun, it's pretty innocent, they're all nice
> people, what harm can it do ...

Anne;

I whole-heartedly agree with Anne that this is wrong.  For one thing B. 
philenor is not currently established in South Florida.  Although there 
are a couple of old records from the region, this type of "population 
reorganization" can be extremely problematic, not only for 
biogeographers, but on the local ecology.  If philenor survives 
(long-term) in the area, it could compete with B. polydamus which fills 
this niche in South Florida.  Although polydamus is not a major pest on 
Aristolochia there, perhaps the addition of philenor (another 
Aristolochia-feeder) could prove troublesome (especially to botanical 
parks that support large populations of the plants).  Moreover, if 
philenor does not survive, they are effectively bannishing all the 
progeny to a useless death. 

We must ALL adhere to logic.  If a species does not occur somewhere, we 
can't simply pack some up and drop them off.  Even if such introductions 
do not offset local ecosystems, these movements make it impossible to 
understand natural distribution patterns for researchers like myself.  
If we eventually found a population of philenor in extreme South 
Florida, we would never know if it was always there, was the result of 
natural dispersion, or was brought in by someone to "brighten up a 
garden".  This is clearly illustrated by the rapid movement of atala up 
the east coast of Florida.  If we ultimately record it as far north as 
Brevard, or even Volusia County, we will likely assume that it did not 
reach the region on its own, even if this was the case.  This is 
dangerous ground....and tough to regulate.    

Best,
John


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