I guess it’s time to roll out another story about the insanity that seems to have infected so many concerning wolves and moose on Michigan’s Isle Royale. I’ll spare readers much of the details of the history but in a brief remark state that scientists have been “studying” the relationship between wolves and moose on the island for many years. At issue now is that the inbred wolves are all dying off and the cult of wolf worshipers are near flogging themselves over what to do; let “nature” take it’s course or bring in more wolves?
Perhaps the most important aspect of this so-called study, is the belief by those conducting the studies and the hundreds of thousands of brain dead followers, that somehow, wolves and moose isolated on an island in the midst of Lake Superior, resembles an “ecosystem” found just about anywhere else in the world. But then again, it is impossible to try to convince “The True Believers” that any of this matters.
Dr. Charles Kay, wildlife ecologist at Utah State University, in an email exchange, had this to say about Isle Royale and the wolf and moose studies.
The entire study has been a waste of time because it is a unique situation and the results are NOT APPLICABLE ANY PLACE ELSE IN NORTH AMERICA——and anyone who says it is applicable to other areas, is committing scientific fraud!
This is much like Dr. Valerius Geist’s title he bestows upon the believers of “balance of nature.” He calls it “intellectual garbage.”
To give you an example of the insanity behind Isle Royale, and all the clap trap that gets repeated and perpetuated, you are welcome to read a fairly recent article in The Chronicle of Higher Education (snicker), written by Paul Voosen.
There’s little worth repeating and bringing up in the article but I would like to point out a couple of things that were written, which I think is a reflection of the entire article’s inaccuracies and unbelievable commentary. The author writes:
The service [National Park Service] debated what to do [about an outbreak of parvovirus] then, as it wrangled with fears about interfering in a pristine wilderness. But given global warming, it’s hard today to see any wilderness as pristine. (emboldening added)
Pristine wilderness? Are you kidding me? And is this author intimating, or perhaps he’s just coming straight out and saying so, that there are no longer any “pristine wildernesses” because of global warming? When anyone writes this sort of stuff, doesn’t it give cause to question everything else written? It should!
It is fraud to claim Isle Royale as a “pristine wilderness”, in the 1980s or much of anytime prior to nearly 6,000 years ago. If you knew the history of the island and called it “pristine” that’s fraud. If you don’t know about the history then that’s a reflection of lazy ignorance and poor journalism. Perhaps I should blame that on global warming; something environmentalists can relate to.
Here’s what Wikipedia, that source even lazy people use for reference, has to say about the history of Isle Royale.
In prehistoric times, large quantities of copper were mined on Isle Royale and the nearby Keweenaw Peninsula. The region is scarred by ancient mine pits and trenches up to 20 feet deep. Carbon-14 testing of wood remains found in sockets of copper artifacts indicates that they are at least 5700 years old. In Prehistoric Copper Mining in the Lake Superior Region, published in 1961, Drier and Du Temple estimated that over 1.5 billion pounds of copper had been mined from the region. However, David Johnson and Susan Martin contend that their estimate was based on exaggerated and inaccurate assumptions……….
In the mid-1840s, a report by Douglass Houghton, Michigan’s first state geologist, set off a copper boom in the state, and the first modern copper mines were opened on the island.[9] Evidence of the earlier mining efforts was everywhere, in the form of many stone hammers, some copper artifacts, and places where copper had been partially worked out of the rock but left in place. The ancient pits and trenches led to the discovery of many of the copper deposits that were mined in the 19th century.[7] The remoteness of the island, combined with the small veins of copper, caused most of the 19th century mines to fail quickly.[citation needed] Between the miners and commercial loggers, much of the island was deforested during the late 19th century.
I think any idiot can plainly see that Isle Royale was no “pristine wilderness” nor was the reason for that caused by global warming.
In addition to the false claim that Isle Royale is or once was a “pristine wilderness”, according to Dr. Charles Kay, there were never any wolves or moose on the island.
…before Whites, Native Americans ran the entire island—-and there were NO MOOSE OR WOLVES only a few caribou.
The important thing to remember about the years of studies conducted on wolves and moose on Isle Royale; this information and knowledge gathered can then be used on all the other islands in North America that have wolves and moose on them, exactly like Isle Royale. Now that’s important stuff right there!
