Insects in the News

One of my unfortunate duties as a blogger of truth and science, here and at Sense of Misplaced, is that I must occasionally dispense bad news. There are plenty of awful stories these days, but bear with me and I'll conclude with something uplifting.

The insect story getting the most press right now, by far, is the "Insect Armageddon" opinion piece in the New York Times, and the follow-up article about the German citizen scientists who made the observations. It appears that there has been a precipitous decline in insect abundance in many parts of Europe, up to 75% over the last twenty-five years. Should the numbers hold up to repetition, this is indeed alarming, if not catastrophic. Insects are the foundation of all major biological processes. You can do the math, use your imagination, and draw the obvious conclusions.

There are plenty of places to point blame for the demise of insect populations, and wildlife declines in general, but accusations and rhetoric are not likely to reverse the course of events. We have to act personally, and locally, to go about changing things for the positive. That means resisting the urge to grab the over-the-counter insecticides, planting native trees, shrubs, and flowers in our urban and suburban landscapes, growing our own vegetables without using chemical treatments, putting up "bee condos" for solitary bees....There is no end to what we can do, and it does make a difference. You are setting an example, for one thing.

jAmerican Burying Beetle, © EcoArkansas.com

Meanwhile, our very own government agencies are against us here in the U.S. Make no mistake about it, the current edition of the federal administration is out to ruin public lands in many ways. I already wrote about U.S. Fish & Wildlife granting permission for the construction of a strip mall known as "Coral Reef Commons" on globally endangered pine rockland habitat near Miami, Florida. The President's directive to shrink Bears Ears National Monument and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument is further proof of the overriding policy to open public lands to private interests, namely those in the natural resource extraction industries.

It is also quite probable that a lawsuit filed by The Independent Petroleum Association of America, American Stewards of Liberty, and Osage Producers Association will result in the de-listing of the endangered American Burying Beetle, Nicrophorus americanus. This is in spite of the fact that there is grave concern as to whether the species is truly "recovered." It is found only in a handful of isolated locations whereas its historical range was over most of the eastern U.S. It also remains largely a mystery as to why it disappeared in the first place. Until a better understanding is reached, any action toward removing the species from the endangered list is premature at best, and irresponsible at the least. God forbid any creature, Native American population, or other sacred entity stand in the way of short-term profits for greedy corporations.

Oh, well, two can play the lawsuit game, and recently the National Butterfly Center in Mission, Texas filed suit against the federal government to block construction of the border wall, which would cut right through that private preserve. Take that! I have visited this area and can attest to the rich diversity of all organisms there, thanks to the caretakers who are so devoted to it. Many, if not most, United States records for mostly Mexican butterfly species are recorded from the National Butterfly Center. It is on every naturalist's bucket list of places to visit. A wall cannot be erected there, or through the Santa Ana National Wildlife Refuge....

Bee-mimicking clearwing moth, Heterosphecia tawonoides, © Marta Skowron Volponi

Ok, I promised some good news, and here it is. It was recently revealed that a spectacular species of clearwing moth was rediscovered after a gap of 130 years in the scientific record. Known previously from only a single specimen housed in a museum in Vienna, Austria, Heterosphecia tawonoides was observed in the Taman Nagara rainforest of Malaysia. It just goes to show how little we know about a planet we are hell bent on destroying in the name of "progress."

Resolve for the new year to get involved, get outdoors, document, record, and report what you find. You never know where your personal discoveries will lead; or whether you are the only thing standing between a lone population of some creature and its potential extirpation. I'm facing that right now myself, but more on that later.

Losing the Pine Rocklands

It has not been my intent to deprive you of new content on this blog, but personal realities have dictated that I put my energies elsewhere, or have actively blocked my creative mindset. My internal motivations have been dealt devastating blows by external events that leave me wondering if I am making a difference. Meanwhile, I still deal with financial struggles and my aging father's circumstances.

The last (or at least latest) straw is what happened this week with U.S. Fish & Wildlife approving construction of a Walmart and strip mall on one of the last large parcels of imperiled pine rocklands habitat near Miami, Florida. Bulldozers began their devastation on Thursday, but thanks to a lawsuit by the Center for Biological Diversity, and a court order issued by heroic U.S. District Judge Ursula Mancusi Ungaro, the engines of destruction have been shut off, at least for the time being.

The Atala butterfly, © Jaret C. Daniels

This dire situation, to be fair, is the end result of poor management by a number of property players. According to Save The Pine Rocklands, the Richmond pine rockland tract was formerly owned by the University of Miami, which acquired the area for free as military surplus land, in 1981 and 1997. The university then sold eighty-eight acres, for $22 million, to Ram Realty Services in 2014. It is Ram that is behind the "Coral Reef Commons" project that would include a Walmart, LA Fitness, Chick-fil-A, and Chili's; plus a 900-unit apartment complex. A mere 40 acres would be spared as a "preserve."

