Insect Apocalypse poses threat to ALL life on Earth

We are in big trouble if this continues, the extinction of insects!

Nearly 50% of insects have gone extinct or died out in the UK alone since 1970 and 400,000 species face extinction due to heavy use of pesticides which means less insects for other animals to survive on.

This report is pretty direct about the circumstances which will arise if this isn't reversed over the next 50 years!

www.dailymail.co.uk...

Conservationists have called for action to be taken to halt the 'unnoticed insect apocalypse' in order to prevent a 'catastrophic collapse of nature's ecosystems'.

Leading ecologists at the University of Sussex, who carried out the report for the Wildlife Trusts, revealed that 40 per cent of the one million known insect species are now nearing extinction.

The use of pesticides, which has doubled over the last 25 years, has seen 23 species of bees and wasps go extinct.

Without insects, a multitude of birds, bats, reptiles, amphibians, small mammals and fish would disappear, for they would have nothing to eat.

Here is a list of 17 species of bee's which have gone extinct:

Barham mini-miner

Perkin’s mining bee

Pale-tailed mining bee

Potter flower bee

Cullum's bumblebee

Great yellow bumblebee

Short-haired bumblebee

Downland furrow bee

Shiny-gastered furrow bee

Square-spotted mourning bee

Flat-ridged nomad bee

Tormentil nomad bee

Six-banded nomad bee

Fringe-horned mason bee

A Cliff mason bee

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Since 1950 the study estimates that the UK has lost 150,000 miles of hedgerow, 50 percent of downland, 98 per cent of wildflower meadows and 50 percent of ancient woodlands

I live in London and noticed the decline way back in 2005, that's when I first noticed it as i was too busy working and that's the problem today, too many people working away to serve the system unaware that an EE is occurring right before their eyes! I gave up work in 2005 and what I noticed was a very true lack of insects, bee's, ants, centipedes, caterpillars, butterflies, almost all species had disappeared in what seems like an overnight extinction but because I was working full-time, I never noticed this take place over the 15 odd years! I'm not too sure what can be done now TBH, unless Cities are dismantled back to the days where there were less buildings and back to the days where people actually left their gardens as was instead of concreting over it all, otherwise we are in sh~~ street. The young generation will find it very tough to live and their children will suffer even worse, there would be famines all over the world, like the ones you see in parts of Africa!

In other words, humans are screwed and we are moving towards 8 billion people on the planet, it's way too many but just now I had a thought... you know those guidestones to reduce the population of humans to 500,000? I believe that's what's going on here, Monsanto and others are on board with this idea and I think they are going to get their wish. It's been done on purpose!

but the damn ants in my kitchen no matter how clean just wont die.....

a reply to: CrazeeWorld777

It is because of people like a freaking neighbor I have down the road. She is a city person that moved to the country.

Now this really chaps my hide... She doesn't think that weeds should grow along the roads............COUNTY ROADS, out in the country!
She has been a real pain in the a$$ and has actually convinced some people to spray. I tried to stop them and they are afraid she will sue! Yes, she has a fear of weeds, in the country. I don't know her and wouldn't know this except the weed guy told me and oh yes, she blasted it on a public forum! She said those weeds are dangerous and she didn't want to walk in them while walking her dog and that people honked at her if she walked in the road...

Bee's dying isn't killing us, it's stupid people.

For people that don't get it. I've been gardening a long long time. Bees and pollinators almost always prefer weeds to other flowers/food. All you have to do is watch, people are spraying everything.

originally posted by: MissCoyote
but the damn ants in my kitchen no matter how clean just wont die.....

well, i don't know where you live but where I am, its all disappeared!

This is actually a real threat that we can do something about.I f we don't get smart about pesticide use and fast we are a going to be in real trouble,I'm skeptical about global warming but pesticide s and habitat loss are real threats and can be lessened to at least some degree

originally posted by: ridgerunner
This is actually a real threat that we can do something about.I f we don't get smart about pesticide use and fast we are a going to be in real trouble,I'm skeptical about global warming but pesticide s and habitat loss are real threats and can be lessened to at least some degree

Totally agree. People have been foolishly ignoring wildlife decreases for far too long and its getting very real now. 50% since 1970 real.

a reply to: CrazeeWorld777

North West England, as a kid I remember seeing a whole plethora of insect's we no longer see, ladybird's were extremely common every summer and came in both the usual red and black - a few variation some with small spot's and other's with larger and different numbers of spot's, some looking more speckled as there spot's were very small and also green lady bird's and black one's with red spot's.
There were so many more variety's back in the 70's compared to today but over the past two decades and perhaps even more over the past decade I have seen the local bee's change to different species to those that used to frequent the garden.

The affect is going to absolutely catastrophic, both to animal's that depend on insects as there main food source AND for the plant's that live in symbiotic relationship's with them including plant's that require insects for pollination.

Over in China it has gotten so bad that farmers have to pollinate by hand.

The loss of the Bee's alone will not simply be a loss of honey some of us like in our tea BUT more severely lead to a global famine the likes of which has not been seen in over ten thousand years, pretty certain though that the big pharma whom are responsible in no small part for this disaster will paint themselves as saviours with there GM crop's and insect killing chemical's - that leech off the land and into the sea and are now killing off the plankton and sea life.

a reply to: CrazeeWorld777
Small minded people will think this is great, no more annoying bugs



What their tiny closed minds can't concept, soon enough after that, no more pesky animals, no more crops, no more people

There are plenty of bugs here in Cincinnati, but as Mark Twain says everything here happens 20 years later.

