A call to arms to protect the world’s insects and other invertebrates, but one that has a much wider focus than gardening.
Improving the world for bugs – everything from insects to rotifers and leeches (and ultimately humans too) – is the spur here for a book that really does want you to help save the planet. Insects and other invertebrates are not only crucial to the health of the planet, but are also a barometer of that health. Even if the quoted headline figure of ‘over 40 per cent of the world’s insects at risk of extinction’ is a little too pessimistic, there’s no doubt that insects are in trouble. So what can we do?
In attempting to answer that question, author Vicki Hird ranges far beyond invertebrates, taking aim at all the world’s current ills: inequality, pesticides, industrial farming, climate change, plastics and food waste. There are plenty of suggestions for action, from the local – showing our children that the vast majority of bugs are both harmless and beautiful, planting a tree, flying less, buying local – to the global; there’s a whole chapter on the basics of campaigning and lobbying.
The text is enlivened by fascinating bug facts, such as that the wings of the hummingbird hawk moth (surely the insect to get children to love bugs?) beat 85 times per second, that tardigrades can even survive in space, and that hungry bumblebees can persuade plants to flower earlier.
A bit surprisingly, since it’s where most of us interact with nature on a daily basis, there isn’t a specific chapter on gardening. But plenty of good gardening advice crops up in other chapters, including a short but useful list of wildlifefriendly plants. But a word of warning: the suggestion that our native yellow flag and white waterlily would be OK, even in a tiny pond, is likely to end in tears – they are too vigorous.
My favourite piece of advice is: ‘Take some time out to see the bugs. Just sit still and they will come.’ Not enough of us do that.