Last year there was one morning when Tasmanian Blennies seemed to be everywhere on the mussel beds in Melbourne’s Port Phillip Bay. They were swimming over rocks in abundance. The next morning, there were almost none. Once you understand why this happens, you realise why nature makes patterns and its extraordinary complexity. It just takes a few variables (like tides, wind and weather) to influence a species’ entire behaviour. Think about how many times a year people gather in large numbers on a popular beach. It’s these kinds of behaviour-linked patterns that keep ecosystemsHow ecosystems function An ecosystem is a community of lifeforms that interact in such an optimal way that how ecosystems function best, is when all components (including humans and other animals) can persist and live alongside each other for the longest time possible. Ecosystems are fuelled by the energy created by plants (primary producers) that convert the Sun's heat energy More resilient by enabling animals to group together. But it’s equally important that these events are rare, or else ecosystems would become overrun. It’s why we should marvel at these moments but also treasure them. Because they are the precise mechanisms on which our world runs, like clockwork.
Complexity, predictability and resilience
Nothing happens all of the time.
Coral spawns only a day or two every year, soon after full moon. Winged ants emerge to breed on certain stormy evenings. This year in Melbourne, there was an unprecedented (or so it seemed) emergence of dragonflies. The skies were filled with them for just one day. Most of the time we don’t know why these things happen.
Recently I joined a spotlighting tour and saw dozens of Eastern-barred Bandicoots at the Mount Rothwell Sanctuary. A week before and they hardly saw any. It had rained the night before and the moon was out. Night animals change their behaviour when the sky is full moon lit. Bandicoots can see owls coming and head out less nervously – in fact the diurnal superb fairy-wrens alarm called when a barn owl went over, that’s how bright it was. Owls have their ‘hay day’ (or night) on dark sky nights, when there is no wind.
Every year, animals have only one or two days (or nights) when conditions are just perfect enough for all the elements to align. These annual events are what keeps whole species surviving. This is what builds resilienceReferring to an ecosystem’s ability to maintain a steady stable-state. The need to build resilience is entirely anthropocentric and symptomatic of ecosystems that are damaged or declining, leading to loss of ecosystem services on which humans depend. More in nature. These events aren’t random or chaotic though. They may be infrequent but they are also regular and somewhat predictable. That is, as long as we don’t introduce too much fluctuation in our climate.
How patterns precision-engineer ecosystems
“It takes two people to create a pattern but only one to change it”
Esther Perel, in Ted Lasso, S02E06.
Two variables can create a pattern but three create texture. In Ted Lasso, Perel was talking about a relationship between two people, which is perhaps less complicated than nature but equally fragile.
Think about tides and time of day. These are systematic variables that create undulations in conditions. Imagine an animal that needs a high tide and early morning to spawn. There may be half a dozen times in a season where these two factors align.
Now introduce a third variable … water temperature, which is less regular. If these events have to happen when the environment is a particular temperature, it becomes much rarer. Turtles, for example, hatch eggs most successfully if they lay during high tide, closer to dawn, when the weather is cool and damp. Success depends on numerous variables.
In-built resilience in wildlife
These rare moments are regular events in an annual calendar that bring animals together. Why nature makes patterns is so animals can boost their success. However, if such events were too frequent, it would mean a species becomes dominant and overwhelms the ecosystem, thus collapsing its resilience.
The rarity of events is also part of the magic. It’s how ecosystems can fit lots of animals together and store enough energyEnergy and nutrients are the same thing. Plants capture energy from the Sun and store it in chemicals, via the process of photosynthesis. The excess greenery and waste that plants create, contain chemicals that animals can eat, in order to build their own bodies and reproduce. When a chemical is used this way, we call it a nutrient. As we More to deliver us food, water and stable climate. The answer to why nature makes patterns is because if animals didn’t contribute to stable climate, they would die out. This is why we should covet these moments, appreciate their significance and do our own best, to avoid impacting climate ourselves.
Species live on the edge of life and death, the pattern of each, fitting around countless others. This is ecosystem precision-engineering on a planet-wide scale.
What we were seeing among the blennies was simple patterns of nature (tides, weather, time of day etc) translated into blenny culture. Blennie brains store the knowledge needed to respond to those variations and gather in different ways. But also to adapt their behaviour, to ensure things keep working, despite some natural variation and unpredictability. It’s what helps makes all animals successful as a species.
This is also why we can go out day after day and never have one day the same as another. It’s why we see unexplained wildlife events all of the time. It’s humbling and awe-inspiring in equal measure.
