New to the city? So are pigeons, house sparrows, and squirrels — relatively speaking. Not all of the animals we see around the five boroughs evolved here, but many have adapted extraordinarily well to city life, making it difficult to imagine New York without them. What does it mean that some of our most iconic animal residents came from somewhere else?
Ecologists often describe species as invasive when they pose a problem for the survival of native species: These ‘new’ plants and animals might be outcompeting more local ones for resources like food and habitat. But this can obscure the origin of the problem. Since European colonization, humans have so drastically altered the landscape — from woodland to concrete jungle — that cities have transformed into entirely new ecosystems that require species to adapt.
The advent of evolutionary theory in the 19th century inspired a craze of hobbyist breeders devoted to “perfecting” varieties of domestic animals.
“I think there is generally agreement that these introductions of birds at the hands of such societies played a huge role in defining North American biodiversity writ large,” said Farnsworth. He said that starlings and house sparrows are causing problems in greener parts of the city — like Inwood, and parts of Brooklyn and Queens — because they’re outcompeting native birds for limited nesting space in the cavities of trees.
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