Insects are the most vivid expressions of the astounding fact of life in what may be a dead universe. Read this book, then look and wonder." This guest blog by Wiltshireman Prof. Dr Terence Meaden is an ode partly written in Wiltshire country dialect. It is a companion piece to the Silent Earth blog dated on 6 June 2019 about the summer solstice sunrise and the core meaning of Stonehenge. A link to the original post is here. In the Stonehenge blog of 2019 it was explained how the planners’ concepts and belief in the Marriage of the Gods, or hieros gamos, was translated by the Stonehenge planners into watchable dynamic action involving stone-to-stone union by the Heel Stone’s moving shadow and its penetration into the female fertility monument that is Stonehenge. It is a joy to watch. Unfortunately, every year on 21 June great crowds stand in the path of ... Read More analyse the history of colonialism and imperialism, and seek international alliances to strengthen those battling their legacy directly

Drawing on thirty years of research, Goulson has written an accessible, fascinating, and important book that examines the evidence of an alarming drop in insect numbers around the world. “If we lose the insects, then everything is going to collapse,” he warned in a recent interview in the New York Times—beginning with humans’ food supply. The main cause of this decrease in insect populations is the indiscriminate use of chemical pesticides. Hence, Silent Earth’s nod to Rachel Carson’s classic Silent Spring which, when published in 1962, led to the global banning of DDT. This was a huge victory for science and ecological health at the time.

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Aside from their role as food, insects perform a plethora of other vital services in ecosystems. For example, 87% of all plant species require animal pollination, most of it delivered by insects. The colourful petals, scent and nectar of flowers evolved to attract pollinators. Without pollination, wild flowers would not set seed, and most would eventually disappear. There would be no cornflowers or poppies, foxgloves or forget-me-nots. But an absence of pollinators would have a far more devastating ecological impact than just the loss of wild flowers. Approximately three-quarters of the crop types we grow also require pollination by insects, and if the bulk of plant species could no longer set seed and died out, then every community on land would be profoundly altered and impoverished, given that plants are the basis of every food chain. Burying beetles drag the corpses of small animals underground, lay their eggs on them, then remain to care for their offspring This far, the book is a dire but essential intervention into public debate. Were it to end there, I would give it five stars, and everyone concerned should read this far at least. The remaining two parts of the book highlight what I think are two main limitations - one contextual and surmountable, the other profound and revealing of broader problems with the response to environmental problems.

The supervision of the work raising the great monolith was entrusted to Mr. Detmar Blow, architect. Dr. Gowland, Professor of Mineralogy at the Royal College of Science, took charge of the excavations, and Mr. Carruthers advised upon engineering questions.’ Below:‘Mr T. A. Bailey, senior engineer, examining the lintels over stones 19, 20 and 1 of the outer circle. These stones were not moved by (Professor) Atkinson but had been straightened by Professor Hawley in 1920. These stones mark the entrance to Stonehenge.’- Historic England. The archaeologist Stuart Piggott can also be seen in the photograph, on his knees smoking a pipe. I consider this to be a false argument, as Stonehenge, if left severely alone, would soon present the appearance of a jumbled heap of ninepins, many of the stones having reached a condition when they are liable to be blown down by any gale from the west, such as the one experienced last year.It's remarkable that insect decline has gone largely unnoticed by non-specialists... Keep dreaming, Dave Goulson. We'll need more dreamers like you The Times

Insects have been around for a very long time. Their ancestors evolved in the primordial ooze of the ocean floors, half a billion years ago. They make up the bulk of known species on our planet – ants alone outnumber humans by a million to one – so if we were to lose many of our insects, overall biodiversity would of course be significantly reduced. Moreover, given their diversity and abundance, it is inevitable that insects are intimately involved in all terrestrial and freshwater food chains and food webs. Caterpillars, aphids, caddisfly larvae and grasshoppers are herbivores, for instance, turning plant material into tasty insect protein that is far more easily digested by larger animals. Others, such as wasps, ground beetles and mantises, occupy the next level in the food chain, as predators of the herbivores. All of them are prey for a multitude of birds, bats, spiders, reptiles, amphibians, small mammals and fish, which would have little or nothing to eat if it weren’t for insects. In their turn, the top predators such as sparrowhawks, herons and osprey that prey on the insectivorous starlings, frogs, shrews or salmon would themselves go hungry without insects. The title is no accident; this is Professor Goulson’s ‘Silent Spring.’ For me, as an amateur entomologist since early childhood, Dave Goulson is The Man. I’ve read nearly all he has written; he writes readable popular science, with serious undertones and a nice vein of humour, as well as serious scientific studies.

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People seem to forget that we are an integral part of the natural world and this planet. Ultimately, everything that we do will have an effect and repercussions much further down the line. This piece of art by Jim Vision and Louis Masai says it all really: I dabbled over the years with all sorts of different insects, but then came to focus on bees – partly because they’re so clever. Bees do all sorts of amazing stuff that other insects tend not to do: they can navigate over huge distances, they can memorise and learn, they have really complicated social lives. His magnum opus. Silent Earth is both a heartfelt letter of love to the insect world that has captivated him from childhood, and a rousing call to arms to counter the recent catastrophic decline in insects before it is too late [...] Magnificent." As for pesticides, they are only tested in isolation from each other. Maybe a single pesto in itself won’t be harmful, but in combination with other pesticides and stressors, the result is devastating.