Hacker News Reader

Yup! I always thought it was me staying inside more as I got older, but I rarely see butterflies and bumble bees anymore.

This terrifies me more than climate alarmism.

View on HN

You don't think it might be related?

They're related in that both are downstream of industrialization, but changing climates aren't lessening insect biodiversity as much as overuse of various chemicals are.

Warmer climate should be better for insect populations. This is mostly about pesticide overuse.

And habitat loss? Crop monocultures are not great for most insects (or animals or birds).

Insects can be very sensitive to drought

what got me is that over the past 10 or more years, I've continually seen dead bees on the ground.

and I think... what a small creature to *notice* on the ground. How many dead bees escape my notice? there must be a LOT.

Bees live less than a year, so the number of dead bees can surely only be used as an indicator of changes on around that time-scale or shorter. Eventually fewer bees means fewer dead bees.

Do you think insecticides are altering where the bees die? Otherwise it sounds like you're describing a large population of former bees.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com