Lemme tell you about the bees. We got plenty of bees. There are ups and downs in the wild bee population like everything else. A lot of the panic you hear about bees having problems has to do with the commercial rental bee industry adjusting to the higher demand for bees to produce artisanal honey and "organically" fertilized crops. The high demand has led to to more hives being split with immature queens and the spread of bacteria that reduces honey output.

Damn rich hippies. They're what's causing the bee problems.

As for other insects, I hate mosquitoes with a passion but I know that killing all of them would certainly be a very bad thing for the environment. Little bloodsuckers.

a reply to: CrazeeWorld777

I could really go for a shortage of mosquitoes, ants, and spiders. I don't have roaches but I hate them so those can die off, too. Bees don't bother me, unless they're drilling into the beams on my deck while I'm standing there grilling.

originally posted by: JAGStorm
It is because of people like a freaking neighbor I have down the road.

It's only your neighbor if they're using pesticides like RoundUp.

a reply to: Blue Shift

You've never been half eaten by the black and white striped mosquitoes in Shreveport in my grandma's back yard... I get bit all day long and the bump and itch will be gone in 5 minutes because I'm immune, but those little bastards in Shreveport will pop you and it'll itch like crazy for a few hours.

a reply to: Blue Shift

Mosquitoes certainly suck.

I read recently they kill 700,000 people a year by spreading disease. I know they feed bats, but would the world really be worse off without bats spreading rabies?

We as a species, with modern farming and ranching methods could in fact live just fine by creating an artificial environment. A designer Earth, just for humans comfort.

I know, I'm bad.

originally posted by: LSU2018
a reply to: Blue Shift

You've never been half eaten by the black and white striped mosquitoes in Shreveport in my grandma's back yard... I get bit all day long and the bump and itch will be gone in 5 minutes because I'm immune, but those little bastards in Shreveport will pop you and it'll itch like crazy for a few hours.

I was born and raised in Iowa and Minnesota, so we got your mosquito weather a couple of days later in the summer. I know it's not like Alaska where they have swarms so thick you have to wear protection over your face so you don't breathe them in, but down by the lake in the woods I've been assaulted by some nasty things.

What's sad now is that where I live in California, which used to be more arid, is now buzzing with evening mosquitoes that leave really big, red welts. Makes me want to become a desert rat out in the Mojave. But I still won't advocate killing them all. Everything has its place, and while sometimes other critters will step up and fill an ecological niche, doing in entire species on purpose is foolhardy at best.

originally posted by: Blaine91555
a reply to: Blue Shift
I read recently they kill 700,000 people a year by spreading disease. I know they feed bats, but would the world really be worse off without bats spreading rabies?

Yup, they kill nearly a million people a year with malaria and other viruses. Their primary purpose is as a food source for smaller creatures like bats. They also pollinate a little. But in order to kill them with pesticides we'd probably end up killing a lot more insects that are even more beneficial.

What somebody should do is genetically modify mosquitoes so they don't spread deadly diseases when they bite, and make them have no itch when they bite, and also maybe inject us with something that's actually good for us, like Vitamin D. Somebody get working on that!

Funny, I had the same Monarch butterfly visit me outside every afternoon all summer.

originally posted by: vonclod
a reply to: CrazeeWorld777
Small minded people will think this is great, no more annoying bugs

What their tiny closed minds can't concept, soon enough after that, no more pesky animals, no more crops, no more people

The very same people think climate change is leftists conspiring against maga hat wearers.

Talk of currently being in a mass extinction event is met fingers in ears and accusations of tds, what a time to be alive.

originally posted by: LABTECH767
a reply to: CrazeeWorld777

North West England, as a kid I remember seeing a whole plethora of insect's we no longer see, ladybird's were extremely common every summer and came in both the usual red and black - a few variation some with small spot's and other's with larger and different numbers of spot's, some looking more speckled as there spot's were very small and also green lady bird's and black one's with red spot's.
There were so many more variety's back in the 70's compared to today but over the past two decades and perhaps even more over the past decade I have seen the local bee's change to different species to those that used to frequent the garden.

The affect is going to absolutely catastrophic, both to animal's that depend on insects as there main food source AND for the plant's that live in symbiotic relationship's with them including plant's that require insects for pollination.

Over in China it has gotten so bad that farmers have to pollinate by hand.

The loss of the Bee's alone will not simply be a loss of honey some of us like in our tea BUT more severely lead to a global famine the likes of which has not been seen in over ten thousand years, pretty certain though that the big pharma whom are responsible in no small part for this disaster will paint themselves as saviours with there GM crop's and insect killing chemical's - that leech off the land and into the sea and are now killing off the plankton and sea life.

It is bloody crazy situation.

a reply to: Blue Shift

Actually I suppose they only need to get rid of certain types of mosquitoes. If I'm not wrong, most varieties are innocent and serve a useful purpose in the ecosystem.

Mosquitoes up here in Alaska swarm so bad on the tundra that they can actually kill a Caribou. Nasty little things anyway.

LINK

Mosquitoes cover a pair of feet in Alaska's North Slope area. The state's infestation of mosquitoes is one of the worst in the country.