Should we rescue invasive species when they die out in the wild?

Last week I found a 12-year-old study about the Franklin tree, which went extinct in the wild back in 1803 but survives in gardens. Some folks say we should plant more of it everywhere, others think we should let nature run its course. I saw a Franklin tree at the Morton Arboretum near Chicago last month and it honestly looked fragile. Are we preserving history or just messing with ecosystems that already adapted without it? What do you all think?

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diana1551mo ago

The "let nature run its course" take is what I used to go with, honestly. But seeing how the Franklin tree basically only exists because people kept planting it in gardens changed my mind. Nature already made its call back in 1803, but that doesn't mean we have to pretend human hands weren't the reason it vanished from the wild in the first place. If we can keep a species alive in a managed spot without pushing out what's already there, that's just keeping a door open, not messing with the ecosystem.