While many people are becoming more aware of the importance of supporting pollinators such as
honeybees, native bees, moths and ants, Susannah Wood of the Norfolk Conservation Commission says that insects do much more to keep ecosystems running and vibrant. Whether it’s beetles that keep us
from being smothered in dung, blow flies that break down dead tissue or dragonflies that eat
mosquitoes and their larvae, insects are also the underappreciated sanitary engineers and nutrient
recyclers of our world.

As E.O. Wilson, the renowned biologist, said, “If insects were to vanish, the environment would collapse
into chaos.” The bad news is that insects are disappearing at alarming rates around the world. In the last
40 years, it’s estimated that 50 percent of the world’s insects have been lost. Meanwhile, the human
population has increased by the same amount.

Wood will share work being done across the globe by naturalists, ecologists and landowners to greatly
slow, and perhaps even reverse, these precipitous declines in a presentation, “Insects in Peril: Why We
Should Care and What We Can Do” on Saturday, April 6, at 4 p.m., at the Norfolk Library.