[ExI] COVID-19 ecology

[Kunvar Thaman]

Yes. A few days ago, I was sitting in the backyard of my home, working away
on my laptop. My father was sitting opposite of me. He whispered to me to
stay still, and that there was a pair of monkeys behind me, on the wall. I
turned and we quietly moved away. I had never encountered a monkey before.
I like to stay outside at night sometimes and look at the stars. The sky is
free of pollution and so clear these days. All the river cleaning projects
needed lots of money are on hold because of covid, and the rivers are still
getting cleaned up by themselves.

People are sanitizing every surface they find, surely there must be some
effects on the microbe level. Another thing I like about the lockdowns is
that the noise levels, the constant chatter in the background of cars has
been replaced with birds chirping. I find it very enjoyable.

As for the spread of other viruses, since they are not alive when not with
a host, they should not be impacted much. The house cats example would have
some effect on the mouse population and that in turn could be a cascade
effect. I'd like to hear more on this.

&Kunvar.

On Wed, Apr 1, 2020 at 1:00 AM Dan TheBookMan via extropy-chat <
extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:

> Maybe someone here or even in media has speculated on this... With over
> seven billion people around, many of them discussing this pandemic, it’s
> probably been mentioned but I’ve missed it. Anyhow, I was thinking that the
> responses to the pandemic, especially physical distancing, must have an
> impact on the wider ecosystem. After all, humans (and their pets*)
> transport around microbes and macrobes (think of fleas and mites), and the
> responses have mostly gone in the direction that would slow down if not
> stop this living transportation network.
>
> I recall years ago reading about ‘citizen scientists’ swabbing railings in
> major metro areas to see what kind of bacteria folks were carrying around.
> I wonder if that sort of thing has been continued and if there are reliable
> censuses that we can refer to to see if COVID-19 measures have radically
> changed.
>
> Regards,
>
> Dan
>    Sample my Kindle books at:
>
> http://author.to/DanUst
>
>
> * I’m used to interacting with cats and dogs on my neighborhood. That’s
> basically stopped due to physical distancing. In fact, many of my neighbors
> now keep their cats indoors all day long. This not changes/stops the
> transport network, but will likely mean less predation by house cats —
> another ecosystem impact.
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