Invasive "Super Pigs", Adaptation, and environmental changes

Void · 2024-04-15 12:51:56

This is rather interesting to me, as I see some possible futures from this.
The animals are described in this article: https://www.fieldandstream.com/conserva … explosion/
Quote:

“That they can survive in such a cold climate is one of the big surprises of this issue. The Prairie Provinces are where we have the coldest winters in Canada except for the very far north,” says Brook. “One of the things they do to survive is tunnel under the snow. They go into a cattail marsh and channel into the soft snow and cut nests in the cattails. If you go early in the morning on a cold day, you can actually see steam pouring out the top of the nests.”

They are somewhat into Northern Alberta by now it appears.

The thing that interests me is how they may forage and how they may alter the vegetation of the northern forests. They apparently have a tendency to produce grassland/pastureland out of brushy areas and perhaps forested areas.

For those who know about these things keep in mind that I don't have much farm experience in me at all so it is interesting to me.
https://www.aphis.usda.gov/sites/defaul … e%20plants.

Some people will use domestic pigs to alter forest land to pasture land it seems: https://themoderndaysettler.com/turning … with-pigs/

Where I am interested in this is that these pigs seem to be adapting, and perhaps even evolving. I would not be an experiment that responsible people would set in motion, but it is already in motion.

The Mammoth Steppe is mostly gone: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mammoth_steppe
Theories have it that Mammoths used to groom the land by knocking down trees and so favoring grassland.
Reasons why the Mammoths are gone include human hunting or a change in the type of grass.

These wild pigs do not groom the land in exactly the same way as Mammoths did but they do apparently encourage grasslands.

Much of the Mammoth Steppe is gone and converted to Taiga now: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiga#/me … region.png

While some people are concerned about the pigs going south, I am interested in their northern incursions.
https://naturealberta.ca/ecosystems/
Image Quote:
I would imagine that the northern limit will be defined by food, shelter, and predators.

What interests me is that perhaps the Pigs, are suitable to refill the ecological positions of some of the extinct Megafauna.

If they do continue to adapt to the cold, then they may change the Earth's albedo by converting northern forests into more grasslands, or mixed parklands. That aspect may cool off the Earth a bit, and perhaps even cool off the permafrost as well.

I wonder if Polar Bears will like polar pigs?

According to this article wolfs get after them in Siberia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wild_boar

So, apparently something limits them in the "Old World":

They do seem to get to the Arctic in one part of Russia. Maybe less predators there.

Done

Last edited by Void (2024-04-15 13:33:40)

tahanson43206 · 2024-04-15 13:51:10

This post is reserved for an index to posts NewMars members may contribute over time.

We have at least one member who is quite likely to find articles about this or related developments.

We may have more.

Best wishes for success with the topic.

(th)

GW Johnson · 2024-04-15 15:59:49

Feral pigs are a real problem in Texas. That's why folks here are allowed to hunt and kill them any way they can, including shooting from helicopters. I've seen them near my farm.

They damage pastures by rooting, which destroys grass and crops. They are a collision danger on highways at night, and even in the daytime. And they're unafraid (and quite capable) of attacking people lethally.

Plus, it is difficult to kill them with guns. It takes a head shot with buckshot in a big shotgun at very close range, or a high powered rifle at any range, to do the job. I would never (!!!) use anything smaller than a 12 gauge with 00 buck, or a 30-06 at 150-grain+, to take them on. I would prefer a flamethrower! Or propelled grenades.

These animals can be anywhere from 200 to 500 lb (think 100 to 250 kg). A few are even bigger. They have vicious sharp tusks, and a ready willingness to use them. Even the babies are dangerous.

Maybe they promote grasslands the way the mammoths did, and maybe they don't! (They don't, here in Texas.) But if they do, it's hardly worth the collateral damage.

GW

Last edited by GW Johnson (2024-04-15 16:02:14)

Void · 2024-04-15 18:22:14

I imagine a little pig rooting is better than a lot.

What I have looked up says you can use domestic pigs, to knock down brush, to allow grass, but you need to be careful to not overdo it.

I am sure that if I was trying to grow crops I would not like wild pigs.

But it is a matter of curiosity for me, as they seem to be really close to entering the Canadian Shield. Northwest Canada is like much of Siberia and Alaska, and apparently pigs have been in Siberia for some time. But the Canadian shield is what was under the ice caps during the last ice age, and is quite a bit exposed rock, with some clay spots, lots of lakes, and generally northern trees where they can grow.

The rivers might be the more likely area where pigs could go, as there are marshes and sandbars and such. Reeds, maybe cattails. Moose, wolfs, bears, and smaller creatures. The one good thing the pigs might do for the moose would be to reduce the white tail deer populations.
Those deer carry a brain disease that the moose die from. Humans have sort of made white tail deer invasive to Moose territory.

Robert is sitting just next to the start of the Canadian Shield, and the maps shows feral pigs to be nearby.

Granted we might wish it were not so, but still, it will be interesting to see if they can cross into that territory and adapt.

When the robots take many of the factory job, perhaps one job people can have is feral pig reduction.

Done

Last edited by Void (2024-04-15 18:29:37)

GW Johnson · 2024-04-16 14:50:21

The robots have already taken most of the factory jobs. That's been going on for multiple decades now. The number of jobs tending the robots is always far less than the number of jobs the robots eliminated.

Automation has its downside, which way too many either cannot see, or willfully fail to admit.

GW

tahanson43206 · 2024-04-16 15:15:57

For GW Johnson ....

Re post #5 and your observation about robots taking on repetitive tasks...

