Europe

by Tim Flannery

  Europe’s vanished wildlife falls into four categories: 1) those that survive as living creatures outside Europe; 2) those that can be re-created through the selective breeding of domestic stock; 3) those that it might be possible to re-constitute through genetic engineering; 4) those that, given current technology and knowledge, are irrecoverable.

  The easiest species to restore are those that survive elsewhere: spotted hyena, lion, leopard, water buffalo and arguably straight-tusked elephant (also known as African forest elephant), to name a few, are all vanished from Europe, but can be found in Africa or Asia. The next easiest to restore are those that can be resurrected through selective breeding, but only the aurochs, the European wild horse and the Neanderthal fall into this category. From a technical perspective, de-extincting a Neanderthal would be the easiest task of all, for human reproduction is extremely well understood, and the Neanderthal genome is known. But the last people to try selective breeding involving humans were the Nazis, and the idea is utterly immoral—I’m sure the ghost of Lutz Heck would look on with great interest.

  Among the irrecoverable species must be counted Europe’s three rhinos (the woolly, Merck’s and the narrow-nosed), the giant elk, and island species such as Myotragus. But the study of ancient DNA is developing rapidly, and before too long the genomes of several species may well be recovered. The third category—the species that may be recovered through genetic engineering—takes us to the outer limits of scientific knowledge. In 2008 there was an attempt to revive the Spanish bucardo, a subspecies of ibex. The last individual had died in 2000, but scientists had taken ear clippings from her the previous year. They transplanted DNA from the frozen clippings into the cells of domestic goats. One of the embryos thus created survived to birth, but the young bucardo died just seven minutes later, after breathing difficulties.1

  Among extinct species the principal candidates for genetic restoration are, in terms of feasibility, the woolly mammoth, cave bear and cave lion. Revive and Restore is an organisation dedicated to using genetics to save endangered species, and to restore species from extinction.2 It is working on a diverse range of projects, from assisting with the increased use of a synthetic substitute for horseshoe-crab blood (the creatures are overharvested for their blood, which is used in the pharmaceutical industry), to supporting the Harvard Woolly Mammoth Revival Team.

  In early February 2017 it was widely reported in global media that the woolly mammoth would be ‘back from extinction’ by 2018. In fact, George Church, who leads the Harvard Woolly Mammoth Revival Team, had claimed that by 2018, his team hoped to create a viable embryo—perhaps just a few cells—of a creature containing a composite of Asian elephant and woolly mammoth genes. A mammophant, if you like. Given what we now know about elephant hybridisation, this doesn’t sound as outrageous as it might once have. Indeed, perhaps we should see CRISPR technology (a technology enabling genes from one species to be inserted into another) as a continuation of elephant evolution through hybridisation, as has been the case for millions of years.

  Even this more limited ambition, however, speaks eloquently of the rapid progress being made in the area of de-extinction. Church and his team plan to create the mammophant by endowing the egg cell of an Asian elephant with the genes for red blood cells that operate efficiently at low temperature, an enhanced fat layer under the skin, and a luxuriant covering of hair and fur—all from the woolly mammoth genome. The team has already made 45 changes out of the 1642 differences between the elephant and mammoth genomes. But this is just the beginning. The nuclear DNA must then be placed in an embryo, much as Dolly the sheep’s nuclear DNA was replaced to create the world’s first cloned sheep.

  The team does not intend to use an elephant egg cell taken from an elephant, but rather to create one from skin cells. Finally, the growing embryo would need to be kept in an artificial womb for twenty-two months, before a baby mammophant could be produced. And from there a genetically mixed, appropriately age-structured herd of mammophants would need to be ‘manufactured’ if the ‘species’ is to be restored to its ecosystem.3 I have little doubt that, given time, all of this will be possible. But first, humanity must decide whether it’s desirable.

