Counting the World’s Trees

ScrAPES#7: Counting The World's Trees

September 4, 2015

In Counting the World’s Trees, BBC World Service News discussed about the side effects of road noises towards birds. Traffic noises are devastating to birds and from January to December of 2015 there had been a greatly amount of increase in temperature. There are three trillion trees in the world and they provide oxygen, carbon, stabilize, and provide habitats for wild life. Dr. Thomas Crowder of Vale School of Forestry om Environmental Studies explained that an average every year there is a gross lost of fifteen billion trees and a net loss of ten billion each year due to human impact. Dr. Heidi Ware of Boise State University and her team created a phantom road that has fifteen pairs of speakers that are strapped on trees blasting road noises in the forest. These speakers are turned on and off every four days; when the road noise are on birds show a low bmi or low body condition. Low body condition means less fat and less fuel. Also birds spent more time with their heads up looking for predators. On the contrary, when it is off birds has a good body condition. Eighty-three percent of the United States is covered within one kilometer of a road noise. Dr. Ware stated that to change this negative impact on birds roads should be designed with a different material (most likely rubber), decreasing the speed of cars, and decreasing the number of cars that drive on the road.

This podcast is significant to me because birds are one of the native species on Earth and the fact that human's most common work of art is negatively impacting them is horrid. Looking at birds I think they are the most precious animals on this Earth because they are innocent and wild. When I was younger I was not very fond of animals but recently owning six pets I realized the wonders of animals; they take a role in the ecosystem and the food chain no matter if they are an insect to as big as a polar bear. Trees are also one of the native plants on Earth. Scientifically they are one of the important factors of living things. 

Road noises relate to the environment because with it around birds will have weak body condition that results to less fuel which means they cannot migrate. Birds also pollinate plants, disperse seeds, and recycle nutrients. Other than that cutting down trees in a forest to invent roads decreases our oxygen level because trees are most common for their role of giving out oxygen to people and animals. They help us breathe. Without birds and trees the ecosystem would not be balanced. 

Resources:

• Counting the World’s Trees
• Why Do Birds Matter?