Those nice folks at Blog Action Day don't seem to know how to make things simple. Kittens. If they decided to make kittens the subject I'd be able to write a nice concise blog on why kittens are important. Instead I'm left to ponder how to cover undoubtedly the biggest issue of our time: climate change.
The trouble is that with a subject this big, it's hard to know what to write. After weeks of wondering what to write I'm afraid that I'm going to do a stream-of-conciousness on the subject. This will start with me getting back on my soap box, briefly, and mentioning biodiversity loss (I've already covered the subject
before): I really care about all biodiversity, from the smallest to largest, cuddly to ugly, friendly to just plain scary, I think it's all amazing. I find it staggeringly difficult to understand how people can not feel a similar sense of awe and wonder. The biggest threat to this thing that I love is climate change.
However, it's not just wildlife that will suffer, as humans will too. Part of this will be as a direct impact of climate change, part will be as a result of the loss of biodiversity. It will and has arguably already started to happen all over the world. It will be have respect for money or power. Saving our failing economy will not help us in the long run. Quite frankly, if we don't do something, we're screwed.
There may be some sceptics reading this. I'm never quite sure what you say to sceptics. Do you ask whether they think after 30 years of collecting data and improved modelling, hundreds of experts worldwide are wrong? Do you ask them whether they think it is some kind of global conspiracy? Do you tell them that denial won't stop these things from happening? Or do you simply tell them to wake up to the fact that a single species
can have a significant, long-term impact upon an entire planet?
The rest of us have to continue to strive to make a small difference. I'm guilty of failing to do this as much as anyone. I'm currently sitting in an artificially lit office, writing on a computer that is draining electricity. None of us are going to eliminate our energy requirements altogether, but it would be nice to think that we could all get into some positive habits that, when multiplied up, might just make ensure a better future.
on Claire's finger. It wasn't so much that it is pretty (though it evidently is), it was that when handled it made a very audible squeak.
I felt sure that this behaviour would have been observed and reported before, so was surprised when I got home yesterday and looked it up to find no reports. It could simply be that I haven't looked in the right places, but I've tried every possible web search that I can think of and have found nothing. In addition, Andrew Duff's articles on longhorn beetles in British Wildlife fail to make any mention. It seems worthy of a blog simply to report the behaviour.
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