Humans who are able, throughout history, have found ways to persuade (or force) other humans to do the grunt work that civilization needs to keep going.

In the modern era, education seems (to me at least) to be the key to remaining an employer of robots.

Computer users are a class of humans who are employing robots of great sophistication to perform all sorts of tasks.

If we humans design our society well, we (humans) will maintain supervisory status over a myriad kinds of robots., and thus enjoy the fruits of their labors.

That is what smart humans have been doing for thousands of years. From my perspective, the less we have humans doing mindless tasks, the better.

(th)

GW Johnson · 2024-04-17 15:48:21

Not everybody is smart enough or talented enough to deal with robots and software. But I have known some mighty talented welders, and some mighty talented machinists. And, some mighty talented pencil-and-paper engineers (of which I was one). So, what do you do with the very significant fraction of your human population who are not smart or talented enough to supervise robots or deal with computers? That's something like at least half of humanity. Especially when that robot/computer supervision only takes 10% or less (probably a lot less) of the population! Just how are the rest of us (myself included) supposed to make a living?

There are moral questions here that have zero to do with what is technologically possible, moral questions that have gone without answers for over a century now, and it is starting to show, rather badly.

GW

tahanson43206 · 2024-04-17 17:51:54

For GW Johnson!

Re #7 ...

Thank you for your thoughtful observations....

Science fiction writers have been addressing the concerns you've expressed, for many years.

Some go down the fearful path. There appears to be a market for that kind of writing.

Stephen King is a massively successful writer, and I understand that he deliberately attempts to provoke fear in his readers.

On the other end of the scale is that part of the population that cares about others, and does everything possible to insure that each individual is as productive as that person can be.

Capitalists are (by definition) not likely to include any caring people.

However, there ** may ** be enough smart and caring people to solve the problem you've raised.

The capitalists are going to do their thing until there are no mindless tasks left for humans to perform unless they deliberately choose to perform them.

The future I see is one in which ** every ** human has the birthright of a full functional AI support entity of some kind, and the economic flows through that entity will provide whatever income the human needs.

Most humans will do well in such an environment.

I wouldn't count on capitalists to be much help.

That's not the role of capitalists in human society.

(th)

Void · 2024-04-17 17:57:49

A person always has the chance to be wrong in a new situation. The little I think I might know I will try to say, but don't bet your future on it.

We are talking about a new source of assistive labor on the cheap. We may see individual robots, but it is questionable if they are going to be individuals or if they have a sort of consciousness it may reside in a computer somewhere, and then that creature has many robot bodies. So, if it does come to express desires and needs, those are not going to be the same as for humans, I think. It is an alien. That is not proven to be a good or a bad thing yet. The question of if we are inflicting cruelty on it, seems a way off. It seems to me that if it does express desires and needs, that may not be too hard to satisfy.

For instance, would a sentient computer/robot(s), regard a toaster as it's kin? Technically we are organic robots, at least in some level of appearance. Would a silicon or whatever materials it is regard us as not kin? Hard to say. If there would be sentient robot(s)/computers, then would they object to less aware robots doing labor? We don't know yet. We may be stumbling into a problem(s) of a solution(s).

But now the result of cheap labor.

Historically the civil war was a bit about that issue. It was normal around the planet for most people of power and money to have slaves/servants. Peoples of various characteristics participated in that.

The Civil War was supposedly about the North and the South, but really it was about the North, South, Federal, and outsiders including native Americans.

The problem was if you kept getting more slaves, then where would common farm people from Europe go to make a living?
And those who owned slaves or hoped they could own slaves did not want these common people from elsewhere telling them what they could or should do. As I understand it the South had a notion that with slave labor, they could take over Latin America.

But that was then, and I was just trying to say how peoples can get against each other because they do not want a bad future, they were each stepping on each other's hopes of a future. I don't care to dip any further into the past, because it was and now is not. It is an example. Best to say let it all go.

But as I think (th) was saying the potential for common people to have robots will exist. And factories will likely be productively deflationary. It won't be possible to say well we will give the common laborers what they want, and suppress the humanoid robots.
Because, the East Asians exist, and so do the Europeans, and India. Africa, I do not understand. I am trying to understand that but I do not.

But I think that we are along for the ride, wherever it is going. So, we will just have to do the best we can.

Whatever you think of Elon Musk, he has provided the notions of brain augmentation and guaranteed income. Those are notions.

The European experience has been three primary inputs. Hunter Gatherers, M.E. Farmers, and Horse Peoples, of the Steppes.

We do have the risk that the inheritors of the Hunter Gatherers will be exterminated from the gene pool by the other two. The Farmers are fond of vertical hierarchies of exterminations slowly, and the Horst Peoples will exterminate periodically horizontally.

The Hunter Gatherers are the adaptive, and strangely enough the more likely to have built technology, I think the other two are about inviting people they don't like to leave the gene pool. Hunter Gatherers will likely kill as well, but I think they would rather have a stake of their own. Living in wilderness they have to be inventive or they die. The other two develop a level of invention and then eat their brains and are unable to have new growth.

That is my opinion. That is why I want to open the frontier of space, and that is why those who wish to own us and dispossess us, do not want us to go into the frontier.

Done

Quote:

A person always has the chance to be wrong in a new situation. The little I think I might know I will try to say, but don't bet your future on it.

Done

Last edited by Void (2024-04-17 18:29:15)

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Invasive "Super Pigs", Adaptation, and environmental changes

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Re: Invasive "Super Pigs", Adaptation, and environmental changes

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Re: Invasive "Super Pigs", Adaptation, and environmental changes

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Re: Invasive "Super Pigs", Adaptation, and environmental changes

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