50 years after the catastrophic explosion that shook the island of Krakatoa and claimed over 36,000 lives and massive destruction of flora and two-thirds of the land mass ensued life seemed to be back to normal with species re-colonization being reported by MacArthur and Wilson (515). Such a catastrophic natural disaster has the capability to wipe out all fauna and flora available as even a slight change in the biodiversity can seriously compromise its equilibrium. As Wilson puts it, “too much disturbance diminishes the assets of biological diversity.” Anak Krakatoa rose as a caldera from this massive eruption and still experiences small eruptions which have set back to the total recolonization of the island by species of animals and plant (MacArthur and Wilson 515).
One of the most evident effects on the biodiversity on the island is that life is only concentrated on individual vegetated patches as opposed to pre-eruption where life was present all over the island. Equilibrium is severely distorted where certain species like the Rattus rattus maintained experienced no increases in their population. (MacArthur and Wilson 516). With species on the increase since the eruption even with smaller subsequent eruptions, Wilson has underscored that "Ordinary volcanic eruptions are not enough, then, to break the crucible of life." It is so because life forms are resilient because even with the major six extinctions recorded on earth since the ice age millions of years ago, life form somehow came up again and started up all over. Thus, judging from this evidence, the crucible of life can never be completely shattered but, "Recovery is a slow, laborious process of trial and error, fortunes and foibles." (Wilson).However, it is rather uninformed to conclude that there will come a time when life no longer exists thus completely breaking the crucible of life with no possibilities of repair.
In line with ordinary times, the face of the “ordinary fauna and flora” might stay the same because some species like spiders, rats and other plants dispersed by the wind have the ability to inhabit any environment. However, once the geography of the environment changes as it was reported that black pumice-like debris covered the island species may evolve to adapt to these changes for survival and thus differ from ordinary times qualitatively but not quantitatively.
Works cited
Cramp, V. How Volcanoes Work. San Diego State University. Web. 27 Jan. 2016.
MacArthur, R. H. and Wilson, E. O. The Theory of Island Biogeography. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1967. Print.
The Diversity of Life. MyWeb Rollins. Web. 27 Jan.
Wilson, E. O. The Diversity of Life. New York: W. W. Norton &Company, 1992. Print.
