
In the middle of a butterfly crisis, California sees a burst of painted ladies - curtis
https://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-butterflies-desert-explosion-20190312-story.html
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lisper
Just to be clear, the butterfly crisis is not the sudden abundance of painted
ladies, it's the drastic decline in all other butterfly species (including
painted ladies, with this year being a notable exception).

Insect populations are in decline worldwide. I can add a personal anecdotal
data point to this: we were in Africa on safari ten years ago. As you would
expect, there were bugs everywhere. We just got back from a similar trip,
revisiting some of the same places we had been before. There were hardly any
insects at all, even in the rain forest.

Personally, that scares the hell out of me.

~~~
mattmanser
I lived in the country for the first 20 years of my life.

Insect populations varied wildly year by year. Like hugely wildly. One year it
would be tons, swallowing bugs as you'd cycle, the next you'd hardly notice
them.

Little anecdotes like yours are honestly not meaningful as you don't realise
just how variable these things are naturally.

~~~
lisper
Yes, my anecdote in isolation means nothing. But it's not in isolation. This
is a real world-wide phenomenon:

[https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/feb/10/plummeti...](https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/feb/10/plummeting-
insect-numbers-threaten-collapse-of-nature)

~~~
mjburgess
Yes, but not to the degree of your anecdote. You observed the background
cycles of insect population variation.

No person is in a position to observe the next effect of population decreases
across many such cycles.

~~~
ceejayoz
> You observed the background cycles of insect population variation.

They openly described their statement as an anecdote.

Meanwhile, you're making a pretty conclusive statement here, without any
apparent evidence for it. How do you know their observed reduction in insect
population is "background cycle" and not the global reductions scientists have
been empirically observing?

~~~
mjburgess
Because no person can conclusively observe statistical effects, of this kind,
in this way.

It's really hard to conclude "the insect population is dropping" by being one
person in one environment once. Even by being multiple people, even over time.

That's why science exists. And it's really difficult (eg., cf., the
replication crisis).

~~~
ceejayoz
The poster simply indicated they'd experienced an anecdotal situation that
matches closely with the scientifically observed declines.

You have to _really_ misread the comment you replied to in order to claim it
stated it was "conclusively observing statistical effects".

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smhinsey
A year or two back we had a super bloom of Joshua Trees at the eponymous park
and one of the rangers said that while yes, it's a beautiful sight, it's also
a little scary, because they only do that when they're under extreme stress,
it's a sign of them almost giving up hope. I hope what we're seeing with the
butterflies isn't a similar dying gasp.

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failrate
I was lucky to see this yesterday, and it was one of the most magical things
I've seen in a very long time.

Every time I thought that they'd finish passing by me, another wave of them
would come. It was relentless and awesome.

~~~
HillaryBriss
They are amazing. With this gentle river of butterflies meandering across LA's
clear, blue, hospitable sky you can forget everything from your little piece
of sidewalk and just stare into nature's magical distance till the exact
instant you're hit by some idiot's muscle car.

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forgotmypw3
Every time you spend a dollar/euro/etc on non-organic produce, food and
external products made with pesticide-sprayed stuff, and most animal products,
you are using the most important vote you have to support the practices that
are causing the butterfly decline.

You are only 2-5 money steps removed from the process of spraying pesticides
all over these butterflies' environment.

~~~
stouset
If you believe organic foods are not sprayed with pesticides you have been
wildly misled. They typically require _higher_ quantities of pesticides than
non-organic crops, due to the lesser effectiveness of organic pesticides. And
those pesticides are often effective for significantly longer than their non-
organic counterparts.

~~~
drewwwwww
you may find this four part series on pesticide use on organic farms to be
interesting: [https://geneticliteracyproject.org/2018/05/21/do-organic-
far...](https://geneticliteracyproject.org/2018/05/21/do-organic-farmers-
really-use-more-pesticides-than-conventional-farmers-not-even-close/)

~~~
stouset
Thank you for this. I’ll try to keep an open mind while reading it.

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mark-r
A year and a half ago there was an explosion of them in Minnesota as well.
Last summer though I don't remember if I saw any at all.

[https://www.dpreview.com/galleries/3708563345/photos/3677554...](https://www.dpreview.com/galleries/3708563345/photos/3677554/imgp7669)

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ravenstine
It was pretty amazing to see today driving on the I-10. :) It's nice to see at
least some bugs in the sky for a change.

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therealISW
I remember when a horde of Painted Ladies took over Bullhead City AZ for a day
back in the 90s. So amazing to watch.

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nukeop
Butterfly populations fluctuate wildly over the decades, there's no "butterfly
crisis". We've already seen such declines followed by huge population bursts
after some time. There's no reason to speculate that this won't happen again.

~~~
Const-me
There is butterfly species crisis, many are endangered and will go extinct
soon.

At the same time there's no butterfly quantity crisis.

I wonder about journalists writing news titles, are they stupid, or do they
pretend they are?

~~~
specialist
Think of the truth as a salmon trying to spawn, and all the challenges that
beset it.

Miscommunication, misunderstanding is the norm. We just have to power thru it.

