{"id":829,"date":"2026-07-15T17:26:10","date_gmt":"2026-07-16T00:26:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wordpress.kpu.ca\/green-criminology\/?p=829"},"modified":"2026-07-15T17:26:12","modified_gmt":"2026-07-16T00:26:12","slug":"what-cougar-creek-taught-me-about-green-criminology","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wordpress.kpu.ca\/green-criminology\/2026\/07\/15\/what-cougar-creek-taught-me-about-green-criminology\/","title":{"rendered":"What Cougar Creek Taught Me About Green Criminology"},"content":{"rendered":"

Before visiting Cougar Creek, I mostly saw creeks as peaceful places where water flowed and wildlife lived. After our field trip, I realized there is much more happening beneath the surface. Walking through the creek helped me understand how connected ecosystems are and how easily they can change over time.<\/span><\/p>\n

What surprised me the most was the information about native, non-native and invasive species. Native species are those that naturally belong to the ecosystem, while non-native species have been brought from another place. Sometimes, non-native species become invasive, and they spread rapidly, taking up space that was supposed to be taken by native species. It became clear to me that even a slight disturbance in the ecosystem may impact the diversity of the environment..<\/span><\/p>\n

What else impressed me is the fact that creeks change all the time. I used to think that once a creek takes its path, it never changes; however, we have seen that a creek may change its direction, it might be dry at some particular times, and it changes the landscape around it. What we have also seen is that when the water moves along, the water pressure wears away the banks and makes the tree roots visible. With time, erosion makes the trees fall down into the creek.<\/span><\/p>\n

Our field trip is also linked to green criminology concepts according to Lynch et al. (2017), green criminology deals with environmental crimes and encourages us to go beyond conventional crime and consider actions that cause environmental harm irrespective of legality. The scholars further argue that the effect of environmental harm goes beyond individuals since it involves the whole ecological system (Lynch et al., 2017).<\/span><\/p>\n

Equally, White (2017) states that critical green criminology is concerned with the conservation of ecosystems and biodiversity because environmental damage is frequently caused by larger societal and economic systems. According to him, ecosystems rely on the interaction between life and non-life elements, and when there is any disturbance in habitat, biodiversity can be affected.<\/span><\/p>\n

The visit to Cougar Creek gave life to these theories, which until now I viewed as mere theories written in textbooks. The observation of invasive species, root exposure, stream channel alteration, and downed trees helped me realize that ecosystems are constantly changing and can be affected by both natural processes and humans. This activity helped me understand the importance of protecting local ecosystems, as well as the significance of green criminology.<\/span><\/p>\n


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Before visiting Cougar Creek, I mostly saw creeks as peaceful places where water flowed and wildlife lived. After our field trip, I realized there is much more happening beneath the surface. Walking through the creek helped me understand how connected ecosystems are and how easily they can change over time. What surprised me the most […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1513,"featured_media":832,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-829","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-published"],"splot_meta":{"author":"Ria","license":"","footer":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.kpu.ca\/green-criminology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/829","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.kpu.ca\/green-criminology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.kpu.ca\/green-criminology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.kpu.ca\/green-criminology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1513"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.kpu.ca\/green-criminology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=829"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.kpu.ca\/green-criminology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/829\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":831,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.kpu.ca\/green-criminology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/829\/revisions\/831"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.kpu.ca\/green-criminology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/832"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.kpu.ca\/green-criminology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=829"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.kpu.ca\/green-criminology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=829"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.kpu.ca\/green-criminology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=829"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}