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75% decline over 27 years in total flying insect biomass in protected areas

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Re: 75% decline over 27 years in total flying insect biomass in protected areas

#101

Post by spodek »

carbonmachine wrote: post #75

Being an earth dwelling human, this seems pretty bad. Aside from buying ammo or survival rations, what's something proactive that I can do? Is there an organization that is trying to rid the world of pesticides (assuming that's the cause)? If I opt to call my representatives, what am I calling in support of/against? Over the last year, reading the news had made me more passive and worried. I want to dedicate a slice…

People here argue things like that if whole industries, laws, etc don't change then an individual's actions don't matter.

I see it the opposite. Only if I change can I expect or hope anyone else will.

My list includes:

- Flying less

- Driving less

- Eating low on the food chain

- Avoiding packaged food

- Owning and acquiring less stuff

... things like that.

My life has never been better. I wish I had started this change decades earlier.

Re: 75% decline over 27 years in total flying insect biomass in protected areas

#102

Post by point78 »

m_mueller wrote: post #86
carbonmachine wrote: post #75

Being an earth dwelling human, this seems pretty bad. Aside from buying ammo or survival rations, what's something proactive that I can do? Is there an organization that is trying to rid the world of pesticides (assuming that's the cause)? If I opt to call my representatives, what am I calling in support of/against? Over the last year, reading the news had made me more passive and worried. I want to dedicate a slice…

Not that I've planned it for that reason, but my family has the documents to live in either Japan or Switzerland. Both seem reasonable bets to me, i.e. protected by geography and with a pretty resilient local population. Have a read on the Bronze age collapse - when the global economy collapses, the main danger won't be environmental but due to human migration. In a functioning economy I'm very liberally minded towar…

Two very expensive countries

Re: 75% decline over 27 years in total flying insect biomass in protected areas

#103

Post by refurb »

avip wrote: post #3

Yes. This is a case of hard data confirming what we already know. As in - few types of butterflies I used to like, and see yearly as a kid - are gone. I see them now once in 5 years, if lucky. I bring my kids to look because it's a first time for them. On the other hand, some types of beetles, ants, flies, mosquitoes, even wasps - are just new. They were not here 20-30 years ago. Now, what are the consequences of all…

Don't different species normally wax and wane in prevalence? And enter/leave areas? A particularly cold winter can kill off a certain type of insect and the loss lasts for year.

How can we determine how much of the change we even have control over?

Re: 75% decline over 27 years in total flying insect biomass in protected areas

#104

Post by earlyriser »

JamesBarney wrote: post #100
carbonmachine wrote: post #75

Being an earth dwelling human, this seems pretty bad. Aside from buying ammo or survival rations, what's something proactive that I can do? Is there an organization that is trying to rid the world of pesticides (assuming that's the cause)? If I opt to call my representatives, what am I calling in support of/against? Over the last year, reading the news had made me more passive and worried. I want to dedicate a slice…

I would think donating to pro environmental lobbying groups. You be surprised how little large corporations spend on lobbying to influence politicians.

I'm surprised by what you're saying about the small amount destined to lobbying. Do you have numbers about this?

Re: 75% decline over 27 years in total flying insect biomass in protected areas

#105

Post by codefined »

refurb wrote: post #103
avip wrote: post #3

Yes. This is a case of hard data confirming what we already know. As in - few types of butterflies I used to like, and see yearly as a kid - are gone. I see them now once in 5 years, if lucky. I bring my kids to look because it's a first time for them. On the other hand, some types of beetles, ants, flies, mosquitoes, even wasps - are just new. They were not here 20-30 years ago. Now, what are the consequences of all…

Don't different species normally wax and wane in prevalence? And enter/leave areas? A particularly cold winter can kill off a certain type of insect and the loss lasts for year. How can we determine how much of the change we even have control over?

When 75% of _all_ flying insect biomass is lost, that's not just wax / wane. Considering the only difference in the past 2 years vs. the other thousands of years that insects have survived is human intereference, doesn't this suggest that we have complete control over this change?

Re: 75% decline over 27 years in total flying insect biomass in protected areas

#106

Post by eksu »

beambot wrote: post #98
carbonmachine wrote: post #75

Being an earth dwelling human, this seems pretty bad. Aside from buying ammo or survival rations, what's something proactive that I can do? Is there an organization that is trying to rid the world of pesticides (assuming that's the cause)? If I opt to call my representatives, what am I calling in support of/against? Over the last year, reading the news had made me more passive and worried. I want to dedicate a slice…

> I want to dedicate a slice of time to doing something to solve the problem Eat less meat (huge environmental impact!), bike more, don't consume as much non-local food, etc.

