US lost a fifth of its butterflies within two decades

It’s not too hard to find a bison burger.

With butterflies though, things like migration are going to be a huge problem - even if you can make some areas safe, some species have wide ranges. We really need to cut back on our use of pesticides as a species.

The decline in insect populations is the scariest thing though. It’s difficult to motivate people to care about protecting insect species, but they are critical to our ecosystem. We need wasps and bees and fly species, but they aren’t “cute.” Small scale conservation projects targeted at a media friendly species are likely to be effective; protecting the bugs is probably going to require uncomfortable and unpopular changes that will never happen.

6 comments

Stop cutting your lawns all the time, plant native have a wildlife section to your gardens.
Has "urgent conservation measures" ever been done for anything ever?
- It’s not too hard to find a bison burger.
  With butterflies though, things like migration are going to be a huge problem - even if you can make some areas safe, some species have wide ranges. We really need to cut back on our use of pesticides as a species.
  The decline in insect populations is the scariest thing though. It’s difficult to motivate people to care about protecting insect species, but they are critical to our ecosystem. We need wasps and bees and fly species, but they aren’t “cute.” Small scale conservation projects targeted at a media friendly species are likely to be effective; protecting the bugs is probably going to require uncomfortable and unpopular changes that will never happen.
Will these deportations ever cease?
Incredibly terrible to see.
I'm sure they'll be able to improve that rate.