Almost 100 females and their pups, plus a handful of three-ton males, have made a temporary home at the popular Drakes Beach at Point Reyes national seashore, 30 miles north of San Francisco. They have spilled into the parking lot, sheltering under picnic tables and crushing wooden railings under their weight. Their presence means that the beach is now off-limit to humans.

    After working so hard to bring the pinnipeds back from extinction, closing the beach and access road was an easy decision, said John Dell’Osso, the head of interpretation and resource education at Point Reyes. “They’re at a critical time: the pups have been born there, they’re nursing. We’re not going to disrupt that process.”



user-inactivated:

    One of the reasons national parks were first established was that animal populations flourish best in the absence of human development and disturbance. “If you just get out of the way, wildlife will find their way in,” he said.

One of my favorite examples of this happening is the wildlife that's currently flourishing in the demilitarized zone between the two Koreas. I've even seen a few articles over the years about attempts to make that area an official wildlife refuge, though I don't know where those attempts currently stand.

Unfortunately, nature's ability to be prolific and to fill gaps and take advantage of opportunities can also be a problem, as those very attributes are what leads to invasive species.


posted 1908 days ago