Butterflies and Environment Change
Global warming is causing new climate conditions and patterns that in turn are leading to changes in growing seasons , patterns of seasonal breeding and shift in species ranges where the area a species can normally live and breed . Longer , hotter summers and / or shorter winters can interface with both the growth of host plants and breeding cycle of butterflies . Successive drought in an area eventually leads to changes in the predominant vegetation , which causes changes in the ecosystem . The climatic changes also result in an increase in natural disasters such as hurricanes and tropical storms . Recovery from the devastation caused by these events takes many years , and many species simply cannot adopt and survive .
Butterfly conservation is so important as the Butterflies are of great ecological importance for many reasons : they are pollinators , they are part of the food web and they are good measure of the health of the habitats ( ecological indicators ). Butterflies are part of our natural heritage and have been studied for over 300 years . People like butterflies because they are beautiful with many being iconic and popular . Butterflies have fascinating life-cycles that are used in many countries to teach children about the natural world . The transformation from egg to caterpillar to chrysalis is one of the wonders of nature . Thousands of people travel abroad each year looking for butterflies and moths . Eco-tours bring income to many European countries and developing countries around the world ( e . g . the valley of the butterflies in Rhodes and the Monarch roost in Mexico ). Butterflies have been around for at least 50 million years and probably evolved some 150 million years ago . They are part of Life on Earth and an important component of its rich biodiversity . Butterflies and moths are a highly diverse group comprising over 250,000 species and make up around one quarter of all named species . Butterflies are flagship species for conservation in general and in particular for invertebrates .
Butterflies are an extremely important group of ‘ model ’ organisms used , for centuries , to investigate many areas of biological research , including such diverse fields as navigation , pest control , embryology , mimicry , evolution , genetics , population dynamics and biodiversity conservation . The long history and popularity of butterfly study have provided a unique data resource on an insect group unmatched in geographical scale and time-scale anywhere in the world . This has proved extremely important for scientific research on climate change . Last but not least Butterflies have a right to exist , as much as any other species on the planet .
References : 1 . American Museum of Natural history / the butterfly conservatory . Different articles . By hazel Davis / Carol A butler . 2 . www . enn . com / climate change may affect butterfly flight season . 3 . Butterflies and climate change- by Astrid Caldas . 4 . Www . inaturewatch . org / climatic change impact on butterflies . 5 . Butterfly lady . com .
Concept & Text by : S . Viswanathan Pictures : Darshan M . Trivedi & A Pavendhan