ambience: Crickets
If you’ve ever wondered whether insects could take over the world, well, in a sense they already have. I’m Jim Metzner and this is the Pulse of the Planet, presented by DuPont. Over the many millions of years of earth’s history, insects have mastered the art of survival — and it’s partly because they’re such good travelers. Scientists who examine fossils of beetles say that insects have moved around more than any other creatures on the planet. “In fact, sometimes they aren’t even found on the same continent as they are today. So for instance, I find things in Alaska that today are living in Japan, or Siberia, or the Canadian Northwest territories.” Scott Elias of the University of Colorado at Boulder says that insects are always crawling or flying off to new territory, and that’s one way they’ve been able to adapt to global climate changes. Sometimes, they hitchhike with humans. “Starting with the Vikings probably, but certainly with let’s say the Mayflower, the arrival of European colonists into the new world, they brought with them, accidentally, insects, and there were dung feeders that came with livestock and there were stored product pests that came with the grain that came over for seed.” Meanwhile, other insects were crossing the Atlantic in the opposite direction. The Colorado potato beetle, for instance. “That beetle accidentally got transported to Europe in a boatload of potatoes in the early part of 20th century and it spread out across Europe in literally a plague, wiping out potato crops.” And sometimes, scientists have accidentally introduced insects to new parts of the world. “One of them is the gypsy moth. It was actually brought over by entomologists knowingly to study it, but unfortunately it escaped and has been spreading across the forests of North America, devastating especially conifers.” Pulse of the Planet is presented by DuPont, bringing you the miracles of science, with additional support provided by the National Science Foundation. I’m Jim Metzner.