Graveyards Are Surprising Hotspots for Biodiversity | Hacker News Reader

Graveyards Are Surprising Hotspots for Biodiversity

scientificamerican.com

74 pointsVigier15 comments

>Many Hebei farmers bury their deceased loved ones in caskets, so it is unlikely that the high number of flourishing plants in the graveyards are linked to the decomposition process, Axmacher says. “It’s really just letting nature get on with things and not touching the area,” he adds.

I've heard the same thing about Chernobyl. The fact that people mostly leave it alone means nature is flourishing there.

> Researchers have found the land surrounding the plant, which has been largely off limits to humans for three decades, has become a haven for wildlife, with lynx, bison, deer and other animals roaming through thick forests. This so-called Chernobyl Exclusion Zone (CEZ), which covers 2,800 square km of northern Ukraine, now represents the third-largest nature reserve in mainland Europe and has become an iconic – if accidental – experiment in rewilding.

https://www.unep.org/news-and-stories/story/how-chernobyl-ha...

This reminds me of what happened after COVID hit hard and everything shut down. The sky got clearer, sometimes dramatically! I smelled forest from my home right in the middle of a small town. It was quiet. You could hear nature... naturing. It was wonderful.

We forget that nature is dynamic... having gotten used to seeing it as perpetual macro trends.

Where I live (dublin) we have a lot of urban foxes. There were there before, but over the last year their visibility and confidence has gone up hugely.

Foxes are ordinarily very shy and stealthy, so you don't see them often. There are always notable exceptions. Certain places where foxes drop stealth. The airport, for example. Both foxes (and somewhat paradoxically) hares around Dublin airport behave like seagulls. 5km away, they're ghosts.

Anyway... since covid, foxes have started behaving more like alley cats. I've seen them quarrel, hunt, walk 5 paces ahead of me on a sidewalk. Stealth doesn't seem to be a priority anymore.

I don't think post-covid foxes will be like pre covid foxes. Foxes have changed.

I hope one day we will acknowledge nature for everything it has given us and treat it as a free utility that everyone must be able to have. Nature's effect is so subtle - and yet undeniable - that most of us forget how important it is to maintain it, but we only appreciate it when it's taken away from us, just like music and every other art.

Ironic the good that came out of the Chernobyl exclusion zone. And the Korean demilitarized zone.

More of these should be deliberately established, rather than accidentally. If I was Prez, the national parks would be greatly expanded. I'd also make national parks out of marine areas.

Sounds like the demilitarized zone between north and south korea:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_Demilitarized_Zone#Natu...

Also, the tunnels are an interesting story...

ORF did a documentary about the vienese central graveyard in 2005. The english title was "The Living Graveyard", but I wasn't able to find a link on YouTube. Perhaps too old. It is sometimes re-aired in austria around All Saints' Day (a day after halloween).

Why surprising? Graveyards are places where, in the main, nature is left to get on with whatever it does without human interference.

Are they? Every one I have seen has just been mowed grass or crushed stone.

I'm sure, cats and dogs owner will find thousand explanations why the ban of domestic dogs and cats on graveyards is not a relevant cause for the biodiversity.

How would you even keep cats away from a graveyard?

It's simply the distance, I suppose. Poaching in the backyard is much easier than going long distances and crossing streets.

A patch of nature like that will support a cat or two. You just don't see them, feral cats are really like ghosts.

I'm sure outdoor cats kill many birds and small rodents, but how are dogs to blame here? Most of them rarely, if ever, catch and kill something, and they generally don't get to hunt in their neighbourhoods unattended for hours on a daily basis. They also can't climb trees.

Here's the keyword: graveyard. No? Dead humans? Wink wink

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