Apparently, we're making our food smaller.
According to a recent Scientific American article, the reproductive cycles of the plants and animals that are "harvested aggressively" from the wild and changing rapidly, and the species that we eat are getting smaller in size -- about 20 percent smaller than a few generations ago.
The findings are the result of a new study published this week in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
According to the study, which was led by Chris Darimont, an evolutionary ecologist at the University of California at Santa Cruz, humans are different from non-human predators, which normally go after the young and the weak -- we "typically exploit high proportions of prey populations and target large, reproductive-aged adults."
Since big, old animals are being caught and eaten by us, they start reproducing at a younger age, mature more quickly and adults become smaller.
The smaller sizes change the predator-prey relationships, impacting entire ecosystems.
GET INFORMED
- "Hungry World Must Eat Less Meat" (BBC, August 14, 2004)
- Eat sustainably
- Sign the Pew Environment Group petition urging the US National Marine Fisheries Service to stop overfishing
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