Do We Really Want to Fool With Mother Nature?

Did you know that the original species of American rainbow trout may now be extinct? Ken Ringle of the Washington Post writes that the rainbow has been "so hatchery-tweaked and interbred over the years that even DNA detectives puzzle over its exact genetic makeup." These hatchery bred rainbows have become rapacious predators who gobble up frogs and native fish, pushing some species to endangerment. Ringle writes that "even songbird and bat populations have suffered near mountain lakes when non-native rainbows consumed mayflies and other insects on which avian populations feed."

Anders Halverson has written a book entitled An Entirely Synthetic Fish: How Rainbow Trout Beguiled America and Overran the World. As Ringle summarizes in the Post, "Once again, the evidence shows, it's a dodgy prospect fooling with Mother Nature."