Spring air is humming with insects. But we’re blind to what’s happening to them

By Eliza Middleton, Senior Ecologist, University of Sydney
Caitlyn Forster, Associate Lecturer, School of Life and Environmental Sciences, University of Sydney

Spring in Australia has arrived like a celebration. Magpies are warbling in the morning, wildflowers are bursting open across bushland, and the air is humming with life as tiny creatures have stirred back into action after the winter: bees darting between flowers, dragonflies skimming across ponds, and swarms of flying ants mating.

But we are largely blind to Australia’s insects, and more specifically, what has happened to them over years and decades. That’s because Australia – despite having some of the richest insect biodiversity on the planet – doesn’t have long-term datasets about…

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