“An estimated 1 to 10 percent of all species that have ever lived, have left fossils – and only an estimated 1 to 10 percent of those will ever be found. The origins of major organisms such as flowering plants, protozoans, and frogs still remain obscured by a lack of transitional fossils. A species such as the horse, the origins which can be traced through clear progression of fossils, is more the exception than the rule.” — Anonymous
Last Spring, I sat near a meadow, alongside Marble Mountain. Early morning and the mist carried with it a slight chill. But the mist also part of a significant ecological system, and the greens and browns and trees and moss and grasses and mushrooms and rotting tree stumps and flowers and nature at its fullest and most robust, simply blossomed before my very eyes.
Not far from where I sat rose two glowing red fly amanita mushrooms, and yes, complete with the white spots. To state they stood out boldly within the damp and nature’s florescent greenery of the morning landscape, an understatement. As nature continued to evolve before me, a gorgeous doe appeared, went straight to the mushrooms and ate them. Fly amanitas are very toxic to humans; but animals vary widely in their biochemistry, and the deer unharmed.
Evolutionary Norms
While this would be a bizarre adaptation for a mammal, it would be a mistake to project our own genetic changeability as an evolutionary norm. For those lesser plants, that form the matrix of forest life, change hardly exists. For the mushroom, on the floor of a forest that has changed little within its sixty million years of life (the Klamath region the youngest geological and ecological growth area in the United States) change hardly exists at all.
Here we can also use the example of reality versus myth, legends of the mountains, and those that roam here and never really seen that much, but seen just the same. Rather than go into the complexities of debate, I will simply take a few seconds and ponder the overall aspect of such a presence within our forests and mountains.
“Though men now possess the power to dominate and exploit every corner of the natural world, nothing in that fact implies that they have the right or the need to do so.” – Edward Abbey “A voice in the Wilderness”
Time is an aspect that we, as human species, take for granted; which, it is also similar in mind-set that we must define within our perceptions evolution of life forms, in time, in order to understand the concepts within a comfortable and agreeable matter. So we force time into a definable matrix, mostly out of confusion and by what we do not understand, when compared to what little we do understand, especially about nature.
But time within nature is of significance, and much different than what our mind-set can assimilate within a proper manner of understanding. We can, although, consider the sixty-million-year time frame here, and attempt to understand that within particular circumstances of stability, whether known by our species or left-unknown, nature could care less, actually, whether we do or not; profoundly, we may not understand that a mature individual hardly needs to die, but nature understands it completely.
Up to this point, this is simply an obscure statement, I know. Let’s take it a step further. Perhaps what is running around up here, and in these mountains, have indeed approached the maturity of the redwoods, within a scarcity of our own narrow perceptions toward life; which, we cannot understand what so ever, and perhaps never will – as despite our lucrative science and brains, so we think and we assume we are superior to much of life on this planet, we may simply not be asking the right questions – or perhaps do not have the ability to ask the right questions to resolve such matters.
We have the thumb, above and beyond all other species on this planet and indeed creates an advanced species within some matters but perhaps not all. But is there a mental capacity we over-look? Could it be similar to the diversity that a thumb gives to us? Something that we simply do not have, and yet another species may indeed have obtained through evolution or even stability within nature, and we remain unaware of its existence. How would we know?
But the individuals that exist up here, and without a firm credible confirmation of existence by us as if we are the prime dictators of such an agenda (human species versus nature – which we seem to be losing this battle as well, and to nature), these creatures may be so healthy and hardy, that they enjoy life spans, and avoidance of us, beyond our comprehension.
Within this perspective, their life-spans would presumably generate the wisdom to avoid being run over, or convoluted, by our civilization – Avoidance is the key phrase here. It must appear very unattractive to them, and why would it not? Our industrialized civilization is very destructive and unwholesome toward life in general and very ignorant as well, to say the least. . .
Evolution
We have a mixed situation within nature, of evolution, but another situation of stability. We see this within the mushroom, among other vegetation and wildlife alike, and the very simplicity of its growth – here one morning, then gone, but there again and more down the same hillside, where yesterday there were none. As far as we can surmise, many mushrooms similar, if not exact, as sixty million years ago, and even more . . .
Is it natural selection entirely? Or, is the finite powdery-brown-dust on the mushroom so compelling, and contains millions of spores’ light enough to float around the world on a spring wind? The very beauty of nature is that we, as a species, do not know all about nature and never will. Ever!
What is even more interesting? That there exist many species on this planet, and within nature, similar indeed to the mushroom, or unique upon themselves, but a separate species. We do not know about many species on this planet, but many of us hope, who are out here and discovering many things in nature previously unknown, we at least find out, or discover, these species before human-kind makes them extinct . . . Certainly, the contents of a different conversation.
