Africa’s superfood heroes – from teff to insects – deserve more attention: Africa is home to a rich variety of incredible indigenous crops and foods – from nutrient-dense grains and legumes to unique fruits and leafy greens. Despite their value, many of these foods are often overlooked, under-celebrated, and under-consumed in favour of imported or …
Pesticides: farming chemicals make insects sick at non-deadly doses – especially in hot weather: Farm workers are also at risk of serious harm from pesticide exposure. Bell Ka Pang/Shutterstock The various regulatory systems for approving pesticides in operation around the world are crude and flawed. This has long been clear to scientists and it is …
Insects are spreading a devastating plant disease in Italy – Britain must keep it out: Olive trees that have died after becoming infected with _Xylella fastidiosa_. Fabio Michele Capelli/Shutterstock Since 2013, over 20 million olive trees in Italy have succumbed to a devastating plant disease. The same disease now threatens many more plant species, across …
Eating insects: the UK seems much more reluctant than the EU to let this industry flourish: Like it or not, there are lots of good arguments for eating insects – both in animal feeds and on human plates. You can farm them with much less land, water and feed than the likes of cows and …
Ivy, dandelions and other common wildflowers are often seen as weeds – but they’re a crucial resource for pollinating insects: A bumblebee flying over a blooming bramble bush. Legonkov Vladimir Since the end of the second world war, factors such as more intensive farming and urbanisation have reduced the abundance of wildflowers in Britain. In …
Why there are fewer insects on UK farms than there were a century ago — and how to restore them: Farmed landscapes have become less hospitable habitats for insects. Protasov AN/Shutterstock Insect populations are declining worldwide at a rate of almost 1% per year. This decline is alarming. Insects play a crucial role in pollinating …
Insects are vanishing worldwide – now it’s making it harder to grow food: Catherine_P/Shutterstock Over the past 20 years a steady trickle of scientific papers has reported that there are fewer insects than there used to be. Both the combined weight (what scientists call biomass) and diversity of insect species have declined. Some studies were …
Insects may feel pain, says growing evidence – here’s what this means for animal welfare laws: Can this dragonfly feel pain? Stefan Csontos/Shutterstock At least a trillion insects are killed annually for food and animal feed. Routine slaughter methods include extreme heat and cold, often preceded by starvation. By comparison, “only” around 79 billion mammals …
Insects will struggle to keep pace with global temperature rise – which could be bad news for humans: Animals can only endure temperatures within a given range. The upper and lower temperatures of this range are called its critical thermal limits. As these limits are exceeded, an animal must either adjust or migrate to a …
Eating insects can be good for the planet – Europeans should eat more of them: Farmed insects are common in many parts of the world today. nippich somsaard/Shutterstock Insects are a nutritious food source that can be produced more sustainably than conventional livestock. While eating insects is common in many world regions, in western cultures …
Chimpanzees rub insects on open wounds – new research suggests treating others may not be uniquely human: The chimpanzees of the Rekambo community in Gabon, West Africa never fail to surprise. For a start, they are known to kill and eat tortoises, which set them apart from any other community of chimpanzees. Now they have been …
Plants are flowering a month earlier – here’s what it could mean for pollinating insects: Rusana Krasteva / shutterstock Plants are flowering about a month earlier in the UK due to climate change. That’s according scientists at the University of Cambridge, who recently analysed the first flowering dates of 406 species and found a link …
A nice Paternoster image: Image from page 9 of “An introduction to entomology : or, Elements of the natural history of insects” (1818) Image by Internet Archive Book Images Identifier: introductiontoe02kirb Title: An introduction to entomology : or, Elements of the natural history of insects Year: 1818 (1810s) Authors: Kirby, William, 1759-1850 Spence, William, 1783-1860 …
Dung beetle experiment suggests carbon dioxide is bad for insects too: Dung beetles Marcus Byrne Insects are a vital cog in the great wheel of nature. They outnumber humans a billion to one and make up more than 75% of animals on earth. It’s no wonder that they are the primary providers of essential ecosystem …
What a warmer, wetter world means for insects, and for what they eat: Protasov AN/Shutterstock A new report has been released by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) – the UN’s authority on climate change – which revealed the latest research on how the Earth is changing and what those changes will mean for …
Why I’m testing what invasive insects can see and the smells they like: _Sirex noctilio_ is an invasive woodwasp that causes huge damage. Understanding what attracts it can help repel it. Ludwig Eksteen Dr Emmett Brown, Dr Victor Frankenstein and Dr Henry Jekyll are just three of the “crazy” scientists who populate fiction. Their methods …
Tiny beetle fossil reveals how insects greeted Earth’s earliest flowers: The world as we know it today is almost inconceivable without the rich and colourful landscapes created by plant life. Among them are flowering plants, or angiosperms, which are by far the most diverse and abundant group of plants, making up over 80% of all …
Are we more closely related to starfish or insects? Our study questions 100 years of consensus: Were starfish really the oldest relatives of vertebrates such as mammals? Yellowj/Shutterstock How humans evolved from the very first animals over the last 600 million years is an endlessly fascinating question. When piecing together the many steps leading from …