“When the Suez Canal opened in 1869, it allowed tropical species from the waters of the Indian Ocean to move into the Mediterranean. And they did. Yet while 250 species of all kinds established themselves, there has only been one recorded extinction. Similarly, when the Panama Canal joined the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans in 1914, biodiversity increased on both sides. North America has morre birds and mammal species than when the Europeans first landed. And the addition of some four thousand plant species has added 20 percent to biodiversity and not, so far as is known, resulted in a single plant species being lost. Likewise, the UK’s twenty-three hundred additional species have not directly caused any known local extinctions.” EcologyExtinctionAlien SpeciesBiodiversity Increase Book:The New Wild: Why Invasive Species Will Be Nature's Salvation Source: The New Wild: Why Invasive Species Will Be Nature's Salvation