Chernobyl zone shows decline in biodiversity By Victoria Gill Science reporter, BBC News

Chernobyl zone shows decline in biodiversity By Victoria Gill Science reporter, BBC News

www.bbc.co.uk

he largest wildlife census of its kind conducted in Chernobyl has revealed that mammals are declining in the exclusion zone surrounding the nuclear power plant.

The study aimed to establish the most reliable way to measure the impact on wildlife of contamination in the zone.

It was based on almost four years of counting and studying animals there.
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“Start Quote

The truth is that these radiation contamination effects were so large as to be overwhelming”

End Quote Tim Mousseau University of South Carolina

The scientists say that birds provi

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New report and research suggests the apparently thriving species of the zone of old are declining the area around the powerplant,
This is in contradiction to many studies in the past which suggested wildlife was thriving in the zone in the absence of humans,
vimeo.com...

www.telegraph.co.uk...
and
news.bbc.co.uk...
and"Despite Mutations, Chernobyl Wildlife Is Thriving"
news.nationalgeographic.com...

However even back then studies suggested all was not as rosy as first was being portrayed as seen here
news.bbc.co.uk...

"Recent conclusions from the UN Chernobyl Forum and reports in the popular media concerning the effects of radiation from Chernobyl has left the impression that the exclusion zone is a thriving ecosystem, filled with an increasing number of rare species," they wrote.

Instead, they added: "Species richness, abundance and population density of breeding birds decreased with increasing levels of radiation."

"The study, which recorded 1,570 birds from 57 species, found that the number of birds in the most contaminated areas declined by 66% compared with sites that had normal background radiation levels. "......Anders Moller of University Pierre and Marie Curie, France, and Tim Mousseau from the University of South Carolina, US.

So was the health of the biodiversity overplayed the same as the human cost was underplayed by the worlds atomic powers and the mass media , considering the majority of the radiation fell on belarus not the ukraine...?and many belorussians were not evacuated?

news.bbc.co.uk...

www.youtube.com...

www.belarusguide.com...







www.bbc.co.uk
(visit the link for the full news article)

Hey, I wanted to post that story... here is my opinion.

This is a good lesson about radioactivity and anecdotal evidence. We should never believe stories until the cold hard scientific facts are available. I was fooled a couple of years ago by a story telling the exact opposite, without giving us the facts.

The second lesson is : radioactivity is not good for us, living creatures.

Super post, S+F

Yeah its the old trick of saying after some big event, that because they found X number of survivors its not a tragedy... its all in the context.

After all a 5% increase decades after a 95% decrease can be spun as an amazing gain even though when looked at its really nothing at all.

Love how, as you say gambon, the complete death toll in human terms over the decades is always down played... but any minor natural return of animal population is hailed as a triumph. Although both are played to the 'nuclear energy is good' crowds benefit.

reply to post by BigfootNZ


thank you for the replies ,I am just looking at other data if I come across any interesting articles I will post one here.One interesting aspect is some species/sub species do indeed seem to thrive in higher rad conditions as the species most prevalent before the accident/catastophe are less well adapted to survive than some previously rarer types , blue eyed birds are apparently more common in the zone ?

This quote tickled me...
"The red color of withered pine needles earned one large area near the reactor the name Red Forest.

"Now it is not the Red Forest but a real green forest, due to [growing] birch trees," said Sergey Gaschak from the International Radioecology Laboratory in Kiev, Ukraine. "

It is a real green forest alright , It is also still one of the most radioactive areas in the surrounding area , that was not used for dumping, if you dug 6 to 12 inches ito the mossy soil you may have a good chance of a pretty severe contamination incident> for at least 10 ,000 years , unfortunatley as some of the radioactive particles decay ,they actually become more dangerous due to the increased ability to transfer into soil ,air and water...



[edit on 3-8-2010 by gambon]

[edit on 3-8-2010 by gambon]

UPDATE....

www.bbc.co.uk...

Chernobyl plant life endures radioactivity

Article following the plant reproductive mechanisms of plant life in the irradated zone , again suggest ing ,"certain species are thriving ....




"[There must be] some kind of mechanism that plants already have inside them. Radioactivity has always been present here on Earth, from the very early stages of our planet's formation.

"There was a lot more radioactivity on the surface back then than there is now, so probably when life was evolving, these plants came across radioactivity and they probably developed some mechanism that is now in them.".....Martin Hajduch from the Slovak Academy of Sciences,

The key word that we need to highlight in this article is biodiversity.

I must stress that certain types of live thriving is certainly not necessarily good for biodiversity. What many people don't understand is that there is a balance within everything. For example, if wolfs are thriving in one area then that usually means other animals are going to be underpopulated and the wolf population easily suffer from sickness due to the rate a disease would spread. Plant life runs along similar lines.

I could understand how it would be likely that some plants and animals could survive radiation, while others die out. This case would play out like the butterfly effect. This is a truly sad situation.