Well said Dennis Paulson,

What percentage of us would leave non-native species alone in the wild,
yet not hesitate to remove them with force from our buildings.

Even native creatures that are less than cuddly are not always
tolerated outside our buildings, yet let even the more harmless among
them (house spiders for example) are dispatched if they enter "our
territory". Black Widow, Brown Recluse, native rats, most any mice,
other rodents, etc, etc. are all usually removed with finality from our
homes and other buildings, and occasionally from properties.

Rats are omnivores and eat almost anything, including their own kind
under certain circumstances.

Squirrels (both Eastern Gray, and Eastern Fox) are also somewhat
omnivorous, and will prey on bird nests and eat both eggs and helpless
young. These two species also damage trees by stripping bark in
circles around twigs, and branches to get at the tender nutrients
underneath the outer bark. They are also responsible, in part, for the
lack of Douglas Squirrels, just as Starlings contribute to the
displacement of many native cavity nesters that most of would prefer to
look at even though Starlings can be said to be good looking.
Starlings in addition they almost always double and frequently triple
clutch. That is how they got from New York's Central Park to the West
Coast in about 70 years after being introduced as about 100 birds in
1890-91, and now number in the hundreds of millions over all of the US
and much of Canada.

Part of the problem with non-natives, is that when they get to their
new homes, by accident (Norway Rats) or by design (Starlings, Eastern
Gray & Fox Squirrels, House Sparrow, Kudzu, Scotch Broom, Nutria,
English Ivy, and on and on), their native controls are not brought
along to keep them in balance, and they out compete native species.

The aggregate negative impact is the major issue with most non-natives,
Starlings merely happen to be the beneficiaries one of humankind's
profound errors of judgment, and we do not need to embrace them because
they were captured, and brought here, or happen to look nice. The
negative impact of Starlings is very significant.

A significant percentage of the US is negatively impacted in some way,
by one or more non-native species, be they:

Microscopic life forms
Plants
Insects
Mammals
Birds
Fish
Mollusks

We need not fall in love, or even accept them merely because they are
here and or look good.

Bill Clemons
SW of Portland in Mtn Park
Willclemons AT Yahoo dot com


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