Hidden in Plain Sight: Pesticide Contamination in Butterfly Host Plants

In almost every episode, we’ve talked about what people can do to help invertebrates, whether that’s planting habitat, reducing pesticide risk, or simply paying closer attention to the living world around us. The success of conservation requires various involvement from community members, volunteers, and professionals. In this episode, we’ll be talking about what it can look like to make conservation part of your work life. We’ve invited several Xerces staff members to talk about how they got...

On Bug Banter we talk a lot about what people can do to help invertebrates and nothing is more inspiring than hearing one person's successful journey to creating a wildlife haven in their own backyard. Joining us to share his experience and tell us about his incredible space is Elliott Gordon. Elliott has been a Xerces Ambassador since 2022, based in New Mexico. At his home in suburban Albuquerque, he stewards a high-quality, pesticide-free landscape of diverse native and xeric plants and tri...

Seed collecting is a hands-on way to learn and care for native plants, plant communities, and the insects that live among them. So who can collect seeds and how do you do it? How do you store the seeds and when is the best time to plant them? To answer these questions and take a deep dive into seed collection is Eric Lee-Mäder and Stephanie Frischie. Eric has a background in conservation, commercial horticulture, and the nursery industry. Eric was previously the co-director of the Pollinator ...

The rusty patched bumble bee is a gorgeous bee, richly colored in yellow and black with a distinctive rusty brown marking on its back. It holds a special place in history: In January 2017, it became the first bee in the continental U.S. to be listed under the Endangered Species Act, and in May of this year, 1.5 million acres of land were designated as critical habitat, the largest area of critical habitat ever declared for an insect. To tell us the story of how this bumble bee went from...

In a previous episode we highlighted the State of the Butterflies report, which found that we are losing butterflies at a rate of 1.3% per year in the contiguous US: more than one-fifth of our butterflies disappeared between 2000 and 2020. Perhaps more alarming, over 40% of assessed species fell in numbers by 50% or more—and two dozen species suffered more than 90% losses. So what can we do to help butterflies? To give us guidance are butterfly experts, Ray Moranz and Kevin Burls, both ...