Nature: What We See and What We Don't See

For years, I have spent part of my life in nature and among wildlife. During that time, I have often encountered situations where identifying a “threat” seemed straightforward: an animal killed in a road accident, an area that had been destroyed, or signs of human presence where there shouldn’t have been any.

But the more I worked in nature, the more I realized that the issue is usually not that simple.

Sometimes, we may find an animal carcass by the roadside, and everything seems clear: the road, the vehicle, and the accident. But the more important question is: why was the animal crossing there in the first place? Had its natural movement route been disrupted? Had it been forced to travel a longer distance to find water, prey, or a mate?

Sometimes, one threat is itself the result of another.

That is why, in wildlife conservation, finding a “culprit” does not always mean identifying the underlying problem.

Some Threats Go Unseen

We usually recognize a threat through something that happens suddenly: hunting, an accident, a wildfire, or the direct destruction of a habitat.

But much of the damage takes shape without any major event occurring on a single day.

A plain may still appear green, a mountain may still stand where it always has, and no animals may have died. Yet prey populations may have declined, a movement route may have disappeared, or water resources may have diminished.

Under such conditions, the habitat still exists on the map, but gradually loses its ability to support life.

This may be one of the most challenging aspects of conservation: many of the most important changes do not initially produce any dramatic or visible signs.

I remember traveling with a professor from a German university to Golestan National Park. We were proud of this beautiful and ancient park and spoke about its age, history, and the land it encompassed. The professor, however, calmly told us that based on the evidence before him, the park had preserved its old trees only in areas that were very difficult to access, while other parts of the forest had regrown after extensive logging many years ago.

In fact, for us, who were young at the time, what we were seeing had itself been shaped by significant changes in the past.

Which Threat Is More Significant?

Let’s assume a species is simultaneously facing declining prey populations, drought, roads, livestock, and the destruction of part of its habitat. Which one is more important?

The answer is not always clear.

To assess a threat, experts do not look only at its severity. They also need to consider its scale, how quickly it acts, how many individuals in a population it affects, and whether its impact is reversible.

And one more thing is especially important: what condition is the population itself in?

The death of a few animals in a large population does not have the same significance as the death of the same number in a small and vulnerable population.

A threat that may not seem particularly serious today can become a much larger problem if it continues for years.

In conservation, time is also part of the equation.

Threats Rarely Exist in Isolation

In nature, different factors are interconnected.

A reduction in water can lead to a decline in vegetation cover. Reduced vegetation can cause prey populations to decrease. A decline in prey can force a carnivore to travel greater distances. And this increased movement may raise the likelihood of encountering humans or crossing a road.

Under such conditions, if we focus only on the final link—for example, a road accident—the underlying problem may remain.

That is why successful conservation is less like putting out a fire and more like understanding a network of connections.

How Do We Know What Is Happening?

Part of conservation work is detecting things that are not immediately visible.

Camera traps, tracks, information from rangers and local communities, satellite imagery, roadkill statistics, changes in vegetation cover, and data on species populations each provide us with a piece of the larger picture.

None of them alone reveals the complete truth.

Sometimes, even what we do not see is important. Failing to find a cheetah in an area does not necessarily mean it is absent; just as an increase in sightings does not necessarily mean an increase in population.

I remember once traveling with a German university professor as we headed toward Golestan National Park. We were younger then and proudly spoke about this old park and its beauty; about the age of the forest and its ancient trees, and about how it preserved such a valuable part of Iran’s natural heritage.

The professor, however, was looking carefully at his surroundings. Then he said to us, “If you look at the trees themselves, some of what you see is not as old as it appears.”

His explanation was that the evidence showed that parts of the forest that were very difficult to access had retained more of their old trees, while other parts of the forest had regrown after extensive logging in the past.

That day left me with an interesting thought. We had imagined the forest as we saw it: old and untouched. But the history of that forest was hidden beneath its present appearance.

Perhaps the same is true of many habitats. What we see today is only a moment in the history of nature, and without understanding the past, we may easily misjudge its actual condition.

Conservation, above all, is a patient effort to understand patterns.

Why Is This About More Than Cheetahs or Wildlife?

At first glance, protecting a species may seem somewhat removed from our everyday lives. Why should we worry about an animal we may never see?

After years of working in nature, I think about this question less in emotional terms than I used to.

The issue is not simply that we love animals. The issue is that wildlife is part of the same system in which we live.

When a habitat is lost, it is not just a single species that loses something. Water, soil, vegetation, the economies of local communities, and ultimately human quality of life are affected as well.

Conservation, when done properly, is not a favor we do for nature.

We are caring for something of which we ourselves are a part.

Years ago, when I thought more about why we should protect a species such as the cheetah, the answers usually revolved around the benefits that species provides to us. Later, I began to think more about the possibility that the question is not simply what benefit the cheetah has for us.

Perhaps we need to stop seeing nature only when it is useful to us, or only when it is injured and at risk.

In nature, we are not dealing with beings that must have a reason, determined by us, to exist. They existed before we decided what they were worth, and they are part of the same world in which we live.

Perhaps that is why, after years of working in nature, I still believe that the most important question about a threat is not, “How frightening is it?”

The more important question is:

If we don't see it today, what will we lose tomorrow?

Perhaps true conservation begins here: with the effort to see the things that have not yet been lost.