Forest Fragmentation In Natural Gas Drilling

From Wikimarcellus

Forest fragmentation is a key ecological concept thought to be closely related to the maintenance and promotion of biodiversity of plant and animal species requiring a forest habitat. Fragmentation essentially occurs once an undivided forest somehow becomes separated into a series of often disconnected patches thus disturbing natural habitats of occasionally very rare species whose ecological niche can primarily be found in deep forest. Natural gas drilling requires the withdrawal of some agricultural and forested acreage for at least a year or more, and it has been argued that this can be a contributing factor to fragmentation and have an ensuing impact on woodland biodiversity. Of course, many other factors can also affect forest fragmentation, and historically these have included a variety of natural and anthropomorphic sources.