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Mon, 25 Jan 2021 20:44:42 -0000 |
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> Insects can move to warmer or cooler habitats -- if they can find them.
Many species of plants that insects feed upon are unable to move north
rapidly enough. There are wholesale changes going on in plant communities
worldwide.
I feel that there have been several different problems over the past half century.
Mid C20th we saw the use of very dangerous pesticides. In the UK it was common to spray Hostathion from the air into the early 1980s. Beekeepers moved the colonies to avoid this, but other insects were not so lucky. Alford produced map of bumble bees before this, but when the map was reproduced later it showed a massive hole in the UK Midlands, mainly due to the spraying of oilseed rape. But you have to ask what happened to other undocumented species of insects.
Next we saw the rise of climate change and insects unable to adapt to the rapid change.
Then, those insidious pesticides - the neonicotinoids - which, it has been shown, left bees unable to navigate home. Honey bees may have been able to reproduce fast enough to overcome the losses - at a cost to the honey crop - but bumble bee colonies suffered huge losses.
But what about all the other insects? Where are the data for them?
Is Covid nature's way of redressing the balance?
Best wishes
Peter
52°14'44.44"N, 1°50'35"W
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