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Where Have All the Butterflies Gone? "Shocking" Nationwide Decline Sparks Alarm
https://scitechdaily.com/where-have-all-the-butterflies-gone-shocking-nationwide-decline-sparks-alarm/
Butterfly populations in the U.S. have declined by 22% between 2000 and 2020, alarming scientists who call for urgent conservation efforts. A major study reveals widespread declines across species, with insecticides, habitat loss, and climate change posing serious threats.
Butterfly populations in the U.S. declined by 22% from 2000 to 2020, with 13 times as many species declining as increasing.
Butterflies are disappearing in the United States. All kinds of them. With a speed scientists call alarming, and they are sounding an alarm.
A sweeping new study published in Science tallies butterfly data from more than 76,000 surveys across the continental United States for the first time. The results: between 2000 and 2020, total butterfly abundance declined by 22% across the 554 species counted. In other words, for every five butterflies in the contiguous U.S. in the year 2000, only four remained in 2020.
“Action must be taken,” said Elise Zipkin, a Red Cedar Distinguished Professor of quantitative ecology at Michigan State University and a co-author of the paper. “To lose 22 percent of butterflies across the continental U.S. in just two decades is distressing and shows a clear need for broad-scale conservation interventions.”
Zipkin and her MSU colleague and co-author Nick Haddad, professor of integrative biology, have been major figures in drilling down the state of U.S. butterflies. Zipkin has been a formidable numbers cruncher with successes gleaning hard facts from imperfect data sets to better understand the natural world.
. . .
A sweeping new study published in Science tallies butterfly data from more than 76,000 surveys across the continental United States for the first time. The results: between 2000 and 2020, total butterfly abundance declined by 22% across the 554 species counted. In other words, for every five butterflies in the contiguous U.S. in the year 2000, only four remained in 2020.
“Action must be taken,” said Elise Zipkin, a Red Cedar Distinguished Professor of quantitative ecology at Michigan State University and a co-author of the paper. “To lose 22 percent of butterflies across the continental U.S. in just two decades is distressing and shows a clear need for broad-scale conservation interventions.”
Zipkin and her MSU colleague and co-author Nick Haddad, professor of integrative biology, have been major figures in drilling down the state of U.S. butterflies. Zipkin has been a formidable numbers cruncher with successes gleaning hard facts from imperfect data sets to better understand the natural world.
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… habitat loss and rampant pesticide use. Neither are trending in the right direction for helping insect populations. 
