Loss of biodiversity: the impacts of the climate crisis, even on your garden

Biodiversity is in danger. This, unfortunately, is the awareness that we inevitably reach when looking at the evolution of climate change, extreme weather events, the exacerbation of the seasons, and greedy human intervention in the environment. The loss of biodiversity is an inevitable cause of numerous environmental disasters, irreversible problems for the health of the planet and the survival of many species, each fundamental for the functioning of the ecosystem it inhabits, and without which the cycle of life risks breaking.

The loss of biodiversity, in fact, is looming over all ecosystems, from large and apparently indestructible ones, like the marine one, to those invisible but fundamental for the functioning of life, like the soil one, to those small and artificial, but no less important, like those inside a garden. But how can the reduction of biodiversity afflict the great balances of the ecosystems?

1. What is biodiversity
2. Loss of biodiversity: what is happening to the ecosystems
3. Biodiversity is important even in your garden

What is biodiversity

Biodiversity is a term coined by the American ethnologist Edward O. Wilson in 1988, created from his studies on the life of ants. The term is the result of the blending of the English terms for biological diversity, and is understood as the richness and variety of life on Earth. All the organisms that make up the biosphere, plant, animal, fungal or bacterial, are fundamental for the delicate balance of life, both thanks to the variety of species, and thanks to the abundance of organisms, which allows fruitful interactions between all the components.

The UN Convention on Biological Diversity defines it as the variety and variability of living beings within the systems in which they live, and structures biodiversity on three levels: genetic, species, and ecosystem. Genetic diversity is understood as the variety of genetic information within individuals of the same species. The loss of biodiversity often prevents species from developing optimally, decreasing the individuals that make up the group and leading to disastrous consequences for their survival, such as the phenomenon of inbreeding, that is, mating between relatives, which gradually but inevitably causes the accumulation of genes deleterious to the survival of the species.

The diversity of species represents the set of species that inhabit a given ecosystem, and is fundamental for the correct relationship between the different organisms. The cycle of life, the relationships between predators and prey but also between organisms that live in symbiosis, depends on the richness and variety of species. The absence or even the reduction of the presence of just one of them, cannot but irreversibly damage the delicate balance of life. Finally, ecosystem diversity refers to the different environments that host life, extremely different from each other and, therefore, inhabited by a great variety of different species.

Loss of biodiversity: what is happening to the ecosystems

Biodiversity at risk is, without any doubt, a direct consequence of human action. Climate change, first of all, disrupts the ecosystems and threatens the survival of some species unable to adapt to the new conditions. But also direct human intervention causes enormous problems. Think, for example, of the destruction of the marine ecosystem due to the risk of extinction of some animals due to overfishing. Or the endless hectares of land cultivated with the same plants, which destroys the variety of life in that system. But what are the effects of climate change on biodiversity and, therefore, on life?

A report was recently produced from a seven-year biodiversity study conducted by the University of Oklahoma, which very well explained the consequences of the loss of soil biodiversity. The research team monitored the changes in the populations of fungi, bacteria, and protists that inhabit the soil, studying their behaviors at different temperatures and humidity. What resulted, in short, is a degradation of all microbial organisms as temperatures increase.

Microorganisms are essential for the balance of the ecosystem, and their disappearance due to high temperatures caused by global warming also endangers human activities. They are, in fact, fundamental for the decomposition of organic and inorganic compounds, allowing plants to absorb them. Furthermore, they are fundamental for the process of carbon dioxide sequestration by the soil. The soil, in fact, plays an important role in the fight against climate change, since it is able to absorb and retain large quantities of CO2. The enormous increase of the same, however, causes an irreversible and extremely dangerous vicious circle for which not only the soil is unable to retain it all, but the excess, which causes global warming, destroys the soil biodiversity, making it increasingly unable to retain it and gradually worsening the situation.

Biodiversity is important even in your garden

Biodiversity is not only fundamental for life in distant ecosystems or invisible to our eyes, but also for what we have at hand. It is, in fact, important even for the life of small gardens.

A garden rich in biodiversity will not suffer from diseases, and will not require the intervention of chemical products to eradicate them, because its natural balance will protect it. On the contrary, however, a garden with less variety or a monoculture, not only has a higher probability of getting sick, but impoverishes the soil, and therefore for the growth of plants it will be necessary, sooner or later, to resort to chemical agents, which further damage the land.

A good and healthy biodiversity, on the other hand, can only do good to your garden. First of all, it nourishes the soil, enriching it with different substances and making it healthier. In addition, even the aesthetic aspect benefits from it, since biodiversity helps to obtain diluted and constant blooms throughout the year.

Preserving biodiversity is fundamental for life in small and large ecosystems. The damage it is suffering is the alarm bell that should wake us all up, and remind us that without diversity there is no life. Not even ours.