The UK’s leading insect conservation charities, joined by over 50 organisations, institutions, and community groups, have issued a unified ‘Declaration on UK Insect Declines’. This urgent call to action, made at this week’s Wild Summit event in Bristol, addresses the steep and ongoing losses in the nation’s insect populations, urging governments, businesses, and the public to take immediate steps to reverse the alarming trend.
The declaration, led by Buglife, Butterfly Conservation, and the Bumblebee Conservation Trust, pushes for a multifaceted approach: widespread restoration of insect-rich habitats, bold reductions in pesticides, stronger legal protections, and major investment in research, monitoring, and public engagement. ‘Reversing insect decline is essential, not optional, for halting nature loss and achieving the UK’s climate and biodiversity goals,’ say the charities.
Even with sketchy knowledge about biology, if that, insect decline scares the living crap out of me.
All you have to understand is that we’ve kicked the bottom of the food chain out. Shocking comparing today with my youth in the 70s and 80s, even 90s.
I hiked for several miles through some wild forest. I saw one grasshopper and loads of invasive fire ants. Seemed to be a second species of ant I hadn’t noted. That’s it. NW Florida should be teeming with life.
I did spy a stag spying on me! Lots of squirrels, and that’s it.