The Latest Buzz

Big Picture Science

Science, Technology

4.6 • 986 Ratings

🗓️ 24 February 2025

⏱️ 54 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Is your windshield accumulating less bug splatter? Insects, the most numerous animals on Earth, are becoming scarcer, and that’s not good news. They’re essential, and not just for their service as pollinators. We ask what’s causing the decrease in insect populations, and how can it be reversed . Also, the story of how California’s early citrus crops came under attack – a problem that was solved by turning Nature on itself. And how chimpanzee “doctors” use insects to treat wounds. We investigate the small and the many on “The Latest Buzz.” Guests: Martin Kernan – Historian and journalist. His article, “The Bug That Saved California,” appeared in the January-February 2022 issue of the Smithsonian Alessandra Mascaro – Evolutionary Biologist, currently working at the Ozouga Chimpanzee Project, co-author of the Current Biology paper, “Application of insects to wounds of self and others by chimpanzees in the wild” Lara Southern – Doctoral student at the University of Osnabruck, co-author of the Current Biology paper, “Application of insects to wounds of self and others by chimpanzees in the wild” Oliver Milman – Environment correspondent for The Guardian in the U.S. and author of “The Insect Crisis: The Fall of the Tiny Empires that Run the World” Featuring music by Dewey Dellay and Jun Miyake Originally aired March 28, 2022 Big Picture Science is part of the Airwave Media podcast network. Please contact [email protected] to inquire about advertising on Big Picture Science. You can get early access to ad-free versions of every episode by joining us on Patreon. Thanks for your support! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	You're listening to an Airwave Media podcast.
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0:19.8	I'm Matt Kaplan, the host of Safeguarding Sound Science, Evolution Edition.
0:24.7	Evolution is the unifying principle of biology, yet it still breeds controversy a century
0:30.4	and a half after Charles Darwin.
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0:38.1	and fighting to keep good science in our schools and politics.
0:42.8	Subscribe to Safeguarding Sound Science on Apple, Spotify, Amazon,
0:47.4	or wherever you like to listen.
0:49.3	Music If you've been irritated by the buzz of a mosquito or suffered the sting of a wasp, and frankly, who hasn't,
1:05.5	you may have wondered what functioned certain insects serve.
1:09.0	Well, here's one for those of you with a sweet tooth.
1:12.4	Without flies, as pollinators, your chocolate habit would end. In fact, many services would stop.
1:19.0	Our lives couldn't exist without insects. They're the most numerous animals on Earth, and the oldest.
1:25.4	These are the creatures that really are, do underpin life, as we know it,
1:28.6	on this planet. As terrible as it would be to lose rhinos, what an awful crime it would be to
1:34.1	lose tigers and orangutans. The loss of these creatures wouldn't cause mass malnutrition or
1:40.3	starvation like the loss of insects would. And now, alarming studies show that insect populations are in dangerous decline.
1:47.6	Find out what we stand to lose when the buzzing goes away
	...

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