Monoculture replanting <span title="-ineedhelp??answermee.plz!.n.thnx?">-ineedhelp??answermee.plz...</span>

Question

why do some environmentalists object to monoculture replanting?

(replanting one type of tree in an area)

essay due soon, help me out

and ill do the same for many others!!

Answer 1

My guess would be that it leads to drastically reduced biodiversity...there are many living things, be it plants, fungi or animals, that depend on many other different living things in forests.  When this intertwining web of dependencies is artificially disrupted by humans, certain species may die off in the surrounding areas.  Biodiversity is always a good thing, and monocultures are frowned upon by environmentalists because of this.  

Just look at corn ethanol or palm oil.  They both offer promise as environmentally friendly alternative energy sources - at least on the back end.  They burn very cleanly, adding little to no carbon dioxide to the atmosphere.  However, on the front end, they are extremely hazardous to the environment because the scale that these plants (corn and oil palm) need to be farmed is extremely high to provide for any energy sustainability.  So, with corn, we are seeing huge monocultures of corn plantations, which is highly dependent upon artificial fertilizers (whose refinement is powered by fossil fuels) and machinery (powered by fossil fuels, and built by more machinery powered by fossil fuels).  Then, there are vast monocultures of the Oil Palm plant, but the catch here is that these only grow in tropical climates.  Thousands of square miles of rainforest are thus being slashed and burned by large, private companies in Indonesia and Malaysia!  Thus, the most biodiverse regions in the world - rainforests - are being replaced by vast monocultures of Oil Palm, in which not even shade tolerant species of plants are allowed to grow.  Not so environmentally friendly, eh?

Answer 2

I will take a different approach from Bada bing.

The problem with monoculture it encourage insects the multiple in large scales.   If there are only corn, all the insects that eat corn would go there and multiple in large numbers.    TO control their population, we need to use more insecticides.   Also, monoculture burn up nutrients faster.  Some plants return nitrogen into the soil, but monoculture often prevent that from happening.      Monoculture is also far more vulnerable to disease.   If we have a diverse selection of plants, some would be immune, but if there are only one strain of one species of vegetable, a disease would spread like wild fire.  If there is different species , it would slow down the infection.   It&#039;s like a crowded room.  If one person has the flu, everyone will get it.    Having different species would help put up a wall  to slow down diseases from passing over to the next plant vulnerable.   Also having different strains of the same species would prevent total lass of crops if disease spreads.    One strain maybe resistant to a disease while the other is vulnerable.