Posted on 02/21/2005 7:04:50 AM PST by Alex Marko
The fabled marshes of Mesopotamia, largely destroyed by Saddam Hussein in one of the worst pieces of ecological vandalism in recent history, can be partially restored, scientists said on Sunday.
The first scientific assessment of the marshes in southern Iraq, al considered by some to have been the Biblical location of the Garden of Eden, was presented to the American Association for the Advancement of Science meeting in Washington.
Saddam's drainage programme - accompanied by the persecution and forced relocation of the Marsh Arabs who had lived there for 5,000 years - reduced the wetlands to 7 per cent of their original 20,000 sq km area. But some of the former marshland is already recovering, following the actions of local people who broke down Saddam's dikes and dams after his regime fell in 2003.
The study by US, Canadian and Iraqi scientists showed a surprising rapid return of plants and wildlife to the areas that have been reflooded by the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. "The quality of the river water turns out to be much higher than many people had expected," said Curtis Richardson of Duke University in North Carolina, the study leader.
"Immediately after [the overthrow of Saddam] we saw just a dozen birds in the marshes," Prof Richardson said. "A year later, there were hundreds and now they are talking about many thousands."
The marshes were once an important resting point for waterfowl migrating between Siberia and Africa. The local otter species, which survived in the small area of the marshes along the Iranian border that were not drained, is also making a come-back.
Barry Warner, a botanist at the University of Waterloo in Canada, said: "There are encouraging signs that a vibrant and healthy plant community will re-establish itself in the newly wetted areas."
Because the marshes were drained only recently - mainly during the 1990s as Saddam took revenge on the Shia Marsh Arabs for their failed insurrection after the first Gulf War - many desiccated areas retain a large and viable seedbed.
But the scientists said a sustained international effort would be needed to support Iraqis' efforts to turn the current ad-hoc flooding into a sustainable long-term revival. Peter Reiss, director of the US Agency for International Development's marshland restoration project, said: "Within Iraq the destruction of the marshes has become a symbol of the oppression by Saddam's regime."
Most Iraqis support restoration, but there is no consensus about how much of the marshes to restore permanently given the competing demands for scarce water. Prof Richardson said 30 per cent would be a reasonable target.
Plans by Turkey and Iran to take more water from the Tigris and Euphrates rivers also pose a long-term threat to marshland restoration.
Even the Marsh Arabs have somewhat ambivalent attitudes about restoration of the wetlands. Their population, estimated at 350,000 in 1950, is now little more than 100,000, none of whom are living in their original homes, Mr Reiss said. Their traditional way of life, documented by Wilfred Thesiger, Gavin Maxwell and other authors, was based on fishing, water buffalo herding and reed cutting. This is virtually extinct today and most of the remaining Marsh Arabs are impoverished sedentary farmers. But according to Mr Reiss, many of them feel it will be impossible to recreate their way of life and would prefer outside investment in conventional agriculture.
Well I don't know if the Garden of Eden was in Iraq, but if it was the place went into Babylon = confusion, since those days.
Restoring "Eden" is a noble and laudable goal, and a very intriguing one at that. Thanks for posting this!
I'm sure God knew about airplanes way back when he dictated those words.
I don't presume to understand their full meaning.
But, hey, !IF! you care to presume greater knowledge than God, He's likely to let you get away with such a presumption . . . for a while.
> If the Colorado river in Arizona was once a babbling brook through verdant pastures and some 'event' turned it into what it is now, then I would say it has been remade, yet it is still the Colorado.
Well, according to the "all the water was suspended in the sky"-type Creationists, the Earth was remarkably flat prior to the flood. Also, the Grand Canyon was carved out by the flood. As a consequence, there would have been no particluar reason or even *ability* for there to be a Colorado river of any description prior to the flood. It would have been a flat, verdant plain; any creek or stream in the area would have been wholly unrelated to the Colorado that results from the Flood tearing the Earth up and forming the mountains.
Similarly, had there been Tigris/Euphrates rivers prior to the FLood, they, too would have been unrelated to rivers post-flood, since the source and sink for the rivers woudl have been entirely different.
