Does that make me a biological terrorist?
That might be a bit far-fetched, but we do have a long history of 'harmless' introductions that turn out very bad in the end. It is very difficult to predict the outcome of a new species in an ecosystem. But there are plenty of devastating examples of intentional introductions gone bad - like kudzu and starling.
Hawaii is not alone, invasives are a huge problem in California too. CA is having a very hard time dealing with many invaders - such as brown headed cowbirds, and the new nemesis polyphagous shot hole borer, bullfrogs, bass & sunfish, the list goes on. And of course we have tons and tons of invasive arundo, eucalyptus, pepper, and palm trees (most of our palm trees in CA are also non-native). Take a walk anywhere around southern CA and the landscape seems dominated by invasive plants.
Across the nation we are contending with emerald ash borers and asian long horned beetles, zebra and quagga mussels, the huge asian carp issue in the midwest, the list is endless.
Now, I have a hard time seeing how a stag beetle could have any sort of impact on the scale of those species I mentioned, but I certainly would err on the side of caution and say its a bad idea.
