Acadia National Park |
Humans in acadia
human impact in acadia
Acadia is a nationally protected park that welcomes visitors. Visitors are asked to follow the 'leave no trace' rule. Many people have been disregarding this rule. Cairns are constructed along the trails of Acadia, there to mark travel routes, but people have also begun to create these cairns all over the park. Although they may seem like an innocent sculpture, these rock piles are another form of graffiti.When you create them on hiking trails, people can mistake a visitor-made cairn for a cairn marker made by the trail crew. This can lead people on the wrong path, which is very dangerous.
Cairns also disrupt the natural beauty of the park. Other visitors want to discover the same land as the people before them, and a beach with a steadily growing number of cairns is a different landscape than what the person before saw. Photographers and sightseers can also be affected by cairns, as they clutter the view and often make it dangerous to venture into certain areas.
A final issue with these cairns is that when they are built in vulnerable places, the removal of rocks from the delicate soil can lead to extreme erosion, and/or uproot and kill plants, as well as affect organisms living in the soil. Everything is connected, and so disturbing just one small ecosystem can hurt a much wider audience.
Cairns are definitely not the only problem concerning visitors at Acadia. The park is very small and very fragile. It can be affected by many things. The cars that most visitors arrive in congest the air and cause traffic throughout the park. The exhaust can harm many species, as well as the environment.When visitors do not stay on the trail they can trample small plants and animals, and even when you walk on the side of a trail rather than the center, you can hurt plants and tree roots that extend onto the path, and lead to erosion.
When visitors bring dogs, they can kill wildlife, bother other visitors, and be hurt by other animals in the park. Visitors also tend to feed wild animals, and because of this, animals often loose the ability to hunt and then they starve, become dangerous pests, or are hit by cars while in search of food. Collecting plants, stones, antlers, beach shells and cobbles is prohibited in the park, but people often do it anyway. The park also stresses recycling, bringing back what you brought, putting out fires thoroughly, and many other rules that are not always followed by visitors.
Cairns also disrupt the natural beauty of the park. Other visitors want to discover the same land as the people before them, and a beach with a steadily growing number of cairns is a different landscape than what the person before saw. Photographers and sightseers can also be affected by cairns, as they clutter the view and often make it dangerous to venture into certain areas.
A final issue with these cairns is that when they are built in vulnerable places, the removal of rocks from the delicate soil can lead to extreme erosion, and/or uproot and kill plants, as well as affect organisms living in the soil. Everything is connected, and so disturbing just one small ecosystem can hurt a much wider audience.
Cairns are definitely not the only problem concerning visitors at Acadia. The park is very small and very fragile. It can be affected by many things. The cars that most visitors arrive in congest the air and cause traffic throughout the park. The exhaust can harm many species, as well as the environment.When visitors do not stay on the trail they can trample small plants and animals, and even when you walk on the side of a trail rather than the center, you can hurt plants and tree roots that extend onto the path, and lead to erosion.
When visitors bring dogs, they can kill wildlife, bother other visitors, and be hurt by other animals in the park. Visitors also tend to feed wild animals, and because of this, animals often loose the ability to hunt and then they starve, become dangerous pests, or are hit by cars while in search of food. Collecting plants, stones, antlers, beach shells and cobbles is prohibited in the park, but people often do it anyway. The park also stresses recycling, bringing back what you brought, putting out fires thoroughly, and many other rules that are not always followed by visitors.
Photo used under Creative Commons from andrewmalone