Scientists Warn of Impending “Ecological Armageddon”
Insects including bees and butterflies in 63 German nature reserves have decreased by 76% since 1989 and by more than 80% at the height of summer.
It’s easy to forget sometimes, but nature is full of wonders. There are more than one million different species of insects on the planet- that we know of- which accounts for over half the world’s living organisms. So yeah, some of them are bound to be pretty weird. Freakily strange. Also, there are those that just plain fascinating- night butterflies that have ears on their wings so they can escape bats, or the monarch caterpillars that shed their skin four times before they become a chrysalis, growing over 2,700 times their original size.
However, of the huge number of insects, only a tiny percent (about 1%) are harmful to humans. Without insects, our lives would be vastly different. Insects pollinate many of our fruits, flowers, and vegetables. We would not have much of the produce that we enjoy and rely on upon without the pollinating services of insects. They feed on a seemingly endless array of foods. Many insects are omnivorous, meaning that they can eat a variety
of foods including plants, fungi, dead animals, decaying organic matter, and nearly anything they encounter in their environment. Many insects are predatory or parasitic, either on plants or on other insects or animals, including people. Such insects are important in nature to help keep pest populations (insects or weeds) at a tolerable level. Also, insects are underappreciated for their role in the food web.But the global decline in insect population has now got the scientists worried. Three quarters of bees, butterflies and other flying insects have disappeared from nature reserves in only 25 years in what scientists fear is a sign of “ecological Armageddon”.
The new data was gathered in nature reserves across Germany but has implications for all landscapes dominated by agriculture, the researchers said.
While no single cause was identified, the widespread destruction of wild areas for agriculture and the use of pesticides are considered likely factors. Climate change was also cited as playing a potential role.
Dave Goulson, professor of life sciences at the University of Sussex and the study’s co-author, said: “Insects make up about two-thirds of all life on Earth but there has been some kind of horrific decline.”
“We appear to be making vast tracts of land inhospitable to most forms of life and are currently on course for ecological Armageddon. If we lose the insects then everything is going to collapse.”
Biodiversity, the variety of life in an ecosystem, is considered a measure of ecosystem health and resilience. Scientists all over the world have been concerned about shrinking biodiversity as species of vertebrates and invertebrates go extinct. This study shines a light on a different aspect of global life, though, by focusing on actual biomass, which the study’s authors say is more relevant to an ecosystem’s functions.
“The widespread insect biomass decline is alarming, even more so as all traps were placed in protected areas that are meant to preserve ecosystem functions and biodiversity,” write the study’s authors. They emphasize that biomass loss in protected areas is especially alarming because it can — and likely will — cause cascading effects through ecosystems and across levels of the food chain.
“There is an urgent need to uncover the causes of this decline, its geographical extent, and to understand the ramifications of the decline of ecosystems and ecosystem services.”
Researchers involved in the study began collecting data across 63 nature reserves in Germany in 1989, obtaining more than 1,500 samples over the years using specialized tents called malaise traps. The total insect biomass of the samples was weighed and compared, revealing an average decline of 76 percent over the 27-year span of the study. During mid-summer, a time when insect numbers are typically at their highest, the decline was even more pronounced, reaching 82 percent for that particular season.
Project leader Hans de Kroon, from the Radboud University in Nijmegen in The Netherlands, said the only thing we can do is exercise extreme caution by using fewer pesticides and maintaining wildflowers wherever possible.
“The fact that flying insects are decreasing at such a high rate in such a large area is an alarming discovery,” he said. “As entire ecosystems are dependent on insects for food and as pollinators, it places the decline of insect-eating birds and mammals in a new context. We can barely imagine what would happen if this downward trend continues unabated.”
The scientists said further work is urgently needed to corroborate the new findings in other regions and to explore the issue in more detail. While most insects do fly, it may be that those that don’t leave nature reserves less often and are faring better. It is also possible that smaller and larger insects are affected differently, and the German samples have all been preserved and will be further analyzed.
Even in light of the grave findings of this recent study and the troubling portent it holds for the fate of biodiversity on a global scale, the profit-driven corporate model that continually places business interests above those of the public is unlikely to change in the absence of a major ecological catastrophe or political movements demanding that a new course be taken.
