Many people unfortunately, have the view that our environment is capable of absorbing many of the pollutants that we put into it, as well as the results of the negative actions we carry out against it.

For instance, deforestation and the construction of dams. But there comes a time when nature lashes back, after all there is so much it can take. This article focuses on the concept of ecological backlash, its definition, its causes and how it manifests itself.

Ecological backlash can be defined as "the unexpected and detrimental consequences of an environmental modification, which may outweigh the gains anticipated from the modification scheme". Most of these environmental modifications mainly come through human activities.

Examples of some human activities that cause ecological backlash include the clearing of forests (deforestation) for the construction of homes and industries or to produce crops to feed our ever-growing global population. Of course, trees and vegetation are there for a reason, and when removed can have detrimental effects. One such effect is erosion, which results in landslides since there the plant roots have been removed, leaving nothing to hold the vegetation together. Also the cover from the vegetation protects the soil, acts as sieve preventing the rain from hitting the ground with force, thus removing or dislodging less soil. Deforestation also causes floods, because since there is no vegetation to absorb the water and to hold the soil together which would also absorb some of the moisture, the water enters our watercourses and fills them to beyond their capacity, causing floods. Finally with respect to deforestation, this vegetation was also someone's home. For instance, some organisms are soil-dwellers, other make nests on trees like birds and termites, while some plants can tolerate shade while others need full sunlight in order to develop. So that we can see the organisms in a forest require a range of conditions and in turn a range of microhabitats so that habitat loss equals biodiversity loss.

Another example of a human action that causes ecological backlash is unsustainable industrialisation. For instance, the emissions released into the air from combustion from industries. These emissions contain large amounts of carbon dioxide which is referred to as a "greenhouse gas" because it traps the heat from the sun against the planet's surface thus causing the phenomena of global warming. These emissions also release pollutants into the air which affects the respiratory health of humans. These pollutants also become dissolved in the water in our watercourses and in our lakes, ponds and oceans, thus killing much aquatic life some of which provide a major source of food for humans as well as terrestrial animals that we depend on for food.

The extreme weather patterns we are experiencing today have also been blamed on global warming. These have the effect of producing stronger storms which cause major floods as well as droughts, resulting in habitat and biodiversity loss as well as the loss of human lives. If you are still unclear about the ecological backlash effects or "the unexpected and detrimental consequences" in these examples, they result in severe droughts and floods that effect our very lives.

Prominent examples of ecological backlash that have occurred through the years include, the Chernobyl disaster that happened in Ukraine in 1986. This nuclear explosion resulted in huge amounts of radioactive material entering the atmosphere and the area surrounding the site has become a "dead zone". Another example is the spraying of about 20 million gallons of the pesticide called "Agent Orange" over the forests of Vietnam during the Vietnam War.

The forests of this country have still not recovered from this atrocity.

Therefore it can be seen that the environmental disasters we see playing out on our TV and computer screen on the news is just our environment "lashing back" against the activities that we so thoughtlessly engage in.