A LOT OF people probably shrugged off the report -- declining butterfly, bird, and plant populations in Great Britain can seem like back-burner stuff compared with the latest headlines on war, terrorism, or the trajectory of a presidential campaign.
That shrug is the problem, and the point of the research published last week in the journal Science. The numbers presented by Jeremy Thomas, ecologist with Britain's National Environmental Research Council, and his colleagues support the theory that the planet could be on track for what scientists refer to as earth's "sixth major extinction event." The cause is oblivious man.
The previous five extinctions were visited upon the dinosaurs and other denizens of the earth by the natural world, coming as glaciers, meteorites, or volcanoes. But the current killer is believed to be the planet's two-legged prime tenant and all his fuel-gulping, air-polluting, habitat-destroying, climate-changing ways.
The British study looked at data gathered by 20,000 volunteers -- most definitely not among the shruggers, for they have meticulously counted flora and fauna in just about every nook of England, Scotland, and Wales in surveys taken since the 1960s. The findings showed that over 20 years there was a 71 percent drop in native butterfly populations and a 54 percent drop in bird populations. Plants decreased by 28 percent over 40 years.
"What's alarming is the rapidity of decline," said Chris Leahy, a naturalist with the Massachusetts Audubon Society. He noted that while there is still rich biodiversity on the earth today, the implications for the future are scary. He said that the British report and other studies indicate a steady "global ecological decline, an eating away at the fabric of the biosphere." And if the biosphere is in trouble, then man is in trouble, for human beings are not immune to extinction, though they may like to think so. Leahy noted that man's eventual epitaph in earth's chronicles might read: "This species did well for a while but overreached."
That's why word of Britain's disappearing pearl-bordered fritillary butterfly, red-backed shrike, and lost ghost orchid should be as riveting as any news bulletin. So should New England's loss of the regal fritillary. The orange, purple, and silver butterfly vanished in the 1990s, possibly aided by man's use of parasitic wasps and flies brought in to combat the gypsy moth -- another whopping human error.
The once-plentiful bobilink and meadowlark are also dwindling here, and Leahy noted that the British research is a reminder to conservationists to keep their eye on the common species as well as the rare endangered ones.
They, and we, and the smallest gnat in the grass are linked in the web of biodiversity -- and the demise of one is a warning to all.