Marian Deschain

What is the most common form of human infrastructure in the world? It may well be the fence. Recent estimates suggest that the total length of all fencing around the globe is 10 times greater than the total length of roads…

On every continent, from cities to rural areas and from ancient to modern times, humans have built fences. But we know almost nothing about their ecological effects. Border fences are often in the news, but other fences are so ubiquitous that they disappear into the landscape, becoming scenery rather than subject.

[In fact]…compiling studies from ecosystems around the world…research shows that fences produce a complex range of ecological effects.

I love articles that jog my brain into looking at my own life’s landscape to examine/re-examine the subject matter. Living where barbed wire rules, here in the American Southwest, you have to think about fences anywhere you roam.