The Eurasian Invasion
The gates were kicked wide and an insidious invasive species took root on the Eastern Seaboard. With no known predators to check its spread, it soon began advancing west. Whole ecosystems were destroyed under its rapacious weight. It felled trees and drove the great mammals to the edge of extinction. It even laid railroad tracks to expedite its own infestation…
Wait, are you talking about Europeans?
Oh hi there! I was just over here penning a description of the greatest pest ever unleashed on the Americas, and yes, some might describe them as ‘Europeans’ but I think that’s problematic because Europe, as I’ve talked about before, doesn’t really exist. And before everyone gets all up on my case I would just challenge you to draw me a mental map of the borders of Europe. Does it include Russia? Because Russia goes all the way to the Pacific Ocean. And if it does not include Russia, why not? Does it include Ukraine? Russia would probably argue whatever answer you give there. Georgia? Armenia? No? Turkey? Was Constantinople European before it became Istanbul? Why? Because of Jesus? Iceland is totally Europe. But is Greenland?
Guys, the point of this is not to slam my ancestors, the Europeans. It’s to remind us all that the concept of Europe, and all regions we define by culture (and race) are super fuzzy. Europe is still considered a continent but it’s not, not by any definition of the word. It’s not even a ‘cultural continent’ because so much of the culture of Europe is bound to that other non-continent, Asia, though we really don’t like to admit it. Again. Don’t come for me. European culture’s entire raison d’être revolves around the worship of an Israelite from what, as almost all maps and cultural scholars would argue, is squarely in ‘Asia.’ The fact that an occupying army from a European Empire murdered/martyred this person hasn’t stopped European history from somehow adopting him and his Jewish posse as the Messiah and his Apostles.
We people of European decent in the Americas don’t like to consider ourselves an invasive species, since that would undermine our whole concept of blood and country and manifest destiny. Also if you go down that road, you could, and maybe should, argue that all humans are invasive species everywhere they’ve gone outside of the African continent.* The arrival of humans to the Americas thousands of years ago from (checks notes) Eurasia, corresponded with a population crash of megafauna the likes of which fossil records have few examples of outside of meteor impacts. Correlation should not imply causation as they say, but the path of environmental exploitation by humans everywhere they’ve gone after leaving Africa is pretty horrific. I spare the Africans because before Euroasians started showing up and wiping out African megafauna, people in Africa appear to have lived in decent balance with their wild neighbors, having essentially evolved to be wary of one another. Large animals were thriving in Africa until relatively recently, before colonists showed up en masse and began the wholesale slaughter of elephants for their ivory and rhinoceroses for their tusks. (The Roman Empire, which I’ve already faulted here for murdering a certain young Rabbi and touching off a cultural revolution, may also have been responsible for wiping out megafauna in North Africa in its time.)
Now. Bare with me for a second while I completely change the topic.
Take a look at these headlines:
The Asian Longhorn Beetle is a Threat to Hardwoods
Deadly Asian Blight Kills American Chestnuts
Invasive Japanese Beetles Pose Growing Threat to Agriculture
The True Story of Kudzu, the Vine That Never Truly Ate the South
‘Murder Hornets’ in the U.S.: The Rush to Stop the Asian Giant Hornet
and the story that inspired this blog post:
Is New York City’s Lanternfly Killing Spree Working?
North America has a bunch of invasive species that we breathlessly blame ‘Asia’ for having introduced. This tracks with our odd, often racist, relationship with the eastern three quarters of our mutual continent of origin, Eurasia. Or, as the Romans used to call anyone outside of their empire, ‘the barbarians at the gate.’
All of the above invasive species, which are in various states of destroying native natural resources, have no natural predators in the Americas because they come from Eurasia. But they were not maliciously introduced by, “the Asians,” as these headlines usually imply. They were introduced by Globalism which, despite the bountiful natural resources of North America, still finds it cheaper to import various products from eastern Eurasia. So it’s not ‘The Asians’ who are responsible, it’s profit. This wording leads people like Donald Trump to accuse China of intentionally unleashing Covid-19 on the world, because it’s an avenue extensively prepped for hateful misdirection.
Unlike geographically isolated countries like Australia or New Zealand, The United States doesn’t look very hard at what people bring into the country. We don’t much care unless it’s soft cheese from France. So while we don’t have as much French cheese as we should, we do have lots of neat looking pests that are devouring our forests and crops.
The last case of an Eurasian invasion I posted above, the spotted lanternfly, is no exception. It’s a beautiful animal, bright red and grey with black spots. They were first spotted in a shipment of stone, from east Eurasia, at a Pennsylvania landscaping business. They’ve spread exponentially from there. Are there not plenty of places to source stone in North America? Apparently none that are as profitable. The spotted lanternfly munches on plenty of native species here in the U.S. but it mostly likes vineyards, so the current infestation has wine makers on high alert. Notably, grape vines are an introduced species from Eurasia that most of us agree are a good addition to the lands. Also note that though grape vines are ultimately native to ‘Asia,’ they are not referred to as Asian Grape Vines. Wine was first cultivated in what is now Georgia and Armenia, did we include those in our mental map of Europe? I can’t remember.
Breathless racism aside. All of earth’s species will migrate in an attempt to expand their range. Furthering their range helps fulfill Life’s great goal of reproducing and consuming until something gets in the way. Once something gets in the way (usually a predator or competing species, or an ocean) a balance is found. Balance will eventually be found for all of the above invasion species. Biological timelines are vastly longer than our own, which we measure in news cycles, and which tired long ago of bemoaning the loss of the American Chestnut, has mostly tired of Covid-19, and will eventually tire of the Spotted Lanternfly.
Our own species may someday find balance too. Populations in developed countries are rapidly falling, and developing countries will eventually develop and follow suit. We may already have set in motion our own course correction without even knowing it. If it isn’t climate change, it’ll be hormones in our produce, nitrogen run-off, toxic masculinity, porn, or online gaming. I just ask that, along the way to our inevitable correction, we stop blaming certain parts of the world for introducing scary species and lay blame where it deserves to be laid.
We are the barbarians and there are no gates.
*Africa is probably a continent, though some say it’s part of Eurasia. Literally no one can agree on what the definition of a continent is.
UPDATE: Here’s another species intentionally imported by Europeans to North America, yet named to be an Asian invader: https://www.cnn.com/wbd/how-to-get-rid-of-ladybugs-in-the-house/index.html