It's a difficult thing to balance protecting animal life and balancing human life. When we grow crops even in our yard we negatively and positively affect the animals all around us. When humanity burns forests to build a hospital, apartment, or even a hotel, we do that for the betterment of our species, likewise when some animals create a home under our plants, destroying our crops.

Our lives are intertwined on the planet and its hard to keep a perfect balance of respecting wildlife in our position as apex predators. It could be selfishness, there could be a profit motive, but over all even if we do mindless tasks, we do have an effect on the ecosystem.