Since this habitat depends on regular fire events for its existence, one has to wonder how apartment residents and business patrons would tolerate prescribed burns for ecosystem maintenance. That is not to mention whether the forty acres falls below some minimal territorial threshold for which a species could no longer survive. It also bears consideration whether pressure for continued economic development would not eventually compromise the rest of the property. You did it once, so you have set a precedent.

Miami Tiger Beetle, © Chris Wirth at Cicindela@wordpress.com

The pine rocklands are home to a diverse and unique assemblage of organisms, including critically endangered species. Among those are the Miami Tiger Beetle, Cicindelidia floridana, found nowhere else on Earth. The Atala (Eumaeus atala) and Bartram's Scrub-hairstreak (Strymon acis), both butterflies, also exist in no other ecosystem. Florida Bonneted Bat is also at risk. Thirty-one plant species occur there exclusively; and a total of nine federally endangered species call the pine rocklands home.

This is just the latest crime against our natural heritage as the President and his appointees go about dismantling all environmental, consumer, and labor protections for the benefit of an extreme minority of extremely wealthy individuals and corporations. This not politics, it is policy. Very, very bad policy that will negatively impact you, personally, at some point.

Bartram's Scub-hairstreak butterfly, courtesy of U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service and Biodiversity.org

The recent actions by the U.S. Department of the Interior, where the National Park Service and U.S. Fish & Wildlife agencies reside, have been decried as "dereliction of duty," but that is being too polite. This is outright theft of public lands and should be prosecuted as such. It is not failure to fulfill institutional mandates, it is criminal behavior.

I pride myself on presenting you with an unbiased, apolitical blog here, but I have my limits of tolerance. Those limits have been vastly exceeded over the last few months, and I do not foresee improvement any time soon. I hope you will respect my personal desire to protect your right to your "pursuit of happiness" as it involves observing and enjoying the natural world in intact ecosystems. I also urge you to stay silent no longer. Thank you.

Being Thankful for Bugs

This is a repost from November 28, 2014, but it still applies today; and not just for the American holiday of Thanksgiving, but for every day in every location on the globe. Life as we know it would not be possible without insects and their kin.

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A couple days ago the following post crossed my Facebook newsfeed, and it is an excellent reminder of why insects and other arthropods are so important to us as human beings, and to the planet Earth as well.

Honeybee pollinating flower in Arizona

"Thanksgiving is tomorrow …and we all have much to be thankful for. But don’t forget to thank our pollinating friends (bees, beetles and a host of other critters) that provide 1 out of every 3 mouthfuls of food and drink we consume. Without them, and the invaluable service they provide, our lives and our world would be drastically different. Happy Thanksgiving!"

Ecosystem Services

Beyond pollination, insects and related invertebrates furnish many other "ecosystem services" that we can't easily put an economic price on. They are responsible for seed dispersal in many plants. They are at the front lines in the decomposition process for all organic matter be it animal or vegetable. Their activities aerate and mix the soil. They serve as the basis of the food chain, feeding other invertebrates and many vertebrates from fish to birds to bats to aardvarks and anteaters.

Dung beetle pair rolling dung ball in Kansas

A scientific article was published in 2006 in the journal Bioscience that attempted to quantify just four of these ecosystem services: pollination, pest control in croplands, waste (dung) removal on rangeland, and food for wildlife (recreational hunting, fishing, birdwatching, etc). The carefully calculated estimate of the value insects thus provide, in the United States alone, was a staggering sixty billion dollars ($60,000,000,000).

Golden-winged Skimmer dragonfly in GeorgiaWatchable Wildlife

Insects are quickly becoming "watchable wildlife" in their own right. Countless field guides and online resources cater to those who enjoy observing butterflies, dragonflies, moths, tiger beetles, and nocturnal "singing insects" like katydids and crickets. What will the next craze be? It is clear that these communal passions are not only sustaining themselves, but actually growing in popularity, as witnessed by the explosion of National Moth Week, for example. There are festivals for everything from butterflies to bees, even mosquitoes (in Paisley, Oregon).

Drosophila "fruit fly" in ColoradoResearch and Medicine

Insects and other arthropods are also used extensively in scientific research and medicine. We owe much of our knowledge of genetics to research conducted on "fruit flies" (Drosophila spp.) and flour beetles (Tribolium spp.). Fly larvae are used to clean wounds because they carefully avoid living tissue while secreting fluids with antibiotic properties. Many patients with joint inflammation and diseases swear by "bee venom therapy," even though it may be relegated to the category of alternative medicine by the healthcare establishment. Spider, scorpion, and insect venoms continue to yield promising derivative compounds. Some fireflies produce chemicals that show promise in fighting herpes.

