It is hard to care about insects, I know. They are small lively dots that ruin your picnics. I know this. You know this. It is hard to get a hard on for declining insect weight, starting in 1989, in Germany. "Ah, but insects are vital to a thriving ecosystem, they are great pollinato—" nobody cares. "Ah, but the insects, they are food for the other animals, without them the entire food chain will colla—" bore off, mate. Nobody cares about insects, exactly. But check out these fucking scientist quotes about the research from the Guardian, though:"We appear to be making vast tracts of land inhospitable to most forms of life, and are currently on course for ecological Armageddon."
— Professor Dave Goulson of Sussex University, who just used the words "ecological Armageddon" and "collapse" in the same three sentence paragraph, we are definitely dying, we are definitely going to die"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."
— Hans de Kroon, Radboud University, lead researcher and doomsayer, we have not even got onto the non-flying insects yet, when those fuckers go we all die"The fact that the number of flying insects is decreasing at such a high rate in such a large area is an alarming discovery."
— That's Casper Hallmann from Radboud University basically saying that these insects have it fucking made and they are still disappearing, what is happening to the insects flying around in non-protected areas, over non-parks and countrysides, what about them, what about them?Here are two scientists who have been looking at insects as part of a 27-year study and still can't really, actually figure out why they are dying or disappearing:"All these areas are protected and most of them are well-managed nature reserves. Yet, this dramatic decline has occurred."
"The weather might explain many of the fluctuations within the season and between the years, but it doesn't explain the rapid downward trend."
— Big Dave Goulson, again, bringing that bad news, againHow is all this going to immediately impact upon your life, apart from that next time you have a post-11PM conversation with a stoner, they are going to tell you all this, in juddering detail, their eyes glazing over and your eyes too, "flying insects are ecologically vital", some lad who used to be in your Art class is saying, "they pollinate flowers and they are food for larger animals, once they start going the dominos start collapsing, mate, once all the bees have died then we shall die too", why is it the stoners are always the prophets, if the warnings of imminent death came from anyone other than lads in woven hoodies we'd actually listen? Well, I don't want to tell you how to live your life, but all the flies and moths and wasps in Germany are dying so maybe it is time to, likeTake up smoking again, orLike get back in touch with The One That Got Away, the one that haunts you, still, every day you live your life thinking, "what if?", you know, like "what if?", you think about the alternate timeline that severed when you guys stopped talking, the alternate future where you were happy and content, maybe you could take one last spin at reigniting it, or"Farmland has very little to offer for any wild creature. But exactly what is causing their death is open to debate. It could be simply that there is no food for them or it could be, more specifically, exposure to chemical pesticides, or a combination of the two."