Steve and I have a mutual interest in Chinese natural history. I don’t know as much as I would like but I try to keep an eye on it. China is a biodiversity hotspot and has temperate forests that were connected across the Bering land and Atlantic land bridges in the past. There is a lot of shared floral history that has been separated with evolution causing drift. This has led to invasive species and disease issues from China. There has been some of that has gone the other way as well but many species evolved in China first and it has been worse outside China.
The rediscovery of Carya poilanei (Juglandaceae) after 63 years
I saw this report and it made me curious so I looked at Yunnan, China on Google Earth and, of course, it was a shock. I was expecting forest but saw fragmentation on a massive scale with roads everywhere on steep mountains. The slopes were covered in fields and terraces. I could only wonder how much erosion and soil depletion there was.
I am furious at their environmental record
Me, too. China was one of the most spectacular places on the planet 10,000 years ago. It has been devastated. The eastern plains would have been forested with giant trees in super fertile soil. All gone and likely many unique species unknown to us now. It has continued into the mountains.
the Han Chinese consider themselves our superiors
I saw somewhere that the official government line is that the Chinese evolved in place separate from the rest of humanity. That is contrary to the evidence, genetic and archaeological. It is propaganda but not a total surprise given their history. They started civilization while suffering invasion from outside forces repeatedly but it is also an authoritarian reflex which they have unnecessarily suffered as well. That us and them mentally plays out in
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7mHpVSfqBoA
trivial ways above and
non trivial ways above.
I looked up a copy of The Retreat of the Elephants book at the time. (FYI I think I found an online copy free somewhere but it is not coming up under a quick search.) I didn’t read it all but it made an impression, which, with the above, is to weep for what China was and what it will become in the anthropocene.
The tree paper led to this digression. There was more to say that I forgot. I may revise this later.