Are we witnessing an insect apocalypse? We don’t know!

Collaborative Team: Adam Sharp, Michael Boyle, Nigel Stork, Roger Kitching, Eduardo Maeda, Tim Bonebrake, Jin Wu, Louise Ashton

Drivers of biodiversity change include climate change, insecticides and habitat loss. Insect declines have been found for some regions with long term data (mainly Europe). However, there is uncertainly around insect declines, particularly in the tropics where most biodiversity is held

For tropical insects we have very little data on insect dynamics through time. Tropical field stations provide valuable insight into how insect biodiversity is changing

Curating published and unpublished historical data sets is a priority. By understanding what is happening in pristine tropical forests – we can disentangle climate change from other drivers of change.

Funded by Research Grants Council Collaborative Research Fund (CRF) 2023