These are my recommendations for revising the article, Ecological imperialism.
Copied content from Ecological imperialism: see that page's history for attribution.
- I added two citations in the first paragraph of Fur Trade in North America at the end of the paragraph.
- I added a citation in the second paragraph of the Fur Trade in North America at the end of the paragraph.
Fur trade in North America
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During this time of colonialism, Europe had seen a great increase in the demand for luxury fur, mainly by Western Europeans. Serbia at the time was the main source of luxury fur, but was unable to supply enough, thus leading to an increase in the value of fur, which in turn expanded the fur trade in North America.[1] The fur trade was as detrimental to the survival of native people as it was imperative to the success of settlers due to high European demand. Trappers employed natives because of their knowledge of the terrain and wildlife, putting native populations with no immunity to European diseases into close contact with them. Europeans introduced the native population to their worse enemy, diseases that were carried and brought over from their home land. [2] Smallpox was the most rampant disease that affected the Native Americans. Fur traders brought smallpox and spread the disease amongst the Native Americans through close contact in the fur trade.[3] The fur trade also led to the trading of guns to Native Americans, which led to war between tribes and the further spread of disease. For example, wars between the Piikanis and Shoshone tribes led to the Shoshones becoming infected with smallpox, a result of Piikanis being given guns by the Europeans through trade, who carried the disease over to the indigenous group.[4]
The fur trade also upset the ecological balance of North America. "Restraint wasn't a hallmark of the fur trade. In 1822, in the north western regions of the country alone, the Hudson's Bay Company stockpiled 1,500 fox skins, a paltry number compared with the 106,000 beaver skins, but too many none the less. The fur traders had miscalculated. As predators, they had failed to adapt to their prey, and their prey, in turn, retaliated with denial. Of course, the red fox didn't render himself extinct. His numbers merely shrank.".[5] The fur trade not only miscalculated the predator-prey ratio, it allowed for the increase spread of smallpox in the Northern regions of the Americas; Thus creating a geographic commercial route for smallpox to travel from urban populated cities to the rural, open, woodland northern country.[6] Among the disruptions to the ecological balance of North America was the overhunting of beavers by fur traders. While Native Americans had been living amongst beavers for years, they almost went extinct due to the fur traders. Wars between Native Americans and fur traders had led to the near extinction of beavers in the area. The beaver population declined rapidly, and along with it the diversity of other animals in the regions where the fur trade took place.[7]
- ^ Crosby, Alfred (3 April 1994). Germs, Seeds and Animals: Studies in Ecological History (Sources and Studies in World History). Routledge; 1st edition. p. 17.
- ^ "American Indians at European Contact | NCpedia". www.ncpedia.org. Retrieved 2020-10-16.
- ^ Carlos, Ann M.; Lewis, Frank D. (July 1, 2012). "Smallpox and Native American mortality: The 1780s epidemic in the Hudson Bay region". Explorations in Economic History. 49 (3): 278–279. doi:10.1016/j.eeh.2012.04.003.
- ^ Hall, Ryan (2020). Beneath the Backbone of the World: Blackfoot People and the North American Borderlands. University of North Carolina Press. pp. 43–46.
- ^ Crosby, Alfred (1986). Ecological Imperialism: The Biological Expansion of Europe. Cambridge University Press.
- ^ Piper, Liza; Sandlos, John (1 October 2007). Environmental History. Oxford University Press. p. 765.
- ^ Roberts, Strother, E. (2019). Colonial ecology, Atlantic economy : transforming nature in early New England. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. pp. 41–45. ISBN 978-0-8122-9614-3. OCLC 1097973967.
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