I wanted to tack on here that even our agriculture has a huge environmental impact — nothing worse for biodiversity than how we’ve replaced animal habitats with fields of a single crop! And then pesticides etc.

I don’t know if it ever happen, but we really should support capture fisheries, fish farms, and captured game.

Properly Managed Captured Fisheries (Mostly more prosperous nations have well managed fisheries, outstanding fisheries would be in Alaska & New Zealand) allow us to extract protien we all need without destroying ecosystems. Same goes for captured game but that scales significantly worse.

Fish farms are in a unique position because unlike farming animals on land, it can be done without radically changing the part of the ocean the fish are farmed in.

I think recently there have been some problems with fish farms and antibiotic / illness spreading but I really think these can be overcome and that long term aquaculture would be the most environmentally conscious option. (In a similar position to electric cars today).

Re: 75% decline over 27 years in total flying insect biomass in protected areas

#107

Post by HisGraceTheDuck »

JamesBarney wrote: post #100
carbonmachine wrote: post #75

Being an earth dwelling human, this seems pretty bad. Aside from buying ammo or survival rations, what's something proactive that I can do? Is there an organization that is trying to rid the world of pesticides (assuming that's the cause)? If I opt to call my representatives, what am I calling in support of/against? Over the last year, reading the news had made me more passive and worried. I want to dedicate a slice…

I would think donating to pro environmental lobbying groups. You be surprised how little large corporations spend on lobbying to influence politicians.

I do like my humour dry.

Re: 75% decline over 27 years in total flying insect biomass in protected areas

#108

Post by kpil »

MrBuddyCasino wrote: post #36
avip wrote: post #3

Yes. This is a case of hard data confirming what we already know. As in - few types of butterflies I used to like, and see yearly as a kid - are gone. I see them now once in 5 years, if lucky. I bring my kids to look because it's a first time for them. On the other hand, some types of beetles, ants, flies, mosquitoes, even wasps - are just new. They were not here 20-30 years ago. Now, what are the consequences of all…

This is making the headlines in Germany right now: http://www.zeit.de/wissen/umwelt/2017-10/insektensterben-flu... http://www.spiegel.de/wissenschaft/natur/insekten-in-deutsch... http://www.sueddeutsche.de/wissen/insektensterben-dramatisch... Der Spiegel discusses issues in the methodology of the data collection. The intervals over the years weren't uniform, data was collected by volunteers/hobbyists and they did not…

Just speculating wildly and looking at Sweden, for example meadows have more or less disappeared since 30-40 years. I mean flowering meadows, not pastures for grazing.

The meadows have been turned into forests and to a lesser extent pastures.

It's not a few percent, it's 30% of the land, probably more in Germany where there are much lest forests than in Sweden.

The bio-diversity in a meadow strikes me as much higher than heavily grazed pastures or a mono-culture wheat fields or pine forest.

Re: 75% decline over 27 years in total flying insect biomass in protected areas

#109

Post by Jach »

carbonmachine wrote: post #75

Being an earth dwelling human, this seems pretty bad. Aside from buying ammo or survival rations, what's something proactive that I can do? Is there an organization that is trying to rid the world of pesticides (assuming that's the cause)? If I opt to call my representatives, what am I calling in support of/against? Over the last year, reading the news had made me more passive and worried. I want to dedicate a slice…

Go into crispr research or other biological engineering fields if you want to do something directly. Figure out how to make less toxic pesticides that are economically substitutable (break-even or only slightly more costly than existing ones) rather than demanding that they're banned entirely, or if you're satisfied those exist already, lobby for their use. I suspect that whatever preventable problems we face we're not going to unite as a big collective to prevent them, especially when incentives don't align, but a few teams will be able to engineer solutions when the problems become actualized. Instead of asking how do we prevent problems, ask how we can solve problems given that they occur.

Re: 75% decline over 27 years in total flying insect biomass in protected areas

#110

Post by losteric »

m_mueller wrote: post #86
carbonmachine wrote: post #75

Being an earth dwelling human, this seems pretty bad. Aside from buying ammo or survival rations, what's something proactive that I can do? Is there an organization that is trying to rid the world of pesticides (assuming that's the cause)? If I opt to call my representatives, what am I calling in support of/against? Over the last year, reading the news had made me more passive and worried. I want to dedicate a slice…

Not that I've planned it for that reason, but my family has the documents to live in either Japan or Switzerland. Both seem reasonable bets to me, i.e. protected by geography and with a pretty resilient local population. Have a read on the Bronze age collapse - when the global economy collapses, the main danger won't be environmental but due to human migration. In a functioning economy I'm very liberally minded towar…

The developed world will use the first wave of immigration to build the walls that keep out the rest
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