Profound Ignorance in Government
First and foremost, we must battle ignorance! Ignorance is a thing that is most comfortable to many, who have never wandered into the articulate realm of learning. Yes, many surmise rather than find out through independent investigation; many except a premise as being truthful, rather than find out whether it is a false premise or not – (we can look at the DOI and BoLM Wild Horse Herd Counts and even a light perusal of their information, we discover quickly, that they assume Wild Horses never die, as their information has neither fatality, nor normal death assumptions of age within it what so ever – according to their statistics they just hang-out, give birth, all live through birth, and multiply, and never die – ignorance of the worst type, because horses die due to this profound ignorance).
We as taxpayers pay these people to generate accurate and scientific management paradigms for America’s lands and wildlife – and what do we get? Ignorance and bigotry and stupidity and lack of knowledge toward what they were hired to accomplish — at its very worst! What can become worse? The fact people repeat the misinformation, erroneous information, the stupidity of it all, and the ignorance.
And what can be worse than that? That people except it as a truth, and become compelled to debate the issue as if truth! So we are essentially debating information that is erroneous in total, and derived from ignorance and stupidity! Is there any doubt that when politicians note this situation, that they will certainly take advantage of it, quickly? Now we can move on further into the point of all of this situation – as I hope I have compelled you to read further still . . .
Keep in mind, these government agencies decide whether Paleontological Evidence is Credible – But how is that if, as pointed out here, they have IQ’s of a noodle, and make decisions based on false premise or false information — for example (well referenced info), taking cattle out of field research and monitoring data bases, then making profound management decisions on the remainder of misinformed info.
Wild Horses and Fossil Records
We now go to the information that surrounds the fossil records of wild horses. Basing the entire population of wild horses, or horses being in America at all on Spanish horses, that apparently just appeared one day in Spain, then were brought over by ship, and become over abundant here in the America’s over time? Ignorance? Comfortable to believe, but facts about the Pleistocene apparently contradict the facts of sales-based history of Spanish and French Horses? Well, we do not know, as there is missing historical-facts, but not fossils records, as they are complete.
Horses have a finite lineage of facts, that clearly state horses were indeed here in the America’s within pre-historic times and eras – and I repeat, one of the only fossil records that can assimilate that as a truth, within our wildlife habitat.
As I had mentioned above and about the deer eating the certainly toxic-to-people mushroom, but not to deer, similar to those who demand that people drink pigs-ovaries after being genetically altered, to prove it is not harmful to wild horses? Ignorance, once again, at its worst levels – as pigs-ovaries certainly toxic to wild horses and their birth systems – as we are finding almost weekly now, harmful to many other animals to include horses as well.
Back to the fossil records, which show not only existence, but wild horses surviving the Pleistocene Ice Age, due to the over-whelming information now of predator kill-off during that era, and Pleistocene horse bones being dug up in Pre-Columbian Era sites; which, Paleontologists state, confirmation of lineage and wild horses existing in the America’s, and crossing the Bering Land Bridge, if not already existing within the Americas’, which there is now credible evidence showing that currently as well.
There is also the fact that the Pygmy Mammoth associated with the horses at that time, and through time, as mid-sized grazing animals. The Pygmy Mammoth sites, which, there exists many sites through America currently, and especially the Northwest. Horse bones had been found at nearly all sites, or within nearby sites – they grazed the same types of grasses. One of the key-theories that is present, the Pygmy Mammoth survived, as did other grazing animals throughout the Pleistocene Era onward.
The conclusion obvious – Until we can re-do our government agencies responsible for proper, competent, and good science based facts in the matters or our Environment and Wildlife complex, as well as the Wild Horse controversy – Then ALL situations paramount to management should be placed ON-HOLD. . .
Thereby, until we can obtain competent and knowledgeable people to manage our Public Lands, Federal Lands, and Wildlife within an appropriate manner, the ignorance and stupidity should be placed ON HOLD! — Simply, common sense dictates this to be accomplished. Ignorance and stupidity is unacceptable in total, and that seems to be those who are currently responsible for managing our lands and wildlife right now. Taxpayers demand change!
Principle and Theory
Fungi does not fit easily into evolutionary theory, but none the less does not make them insignificant what so ever. A fungus can disappear momentarily, when it exhausts the nutrients in the soil, and reappear three-feet away. Yet, some trees, whose roots lost the capacity to absorb water, symbiotically obtain water, as well as nutrients, from fungi. Actually, there is no way of knowing how or when such symbiosis evolved, but it could help explain the sudden appearance of modern trees. And just as odd, and quite frankly interesting information for many to ponder, the trees appeared so suddenly and have changed so little since their appearance, it is as though they are a new type of symbiotic organism.
There is much, much more nature gives to us, and we simply do not know or acknowledge all of it what so ever – but oh boy, the items we can acknowledge and reap within a cohabitation-type context is fantastically amazing.
But there is one thing I hope you have taken from this particular blog, and that is Ignorance is nothing more than stupidity defined within a friendlier-manipulated context – and that we need honesty, not only within ethics, but within science, research data, and within our very own humane-spirit and how we go about observing and accumulating data within nature – as we are nature, and thus doing nothing more than taking an inward look, an inward perspective upon ourselves – and the way we treat ourselves, is also the way we treat nature and our surrounding habitats . . . – John Cox, The Cascades
Preservation of America's Wildlife 