Green Equilibrium

This book is about the vital balance between humans and nature and is based not only on a wide knowledge of molecular genetics and evolution, but also on extensive explorations by the author with his wife all over the world. It is engagingly written, and the reader witnesses some remarkable adventures, including landing on a sloping airstrip high in the mountains. Writing The Protein Crunch made me aware of the delicate balances within ecosystems, and the author begins with an example from Tanzania where the suppression of fires in the crater resulting in lush grass appealing to the tourists created the enabling conditions for ticks to multiply and infect the indigenous animals with various diseases. Controlled burns of the crater grasslands succeeded in re-establishing ecosystem equilibrium. So far as the human future is concerned, we need to modify our behaviour as the ruling predator by applying the principles of ecology if we are to halt our exploitation and damage of Earth's ecosystems. We are now in a much better position to understand the interactions of evolutionary pressures, genetic resources, ecological complexity and environmental change that determine the fate of ecosystems. Biodiversity is an important condition of ecological balance and we find that interlocking webs of life confer ecological stability.

Restoration ecology can take advantage of the resilience and adaptive capacity of nature. One significant position is the re-establishment of predator-prey relationships along with grazing and browsing interactions between animals and plants. At a bacterial level, this involves equilibrium between hosts and parasites and a balance of symbiotic species. The author is in no doubt that we have the capacity to heal the world and create a well-balanced home for our species, but the timing is urgent, especially in view of economic exploitation, warfare, poaching and hunting. The author makes it clear that there is an important human dimension to this process in the sheer joy of those working in the field to restore damaged ecosystems.