4 ms·

Maybe not only birds. Today, I drove home from Las Vegas to Portola Valley. I went 95->6->120 over Tioga pass, then home. I've driven this route over several

Maybe not only birds. Today, I drove home from Las Vegas to Portola Valley. I went 95->6->120 over Tioga pass, then home. I've driven this route over several decades. My recollection (corroborated by a few Kodachrome slides) is that my windshield would be smeared with bug impacts by the time I got to Lee Vining, necessitating a stop at the humongously overpriced gas station so I could use their window cleaners. Since about 15 years ago, not so much. I had a total of three bugs at Lee Vining today. I bypassed the gas station and window cleaning, went over Tioga. If we're really missing the quantities of bugs my anecdote may illustrate, it's no wonder the birds are missing, too.

quibbler 7y ago
Seasons might play a role? Summer is almost over.
bt848 7y ago
Curious how many times you and millions of others thought you could slaughter all those insects with your cars before it would harm them. Roads are one of the main reasons for declining animal populations and insects are impacted as much as or more than any animals.
- dhhdhdsbdb 7y ago
  Is this true? I always thought the decline was more often caused by removing habitats. Would be curious to know how this is measured and communicated.
jay_kyburz 7y ago
I remember walking through the grass on the way home from school and seeing hundreds of grasshoppers jump out of the way. I saw a grasshopper the other day walking my kids to school and realised it was the first I had seen in many years. Mum used to yell at me all the time to hurry though the screen door so the flies wouldn't get in. Now we could leave the screen open all day and we'd be lucky to see a fly come in.
robocat 7y ago
There's really only one insect we care much about - bees - and the keywords there are colony collapse disorder. Given that bees are given homes and food, it makes you wonder what is happening to the rest of the insect ecosystem. Even worse, there is a whole universe of microbes which we know even less about than insects...

quibbler 7y ago

Seasons might play a role? Summer is almost over.

bt848 7y ago

Curious how many times you and millions of others thought you could slaughter all those insects with your cars before it would harm them. Roads are one of the main reasons for declining animal populations and insects are impacted as much as or more than any animals.

dhhdhdsbdb 7y ago
Is this true? I always thought the decline was more often caused by removing habitats. Would be curious to know how this is measured and communicated.

jay_kyburz 7y ago

I remember walking through the grass on the way home from school and seeing hundreds of grasshoppers jump out of the way. I saw a grasshopper the other day walking my kids to school and realised it was the first I had seen in many years. Mum used to yell at me all the time to hurry though the screen door so the flies wouldn't get in. Now we could leave the screen open all day and we'd be lucky to see a fly come in.

robocat 7y ago

There's really only one insect we care much about - bees - and the keywords there are colony collapse disorder. Given that bees are given homes and food, it makes you wonder what is happening to the rest of the insect ecosystem. Even worse, there is a whole universe of microbes which we know even less about than insects...