butterflies

The monarch butterfly is imperiled by the loss of food and habitat as well as climate change but an expansion in its winter hibernation area was "a sign of recovery — albeit a fragile one," WWF said in an annual survey.

Across Europe, butterfly populations are undergoing huge declines, with grassland butterfly abundance dropping by 39 percent between 1990 and 2017. Spain's Catalonia region offers an extreme example of this continent-wide wave of biodiversity loss: Over the past 25 years, populations of the most common grassland species have declined here by 71 percent, reports FERN's latest story, produced with National Geographic. (No paywall)

Public-health officials know that the insecticides that kill mosquitoes, in order to prevent Zika and other diseases, also are fatal to honeybees, butterflies and imperiled species, says Ensia in describing an emerging interest in minimizing environmental harm. "We're just at the beginning stages, trying to figure out what we need to focus on," said Patricia Bright, senior science adviser for the U.S. Geological Survey.