  The genetic reincarnation of Europe’s lost giants would not be the last step, for a sufficiently large and fertile area would have to be set aside for hundreds if not thousands of mega-mammals to roam. Europe is hardly ideal for re-creating the mammoth steppe. But a large project in Siberia, aimed at doing this, is already well underway.* If the mammoth can be restored, then so in all probability can the cave bear and the cave lion. But what would be gained by re-creating them? If a top predator is someday required for a European rewilding project, the living lion is probably a better candidate than the cave lion, being adapted to the prevailing warmer conditions. And by exerting selective pressure on the brown bear to make it herbivorous, we have effectively re-created a large herbivorous ursine that probably occupies the cave bear’s ecological niche. If Europe is to rewild in this age of warming, it is the temperate species, such as the lion and the straight-tusked elephant that must be the focus, and even the largest temperate wilderness on the continent is currently too small for them. But by 2030 it is predicted that there will be 30 million hectares of abandoned farmland in Europe.4 Most of Europe’s national parks exist on privately owned land, and European landowners tend to accept the imposition of societal decisions. It is to the flexible and adaptive European concept of land ownership and the opportunities opened by land abandonment that future generations must turn if they wish to realise the nascent dream of a dynamic, megafaunal Europe.

  But should the Europeans seek to re-create a European megafauna by importing species similar to those it once had, which survive elsewhere? I think the moral case is unassailable: it is unacceptable to ask the people of Africa, whose population may reach around four billion by 2100, to live alongside lions and elephants while Europeans refuse to do so. If we ask others to shoulder such a disproportionate burden, I fear that there will no longer be a place for elephants in this world.5

  The scale of land abandonment in Europe is already so great that managed rewilding is being conducted on only a minute fraction of abandoned lands. Most is instead subject to a huge unplanned experiment, with little or no scientific oversight, and in which an array of species there by happenstance are shaping the future. In the mountainous Colline Metallifere of Grosseto and Siena provinces in Italy, for example, land abandonment is creating a vast new wilderness, which is currently of exceptional diversity. Despite its location amid the manicured landscapes of Tuscany, the region has the lowest population density in all of Italy, and some of its greatest biodiversity. Maquis grows on the warmer slopes, and elsewhere a very diverse forest including oak, holly, chestnut and aspen thrive. The understorey of the regrowing forest is cropped by roe, fallow and red deer—the last two species having escaped from captivity in recent decades. There are no lynx in Tuscany, so the deer population is dense and is having a severe impact on the understorey. Just a few unpalatable species, like juniper, now survive the seedling stage, and if nothing is done they will create a future, impoverished forest of the Colline Metallifere.

  Some people believe that humans should not seek to guide the development of the ecosystems of Europe’s newly wild lands, imagining that they will return to some primeval and desirable state if left alone. But it is already clear that this will not occur, and that a less-diverse and unproductive forest will result from the current haphazard mix of landscape architects comprising the large herbivores and carnivores. The big decisions, as far as human management goes, involve deciding what kinds of large herbivores and carnivores should be released into the unmanaged lands. To make wise decisions, a long-term view is needed.

  Luigi Boitani lives amid the regrowing forests of Tuscany’s Colline Metallifere. Soon after he moved there he planted an acorn beside his house. Today it is a thriving sapling five metres high. I can imagine the grand old tree that, given
a little luck, it will become by 2030, but both Luigi and I struggle to envision the forest it will exist in, let alone the Europe of 180 years hence. The only thing that we’re sure of is that there will be plenty of surprises.

  Let’s enter our time machine for one last journey—into an imagined future Europe 180 years from now, to visit Luigi’s oak in its maturity. We approach a continent that in one respect looks like the archipelago of old: cities stand out like islands linked with transport corridors, each surrounded by a penumbra of greenhouses and other enclosed structures that produce the food the population requires. Instead of being separated by sea, Europe’s cities are separated by vast areas of forests and woodlands—the result of centuries of land abandonment. We touch down beside Luigi’s oak, which is growing in a grassy woodland surrounded by palms, ginkgoes and magnolias, as well as chestnuts, oaks and beech; courtesy of climate change, the Arcto-Tertiary Geoflora is well on its way to re-establishing in Europe.

  Before us in the glade stand two statues. One honours a twenty-first century Russian oligarch who released his immense collection of wild animals into abandoned lands in eastern Europe. Thanks to him, Europe once again has lions, spotted hyena and leopards. A second statue honours a long-sighted Dutch woman who crowdfunded a project to gather the world’s last Sumatran rhinos and straight-tusked elephants and release them in a fenced estate created from recently vacated farmland in western Europe. Given food and shelter, they adapted to the new climate. Eventually the fence was taken down, and elephants and rhinos once more roamed European forests.

