Client: Professor Jodie Jenkinson
Year: 2020
Media: Adobe Illustrator, Adobe Photoshop
Insects are vital to the health of our planet and our society, yet compared to charismatic megafauna, their decline has gone relatively unnoticed. This infographic is intended to show the general public the importance of insects, then educate the audience on the magnitude of their decline and the effects the disappearance of insects will have so they are motivated to take action.
References
Academic Sources
Hallmann, C. A., Sorg, C., Jongejans, E., Siepel, H., Hofland, N., et al. (2019). More than 75 decline over 27 years in total flying insect biomass in protected areas. PLos ONE. 12(10), e0185809. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal. pone.0185809
IUCN Red List. (2019). Table 2: Changes in number of species in the threatened categories (CR, EN, VU) from 1996 to 2019 (IUCN Red List version 2019-3) for the major taxonomic groups on the Red List. IUCN Red List. Retrieved March 12, 2020, from https://www.iucnredlist.org/resources/summary-statistics
Losey, J. E. and Vaughan, M. (2006). The economic value of ecological services provided by insects. BioScience. 56(4), 311-323. https://doi.org/10.1641/0006-3568(2006)56[311:TEVOES]2.0.CO;2
Sánchez-Bayo, F. & Wyckhuys, K. A. G. (2019). Worldwide decline of the entomofauna: A review of its drivers. Biological Conservation. 232(8), 8-27. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2019.01.020
Stork, N. E. (2018). How many species of insects and other terrestrial arthropods are there on Earth? Annual Review of Entomology. 63, 31-45. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-ento-020117-043348
United States Department of Agriculture. (n.d.) Insects & Pollinators. USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service. Retrieved March 11, 2020, from https://www.nrcs.usda.gov/wps/portal/nrcs/main/national/plantsanimals/pollinate/
van Veen, F. J. F., Morris, R. J., & Godfray, H. C. J. (2006). Apparent competition, quantitative food webs, and the structure of phytophagous insect communities. Annual Review of Entomology. 51, 187-208. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.ento.51.110104.151120
Zhang, Z-Q. (2011). Animal biodiversity: An introduction to higher-level classification and taxonomic richness. Zootaxa. 3148, 7-12. https://doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.3148.1.10
Visual References
Cheryl. (2006). Clearing in Olympic Rainforest. Flickr. Retrieved April 9, 2020, from https://www.flickr.com/photos/8720628@N04/536586210
Marion. (2014). Desert Drought. Pixabay. Retrieved April 9, 2020, from https://pixabay.com/photos/desert-drought-composing-dehydrated-279862/