Ask Lemmy
A Fediverse community for open-ended, thought provoking questions
Rules: (interactive)
1) Be nice and; have fun
Doxxing, trolling, sealioning, racism, and toxicity are not welcomed in AskLemmy. Remember what your mother said: if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all. In addition, the site-wide Lemmy.world terms of service also apply here. Please familiarize yourself with them
2) All posts must end with a '?'
This is sort of like Jeopardy. Please phrase all post titles in the form of a proper question ending with ?
3) No spam
Please do not flood the community with nonsense. Actual suspected spammers will be banned on site. No astroturfing.
4) NSFW is okay, within reason
Just remember to tag posts with either a content warning or a [NSFW] tag. Overtly sexual posts are not allowed, please direct them to either !asklemmyafterdark@lemmy.world or !asklemmynsfw@lemmynsfw.com.
NSFW comments should be restricted to posts tagged [NSFW].
5) This is not a support community.
It is not a place for 'how do I?', type questions.
If you have any questions regarding the site itself or would like to report a community, please direct them to Lemmy.world Support or email info@lemmy.world. For other questions check our partnered communities list, or use the search function.
6) No US Politics.
Please don't post about current US Politics. If you need to do this, try !politicaldiscussion@lemmy.world or !askusa@discuss.online
Reminder: The terms of service apply here too.
Partnered Communities:
Logo design credit goes to: tubbadu
view the rest of the comments
I wish people would stop killing all the insects. We've kicked the bottom out of the food chain, and no one seems to have noticed. I've seen populations tank over the last two decades, even year by year.
Summer before last, when I took the kids to the creek we'd have to start a smoky fire to keep the mosquitoes and flies off. Didn't bother this year, not once. Went hiking yesterday and only had 2 mosquitoes annoy me. Y'all, that creek is surrounded by swamp. Saw a few frogs, zero fish, not even minnows.
September in NW Florida has always meant a lovebug invasion. They were so bad when I moved here that natives advised me to wash my car a couple of times that month because their guts would eat clear coat. Last year I saw a few dozen couples, stuck butt-to-butt (hence the name) in my driveway. The month is all but over and I've not seen a single one. Not fucking one.
Five years ago I'd count the tree frogs and salamanders on my front porch. I leave the porch lights on 24/7, so free food for amphibian friends. Haven't seen either animal in 3 years. Used to have to spray the bug guts off the lights several times in the spring and summer. Just looked, they're fairly clean, haven't sprayed them for over a year.
For context, I'm on the bleeding edge of town. I can walk 10 minutes and be into hundreds of acres of forest and swamp. This ain't the middle of the city from which I'm observing these events.
Nothing else makes me so internally panicked. Rise of fascism? Historical trend, it's here, someday it will be gone. Global warming? Not so immediate, not seeing clear and deniable changes year to year, not so much up in my grill. My planet is dying, I'm scared shitless, and no one even notices.
If it's any consolation I spent some time on a lake in canada this summer, and there is a bunch of wildlife: frogs, ducks, even a loon! And way too many mosquitoes and black flies.
Point being its not quite that bad everywhere
Also in Florida and yes the insect apocalypse is the most ominous sign of doom. And their life cycles are so short, just lay off for a couple of years, they would probably bounce fast!
Thought I saw a firefly on the trail last week. Probably not. Haven't seen one since I bought this house 8 years ago. Not one. And at that time? Only one.
I've got a pretty wild yard. We've brought frogs back, and next year I hope dragonflies mature and come boiling out my little water features. Pretty sure we're driving the butterfly population, and the hummingbirds are slightly more populous than last year.
But my god man, I'm only one person, with one yard, and I'm nearly broke. I have 40+ guns, but I can't go out and fight fascism by myself. I want to scream and rage, but I do what I can do, defend what I can.
I've never seen a firefly, they don't come this far south. We do have dragonflies, and I still see plenty of lizards, and unfortunately the squash bugs are doing fine, but the city of bees that used to appear when this one random bush bloomed by the garden never comes around anymore, and I can fearlessly turn over bricks piled in the yard, that used to be a nightmare with a palmetto bug under every one!
From what I know, fireflies love dead leaves and laying eggs under those. So don't rake the leaves! Let them be. Or some of them at least. We haven't raked leaves from under our bushes for ages and we always get some fireflies in the summer now!