  A group of tourists from Africa and Asia, hoping to see elephant and rhino, is led by a young European tour guide. She explains that once-upon-a-time Africa and Asia had megafauna too, but they did not survive the booming population and political chaos in the twenty-first century. She points out an elephant with mammoth-like features. It’s a mammophant whose mixed genetic heritage allows it to fill the ecological niche of a mammoth and still survive in Europe’s warmer climate. The guide explains that scientists discovered that Europe’s ecosystems required two elephant species if they were to stay diverse and healthy, so the mammophant was genetically engineered. The first specimens learned behaviours necessary for their survival after being adopted into herds of straight-tusked elephants. But now there are enough of them to form herds of their own.

  The guide is armed only with a small, high-technology stick, yet she is completely at ease with the great beasts around her—much like Australian tour guides in the land of sharks and crocodiles. And it is this ease with nature that the Europeans have become famous for. As many young Europeans live in the complex ecosystems they have helped to create as do in the cities, for the forests offer adventure, and the possibility of learning something new. The lifestyles of the Europeans are very different from those of the rest of the world’s population, which is concentrated in mega-cities without access to wild areas. A dynamic and adventurous people, the Europeans are always thinking of something new.

  ______________________

  * The project, known as Pleistocene Park, is being led by Sergei Zimov. Horses, moose, muskox, wapiti and wisent are already present in the enclosure.

  Envoi

  In the German city of Worms, a medieval carving depicts a woman holding a midwife toad, which denotes that the woman is herself a midwife.1 The Europeans are the eternal midwives of their environment: every interaction they have with it helps give birth to a new Europe. Let us hope that this generation are midwives with vision.

  Acknowledgments

  Luigi Boitani contributed much material concerning Europe over the past millennium and brought his unparalleled knowledge of European carnivores and the dilemmas of managing abandoned land in Europe to the project. We do not agree on every sentiment expressed in the book. Any errors are mine, and contentious points of view my responsibility.

  Kate and Coleby Holden accompanied me on the many journeys required to write this book. Kate read the manuscript and provided many useful comments. I owe Brian Rosen an enormous debt of gratitude for sharing his profound knowledge of European geology and palaeontology. Kris Helgen read the entire manuscript and corrected many errors. Jerry Hooker generously shared his research into early mammals, and was exceedingly generous with his time, illuminating many aspects of European prehistory and palaeontology. Colin Groves critiqued the first third of the manuscript in the last week of his life, in his usual acute and humorous manner, and Martin Aberhan and Johannes Müller, both herpetologists, explained their important research. Some of the writing and research for this book was completed while I taught at the Graduate Institute in Geneva. Its director, Professor Philippe Burrin, provided much stimulating conversation and encouragement. A special thanks to Claudio Segre, for supporting me while at the Graduate Institute, and for his wonderful hospitality. In Romania, Enrico Perinyi and the staff of Seneca Publishing, especially Anastasia, Irina, Catiline, Micale, Maria and Christie, made our visit a most enjoyable and enlightening experience. The staff of Wildlife Carpathia and the Hateg Geopark were also extremely generous with their time. Dr Valentin Paraschiv, Dr Dan Grigorescu and Dr Ben Kear all deserve my thanks for assisting with information and discussions. Nick Rowley alerted me to the plight of Europe’s smaller birds, and Geoff Holden informed me of many other matters, as well as reading a draft of the manuscript. Finally, thanks must go to my editors, Michael Heyward and Jane Pearson, at Text Publishing, who have made this a far better book.

  Also by Tim Flannery

  Mammals of New Guinea

  Tree Kangaroos: A Curious Natural

  History with R. Martin, P. Schouten and A. Szalay

  The Future Eaters

  Possums of the World: a Monograph of the Phalangeroidea with P. Schouten

  Mammals of the South West Pacific and Moluccan Islands

  Watkin Tench, 1788 (ed.)

  John Nicol, Life and Adventures 1776–1801 (ed.)