Paper wasp nest in Cape May, New JerseyArt, science, and inspiration

Many people find inspiration in the world of insects. We owe the invention of paper to ancient peoples in Asia who observed paper wasps constructing their nests of chewed wood and plant fibers. We continue to refine the performance of our aircraft thanks to experiments on, and observation of, insect flight. Insects are being enlisted in the fight against terrorism because of their acute chemo-tactile senses that far exceed our own abilities to detect harmful substances and agents; and their small size that allows them access to the most remote cracks, crevices, and other cavities. Artists are endlessly inspired by the beauty, colors, and patterns of insects.

Cochineal scale insects on cactus, ColoradoRaw Materials

Lastly, insects and their kin provide us with many invaluable raw materials and products. Silkworms and spiders produce silk with different properties of strength, durability, and elasticity, often exceeding the quality of synthetic fabrics. Honeybees produce honey, and beeswax. Cochineal scale insects produce organic scarlet dye, and the lac scale insect yields shellac. Many cultures also consider insects themselves as a staple food source, a practice known as "entomophagy" that is steadily gaining favor in modern western cultures.

Tiny gall wasp (Cynipidae) I found yesterday, ColoradoPersonally....

Personally, I value insects and arachnids as an endless source of fascination. Their physical diversity is mind-boggling. The behaviors they engage in are amazing. You can find them anywhere and everywhere, even inside your own home in the middle of a cold winter. Their stories demand telling, and I feel honored and privileged to have a modicum of ability to bring them to life for others.

What is it about "bugs" that you are thankful for? I encourage you to share your thoughts and feelings here.

Source: I wish to thank the Missoula Butterfly House and Insectarium for sharing the quote at the top of this post. Please visit their website, donate if you are able, and "like" them on Facebook. Thank you.

Ok, Save Some Bugs

A couple weeks ago I ran a post suggesting that efforts to save individual insects often is a waste of time, or at least was a misplaced investment of one's energies. Thanks to thoughtful and polite comments here and in social media, it is clear that some clarification is in order, and some exceptions, perhaps.

Go ahead and save the Monarchs....

I will stand by my assertion that rescuing individual insects is largely an ineffective strategy; but I would be a lot less animated about it were it not for this persistent notion that we can choose which species are worthy of salvation. That is not how Nature works. At the level of ecosystems and the biosphere, we have to save everybody (read "species") in order to save anybody. Recent news reports like this one in the New York Times, citing scientific studies, point to that very fact.

....but then save the Milkweed Bugs, too....

A perfect case making my point for the wrong way to act is the person who plants milkweed in their garden and then insists it be for "pollinators and Monarchs only." Therefore, competing milkweed bugs and milkweed beetles must be banished, killed on sight in fact. Really? Look at a wild stand of milkweed and you will see an entire ecosystem of pollinators, herbivores, predators, and parasites functioning exactly as they should, complementing each other's roles, with adequate survivorship of all parties. Listen, if you have a full complement of players in your yard's milkweed patch, then you are doing everything right! Relax. Neglect is often the best thing you can do once you get a native plant garden going.

....and also the Milkweed Beetles

We need more people to stand up for species that are "ugly," suffer from stereotypes and slander in the media, or languish in obscurity. It is those behind-the-scenes species that are doing the real work of keeping the biosphere spinning. Were it not for dung beetles and termites, we would already be buried by debris and animal waste at a scale that bacteria could not begin to attack. The processes of decay would be halted.

Dung beetles are a vital natural clean-up crew

Insects are the foundation of the food web, without which all other organisms would perish in a domino effect. If you like to fish, then you need aquatic insects. If you are a birder, you can thank virtually all insects for feeding our fine feathered friends.

The point is that all organisms have value, though it may not be obvious, or directly relevant to your everyday life. Our own species has been shaped over the eons by our interactions with other forms of life, and that will always be the case. It can continue to be a positive thing, if we keep all the pieces, or an apocalyptic disaster if we continue in our hubris as a species that we know best how to manage the wild world.

Grasshoppers and other insects feed the birds!

Even if you only value organisms for what they can do for us, nobody knows if the next miracle medicine could come from some beast we currently loathe. Increasingly, bioprospecting for pharmaceuticals has revealed just how rich the insect world is in chemical compounds that might one day cure our worst ills. We do not know what potential we are losing when we pave over, plow under, and deforest natural ecosystems.

You want to save something, hands on? Volunteer for your state or local wildlife agencies, zoos, and other institutions that are trying to resurrect truly endangered species like the American Burying Beetle, Salt Creek Tiger Beetle, Karner Blue butterfly, and other imperiled species you probably have never heard of. Their populations are at such a low level that saving individual specimens really is critical.

Even yellowjackets are valuable pollinators, and predators of pests

The late, great entomologist Howard Evans wrote in his classic book Life on a Little Known Planet: "I happen to like yellowjackets; do I not have a right to yellowjackets if my neighbor has a right to a cat?" He continues "If freedom means anything at all, it means the right to choose one's environment and one's friends." Ladies and gentlemen, I urge you to choose wisely.