Category: Silent Spring Continued: A World without Insects?
Make Meadows, Not Lawns
“The Heart of the Ecosystem: Taking Responsibility for the Extinction of Bees” By Rosamund Portus *Featured image: A roundabout in Mössingen, the “City of Flowers.” Photo: UnreifeKirsche [CC BY-SA 3.0], from Wikimedia Commons. When we think of extinction, we tend to think of a…
The Bellflower Specialists
Read the first part of this post, Insect Profile: Chelostoma rapunculi. (*Featured image: Campanula cochleariifolia, by Jerzy Opioła [CC BY-SA 4.0], from Wikimedia Commons) “Bees of Öland, Sweden: An Interview with Heidi Dobson” By Eunice Blavascunas and Alie J. Zagata Professor Heidi Dobson is…
Insect Profile: Chelostoma rapunculi
By Eunice Blavascunas and Alie J. Zagata On the Swedish island of Öland in the Baltic Sea, a fascinating little creature is rapidly disappearing. Chelostoma rapunculi, also known as the scissor bee, is a European solitary bee species. What makes it so interesting is…
The Last Kindred Spirit of Moths and Butterflies
Check out the first installment of this post, Insect Profile: The Apollo. “An interview with Andreas Segerer” by Susanne Schmitt and Birgit Müller We are standing in a hallway across from a hidden treasure: the world’s largest collection of butterflies and moths, holding about…
Insect Profile: The Apollo
*Featured image: Specimens of Parnassius Apollo in a collection case at the Zoologische Staatssammlung München. Photo: Susanne Schmitt. By Susanne Schmitt and Birgit Müller Classified as moderately endangered, Parnassius apollo is a species of butterfly that inhabits mountain meadows and rocky alpine sites. These creatures’…
Fifty Years Ago, Cockchafers Belonged to Spring…
“The Cockchafer, Part 2” (In case you missed it, read part 1, Insect Profile: The Cockchafer here! *(Featured image by dbgg1979 [CC By 2.0], via Flickr) By Birgit Müller and Susanne Schmitt We met Ernst-Gerhard Burmeister at the Bavarian State Collection of Zoology where he has dedicated most of his…
Insect Profile: The Cockchafer
“The Cockchafer, Part 1” *(Featured image: Common Cockchafer (Maybug). Copyright Zoonar/Frank Hecker) By Birgit Müller and Susanne Schmitt On a warm night in May, the cockchafer crawls out of the earth for the first time to take flight into the bushes and trees. It has…
Where Have All the Insects Gone?
For many of us, engaging with insects doesn’t extend much beyond swatting away flies and mosquitoes, or calling on bigger and braver friends to deposit unwanted “visitors” outside. And yet, as E.O. Wilson observed, it is we who are the visitors in “a primarily…
Call for Submissions: Silent Spring Continued
By Birgit Müller, Sainath Suryanarayanan, Katarzyna Beilin, Susanne Schmitt, Tony Weis, and Serenella Iovino The recent article by Hallmann and others about a more than 75 percent decline in the biomass of flying insects in Germany over the past 27 years has received considerable…