  Throwim Way Leg: An Adventure

  The Explorers (ed.)

  The Birth of Sydney (ed.)

  Terra Australis: Matthew Flinders’ Great Adventures in the Circumnavigation of Australia (ed.)

  The Eternal Frontier

  A Gap in Nature with P. Schouten

  John Morgan, The Life and Adventures of William Buckley (ed.)

  The Birth of Melbourne (ed.)

  Joshua Slocum, Sailing Alone around the World (ed.)

  Astonishing Animals with P. Schouten

  Country

  The Weather Makers

  We Are the Weather Makers

  An Explorer’s Notebook

  Here on Earth

  Among the Islands

  The Mystery of the Venus Island Fetish

  Atmosphere of Hope

  Sunlight and Seaweed

  Tim Flannery is a leading writer on climate change. Scientist, explorer and conservationist, he has held various academic positions including Professor at the University of Adelaide, Director of the South Australian Museum, Principal Research Scientist at the Australian Museum, Professorial Fellow at the Melbourne Sustainable Society Institute, University of Melbourne, and Panasonic Professor of Environmental Sustainability, Macquarie University. His books include the award-winning international bestseller The Weather Makers, Here on Earth and Atmosphere of Hope. Flannery was the 2007 Australian of the Year. He is currently chief councillor of the Climate Council.

  Endnotes

  INTRODUCTION

  1 Wodehouse, P. G., The Code of the Woosters, Herbert Jenkins, London, 1938.

  CHAPTER 1

  1 Much of the rest of this chapter has been distilled from a recent and detailed review: ‘Island Life in the Cretaceous—Faunal Composition, Biogeography, Evolution, and Extinction of Land-living Vertebrates on the Late Cretaceous European Archipelago’, Zoltan Csiki-Sava, Eric Buffetaut, Attila Ősi, Xabier Pereda-Suberbiola, Stephen L. Brusatte, ZooKeys 469: 1–161 (08 Jan 2015). I am extremely grateful for their work in bringing so many scattered references toget
her and placing them in context.

  2 Signor III, P. W. and Lipps, J. H., ‘Sampling Bias, Gradual Extinction Patterns, and Catastrophes in the Fossil Record’, in Silver, L. T and Schultz, P. H. eds., Geological Implications of Impacts of Large Asteroids and Comets on the Earth, Geological Society of America Special Publications, Vol. 190, pp. 291–96, 1982. A taxon, incidentally, is a taxonomic grouping of organisms.

  3 This reconstruction of Hateg’s flora is drawn from a number of sources that document the flora of Modac and Bal over a long period of time. It thus paints a broadbrush picture, some details of which may not be precisely applicable to Hateg at the time that some of the creatures discussed existed.

  4 Blondel, J. et al, The Mediterranean Region: Biological Diversity in Space and Time, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2010, 2nd edition, Chapter 3.

  CHAPTER 2

  1 Veselka, V., ‘History Forgot this Rogue Aristocrat Who Discovered Dinosaurs and Died Penniless’, Smithsonian Magazine, July 2016, http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/history-forgot-rogue-aristocrat-discovered-dinosaurs-died-penniless-180959504/

  2 Gaffney, E. S. & Meylan, P. A., ‘The Transylvanian Turtle Kallokibotion, a Primitive Cryptodire of the Cretaceous Age’, American Museum Novitates, 3040, 1992.

  3 Ibid.

  4 Edinger, T., ‘Personalities in Palaeontology—Nopcsa’, Society of Vertebrate Palaeontology News Bulletin, Vol. 43, pp. 35–39, New York, 1955.

  5 Ibid.

  6 Taschwer, K., ‘Othenio Abel, Kämfer gegen die “Verjudung” der Universität’, Der Standard, 9 October 2012.

  7 Ibid.

  8 Nopcsa, F., ‘Die Lebensbedingungen der Obercretacischen Dinosaurier Siebenbürgens’, Centralblatt für Mineralogie und Paläontologie, Vol. 18, pp. 564–574, 1914.

  9 Plot, R., The Natural History of Oxfordshire, Being an Essay towards the Natural History of England, Printed at The Theatre in Oxford, 1677, llustration on p. 142, discussion, pp. 132–36.