This is, of course, idle fantastical specualtion.
There are certainly plenty of references indicating God does precisely that.
But, what I'm curious about and find much more odd . . . just when did you become big enough to tell God HE can't or oughten to do that? He'd likely be up for a good chuckle to but He already knows.
LOVE your tag!
> just when did you become big enough to tell God HE can't or oughten to do that?
Just when did you become big enough to tell other people not to question things?
What that location has going for it is that its near the city of Ur(religious importance need not even be explained)
That's a pretty big leap of illogic!
I think the attitude of the heart is rather important when it comes to questioning things God has said.
And, I haven't found the attitude of the heart to be that great amongst those who seem most at odds with; most cheeky in wording about; most skeptical about the things God has said. But then, they don't seem that intimate with God's heart, either, so I guess it figures.
As to what the attitude of your heart is--God knows. But from the available evidence, I wouldn't want to bet the farm on it.
Shall we interpret that as a confession that you're reevaluating whether you're big enough to tell God how He has to do something or what He meant in Scripture?
> when it comes to questioning things God has said.
I'm not questioning what God has said. I'm questioning what the *Bible* says. Whether those thigns are one and the same is an arguement that has been going on for centuries.
Shall we interpret that as a confession that you're reevaluating whether you're big enough to tell other ppeople what questions they dare ask?
Southern Mesopotamia, where the Tigris and the Euphrates flowed, first separately, then united, towards the Persian Gulf, was more beguiling in history than in fact. Here were Babylon and Nineveh, here Sennacherib had fought his battles, here indeed, some said, had been the Garden of Eden at the start of the world. But it was a fearful country now. .... In the summer it was indescribably hot, in the winter unbearably cold. In the dry season everything was baked like leather, in the wet season 10,000 square miles were flooded, the waters gradually oozing away to leave malodorous wastes of marsh. Fleas, sand-flies and mosquitoes tormented the place, and its inhabitants lived lives of ignorant poverty, enlivened only by sporadic excitements of crime or brigandage, the illusions of religion and the consolations of sex.Is this the land of dear old Adam (one British soldier wondered),
And beautiful Mother Eve?
If so dear reader small blame to them
For sinning and having to leave..
-- James (Jan) Morris, Farewell the Trumpets.
Nah! The enviromental whackos don't even believe the Bible.
And they fight anything that's common sense.
Or for that matter.... "faith based".
aaahhhhhhh.
Wellllllllll, The Bible has won a lot of arguments. Won another one recently. Said Edom was at such and such a time and state. Scholars heretofore had said that was impossible. Recent archeological evidence for the umpteen hundredth time has shown The Bible accurate to the last detail.
I think I'll go with The Bible.
I guess you missed that part about the attitude of the heart.
Not surprisingly.
> Said Edom was at such and such a time and state. Scholars heretofore had said that was impossible.
Which scholars said that it was *impossible?* Same ones who said that Troy was a myth... until it was found, thus proving the truth of the Iliad and revealing the actual divinity of the Olympian gods? </sarcasm>
> Recent archeological evidence for the umpteen hundredth time has shown The Bible accurate to the last detail.
Yes, in things of which there is no particular controversy. A religious text written in, say, New York City, buried for three millenia and then rediscovered woudl hardly be proven to be God's Hoenst Truth just because the remains of the city of New York are found, now would it?
> Said Edom was at such and such a time and state. Scholars heretofore had said that was impossible.
Which scholars said that it was *impossible?* Same ones who said that Troy was a myth... until it was found, thus proving the truth of the Iliad and revealing the actual divinity of the Olympian gods? </sarcasm>
> Recent archeological evidence for the umpteen hundredth time has shown The Bible accurate to the last detail.
Yes, in things of which there is no particular controversy. A religious text written in, say, New York City, buried for three millenia and then rediscovered woudl hardly be proven to be God's Hoenst Truth just because the remains of the city of New York are found, now would it?
> I guess you missed that part about the attitude of the heart. Not surprisingly.
No, it's not surprising. My heart has no attitude. It is just a muscle, incapable of emotional response.
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