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Where have all the insects gone?

sciencemag.org

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Re: Where have all the insects gone?

#91

Post by Arizhel »

tcfunk wrote: post #17
perseusprime11 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lawns, in general, are not environment-friendly because of the need to use fuel to cut it and for spraying chemicals to keep the weeds and mosquitoes out. I lost the battle with my HOA to completely take the lawn out and instead just plant some useful trees. People don't realize how much money they spend on a 30 year basis to keep the lawns healthy.

I don't understand why more people don't use push reel lawnmowers. I've used one ever since I stopped living in apartments, and they are not that difficult to use. They are lighter-weight than their gas-powered cousins, and you don't have to fill it up with gas every damn time you mow. Also it doesn't make 9000dB of noise.

Depends on the size of your lawn. If you have a little postage-stamp lawn, reel mowers are great. If you have a sizeable lawn (the kind you really need a riding mower for), then you're looking at hours and hours of backbreaking work every week.

The big problem with reel mowers is that they only work well when the grass is already short. If the grass grows too tall (which isn't that much), the mower just pushes the grass over, or gets bogged down in it. So you have to be absolutely religious in cutting the grass on time. I've used reel mowers at a couple of houses I've lived in; they were great when the grass area of the yard was tiny and the grass didn't grow too quickly. But where I am now, there's just no way.

Re: Where have all the insects gone?

#92

Post by emiliobumachar »

VA3FXP wrote: post #18
Daishiman wrote: post #13

So when will people stop minimizing that, literally, the planet is dying?

When will people stop with this hyperbole? The planet; as-in this rocky, water-world orbiting Sol, will exist for BILLIONS of years. The _life_ on this planet AS WE KNOW IT is dying, along with ourselves. That is a huge difference and one that needs to be repeated with as much clarity as possible. Will homo-sapiens still exist in 10,000 years? maybe. 100,000 years? doubtful. 1,000,000 years? nope. Will single-celled…

> Will homo-sapiens still exist in 10,000 years? maybe. 100,000 years? doubtful. 1,000,000 years? nope.

If civilization does not collapse in the next mere 1,000 years, I'm very bullish on technology indistinguishable from magic, which would come very handy in assuring our continued survival well into the billions of years.

Re: Where have all the insects gone?

#93

Post by accountyaccount »

Retric wrote: post #15
accountyaccount wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>the need to use fuel to cut it and for spraying chemicals you can manually do both of these things though

It still takes fuel to make those spraying chemicals and get them to you.

No no no, I'm saying just pull out weeds like people have been doing for thousands of years.

Re: Where have all the insects gone?

#94

Post by vivekd »

flowersoldier wrote: post #68
ashark wrote: post #9

Interesting. So maybe it wasn't just my imagination. I remember butterflies being everywhere in Spring in this area when I was a kid. Fields and air full of 'em for weeks. Monarchs especially, but all kinds. I haven't seen that kind of thing even once in probably a decade, at least. And the windshield thing. I hadn't really thought about it, but I remember my parents having to scrape the windshield just about every g…

I've noticed a decline in Monarchs here in Northern California as well. The very few I do see are colored differently than when I was a kid. They used to be a deep orange hue, but now they are all a pasty yellow color. At first I thought it was a different species. I've mentioned it to other people, but they don't really care. They're more interested in upgrading their cell phone or checking their instabook.

The monarch population is actually declining to dangerous levels. Scientists believe this is due to the decline of the milkweed plant which is the monarch's main source of food.

Re: Where have all the insects gone?

#96

Post by zeroxfe »

notadoc wrote: post #63

> No one can prove that the pesticides are to blame for the decline, however. No one can prove that insecticides are responsible for killing insects? If only someone would do some sort of study on this, or perhaps if we somehow had some way to know the purpose or function of pesticides and insecticides.

Guns are responsible for killing people, but they're not responsible for the decline of human population during a plague or a drought.

(It's easy to be snarky.)

Re: Where have all the insects gone?

#97

Post by blacksmith_tb »

aruggirello wrote: post #26
ashark wrote: post #9

Interesting. So maybe it wasn't just my imagination. I remember butterflies being everywhere in Spring in this area when I was a kid. Fields and air full of 'em for weeks. Monarchs especially, but all kinds. I haven't seen that kind of thing even once in probably a decade, at least. And the windshield thing. I hadn't really thought about it, but I remember my parents having to scrape the windshield just about every g…

> So maybe it wasn't just my imagination. And mine. BTW I was wondering what use will be that famous "ark" they're building with seeds - in a world without insects for pollination? Like having a backup of half of your data only... Edit: clarified. Also, correct me if I'm wrong, but it looks like eating insects is all the rage when it comes to talking about the future of food...?

That's not too inconsistent, we've depleted stocks of fisheries all over the world, and the solution is - fish-farming, on land!

Re: Where have all the insects gone?

#98

Post by vivekd »

notadoc wrote: post #63

> No one can prove that the pesticides are to blame for the decline, however. No one can prove that insecticides are responsible for killing insects? If only someone would do some sort of study on this, or perhaps if we somehow had some way to know the purpose or function of pesticides and insecticides.

The issue of pesticides was considered and some countries did pass legislation based on it. While intuitively the connection between pesticides and insect population collapse looks attractive, the facts are a little more murky.

Some scientists suspected that neonectide pesticides were linked to the decline in insect populations, particularly bees. Despite the fact that this connection was not fully proven, many EU countries banned the use of neonectide pesticides in 2013.

While bee populations recovered slightly, the issue is that bee populations started recovering before the ban was even issued. Also the recovery was also felt in Canada, where there was no pesticide ban 1. This suggests that the decline in bee population was more related to climate than to insecticides . . . suggesting similar possibilities for other insects.

Yes insecticides kill insects but I don't think that's enough to conclude that they are causing the general massive collapse in insect colonies - which is a relatively recent phenomenon, while insecticides have been used for quite some time.

1. http://www.agprofessional.com/news/bee-population-rising-aro...

Re: Where have all the insects gone?

#99

Post by Arizhel »

notadoc wrote: post #58
Arizhel wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is rather worrisome, but I sure didn't see any lack of mosquitoes last summer :-( Maybe this is affecting the "good" insects while the "bad" ones are thriving...

There is truth to that. Data demonstrates that disease carrying pests like mosquitoes and ticks are proliferating, while pollinators are vanishing. That is really not a good trend.

Nature's attempting to curtail the numbers of a particular highly-invasive species.

Re: Where have all the insects gone?

#100

Post by Arizhel »

aruggirello wrote: post #23
VA3FXP wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When will people stop with this hyperbole? The planet; as-in this rocky, water-world orbiting Sol, will exist for BILLIONS of years. The _life_ on this planet AS WE KNOW IT is dying, along with ourselves. That is a huge difference and one that needs to be repeated with as much clarity as possible. Will homo-sapiens still exist in 10,000 years? maybe. 100,000 years? doubtful. 1,000,000 years? nope. Will single-celled…

Except that this time the disaster has probably little to do with nature. I'd add that, given current situation, 10,000 years seems a bit of a stretch. IMHO it's more like 100 years to the first "maybe" - or more probably even a fraction of that.

Sure, but the point is, the planet will be fine in 10k or 100k or 1M years, it'll still be orbiting the Sun. We probably won't be here any more because we'll have killed ourselves off, but that's OK, some other lifeforms can take over. Hopefully they'll be more successful.
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