2016-09-26 Game Management Advisory Commission Minutes

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Hawaii Game Management Advisory Commission Meeting Minutes – September 26, 2016 VII. DISCUSSION: 1. Dr. Sydney Ross Singer, Environmental Anthropologist on the impact of Invasive Species and their Management DS: Thank you, Tom, thank you for having me here, um, I think to start off we need to discuss that there’s really two types of invasive species, ah, there is the type that are basically pests that everyone would agree with are pests: mosquitoes and the diseases that they carry; fungus that infects our ohia; various agricultural pests; noxious plants that are poisonous – poisonous to animals. I think we would all agree on that and I think throughout the history of taking care of agriculture and the environment in Hawaii and on the mainland, in general, people have been aware of the need to control pests. But there’s another type of invasive species and that is a species that is an alien to an environment and that can cause damage to either, either if it can, or is likely to cause damage to human health, the environment or the economy. And because the environment is being interpreted by these rules that define the invasive species that way, as being something that should be native and restores to a native ecosystem status. Species are being judged as invasive because basically they’re not native and they’re not part of the preservationists’ scenario and goal of protecting native species and restoring native ecosystems and I think because we have this – these two definitions of invasive species \[unclear\] that term has co-opted what used to be just “pests” and I think that’s created controversy because many of the species that are labeled now as invasive simply because they are introduced, um, these are beneficial species that were introduced for a reason – many of them. And, I think, the reason this is of interest to the Game Management community is that many of these species are food animals and from plants that were brought here for sustainability, for, ah, to provide food and to this day are still an important component of the diet of many people, ah, especially in, you know, parts of Puna, where I live. I know it’s a very important part of the culture and the personal economy. So when you have this – so there’s basically these two different approaches to what’s invasive and unfortunately we’re dealing with a bio-security agenda right now, and there’s – I was really glad you asked me today because \[unclear\] is still open on the proposed bio-security plan until like mid-October, you should check on that, Tom, but you can still make comment and the comment that I said to them, um, was that, I think the resistance that you’re getting over the years \[unclear\] invasive species management is that they’ve been attacking the wrong things. They’ve been attacking species that have benefits but, once they label it invasive there are no benefits, ah, to the, to that preservationist model of what is invasive, what is – doesn’t belong in Hawaii based upon an arbitrary date in history – pre-western contact – and at that point they’re after anything that was brought – 3