#ecosystem collapse

i am a prairie dog; made to kiss my loved ones

i am a prairie dog; always on high alert for danger

i am a prairie dog; part of the land, since eternity

we learned from our relatives how best to live

what did we learn when we watched pispiza?

how to love? how to live in community? how to share and move when needed?

my people are like prairie dogs; we belong here

my people are like prairie dogs; we are not wanted here

my people are like prairie dogs; inconveniently occupying what COULD be farmland

my people are like prairie dogs; removed; destroyed; exterminated; mitigated; killed; murdered

for the audacity to call someplace home when someone else could make money from it

prairie dogs are me; helpless in the face of bulldozers and poison and lead bullets and bureaucracy

prairie dogs are me; afraid of what humanity is capable of when it WANTS

prairie dogs are me;

who decides what it means to be endangered?

not the prairie dog.

not me.

---

The impacts of climate change on the British summer will be unequal across class, race and socioeconomic lines. More deprived areas are less likely to have tree cover for shade. The homes of lower-income families, renters, those with children and ethnic minority households are more likely to overheat.

And the countries most vulnerable to severe climate-related breakdown – those in the global south, who are not responsible for climate change caused by human activity – are facing summers projected to be much more deadly and violent than those in the northern hemisphere.

But in the UK’s new heatwaves and drought, the health of ecosystems – in other words, life – is threatened. Wildlife can become dehydrated and struggle to find food and water. Trees may die; plants may reduce flowering and seed production. Without food plants caterpillars can’t survive, which means fewer butterflies and moths. If fruit ripens early, it may not be around for winter migrants such as fieldfares or redwings, or for hibernating species such as dormice. High temperatures and falling water levels threaten freshwater ecosystems by shrinking habitats and concentrating levels of pollutants and sewage.

When I approached our wildlife and nature NGOs about how the British summertime is playing out with the living world, they were keen to tell me what we can do to help our non-human neighbours. Suggestions included: increasing moisture-retaining wildflowers in public spaces and road verges; watering trees; keeping ponds topped up; leaving out shallow dishes of water with pebbles in them so bees and butterflies can safely drink too; letting areas of grass grow long; creating shade with log piles.

Buying organic food is among the actions people can take to curb the global decline in insects, according to leading scientists. Urging political action to slash pesticide use on conventional farms is another, say environmentalists.

Intensive agriculture and heavy pesticide use are a major cause of plummeting insect populations, according to the first global review, revealed by the Guardian on Monday. The vanishing of insects threatens a “catastrophic collapse of nature’s ecosystems”, the review concluded, because of their fundamental importance in the food chain, pollination and soil health.