While I tend not to be the sort to shriek in righteous terror at the prospect of Genetically Modified food, or clones, or stuff of that sort being a blight upon the land, a moral outrage, and a clear and present danger to the general ecosystem, it is worth remembering as we tinker with the stuff of life that it is possible to seriously screw stuff up that way. While everyone shakes their heads over the rabbits-in-Australia or kudzu problems, even today folks are making (bad) decisions with ecosystems and tinkering with breeds that have unforeseen bad consequences.
Back in the early 1980’s, the Wilhelmina Zoo in Stuttgart was looking into various types of seaweed for use in their aquarium displays. They settled on a species known as Caulerpa taxifolia, since its bright green, feathery fern-like fronds were quite pretty, and it was both hardy and fast-growing. In addition, it produces chemicals that make it taste awful to marine animals, so it wouldn’t get eaten.
By repeatedly subjecting specimens to harsh aquarium conditions and selecting the ones that survived the best, researchers developed Caulerpa taxifolia (Vahl) C. Agandh, a new-and-improved, genetically distinct strain which was particularly hardy and fast-growing. This variety was ideal for their purposes and it was shared with other museums and aquariums. For a time, all was well and good in the world of marine botany. In 1984, however, a square meter patch of this new variety of Caulerpa was found in the Mediterranean off the shore of Monaco, right outside the Oceanographic Museum.
From which it has spread to be a major problem in the Mediterranean and elsewhere.
“It will never get out / spread” is going down with “the check is in the mail” and “unsinkable” as one of the cliche false prophesies of our time. You’d think those guys never watched a science fiction movie. “Let’s make something fast growing, unpredatable, and, oh, let’s give it the capability of independent thought and put laser guns on its head. What could go wrong?” Okay, I’m fibbing on the “independent thought” and “laser guns” bits, but, jeez, fast-growing plus no predators = freaking disaster in any ecology or biology book.
And that was just basic breeding program stuff. No direct genetic tweaking involved.
Enough to make a man a Luddite.