Word: bugs
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...Several months of research led Barclay to discover that the insect, which resembles the common North American box elder bug, is actually most closely related to to Arocatus roeselii. But that European bug is also associated with alder trees rather than sycamores. An insect specimen found in Nice on France's Mediterranean coast, which is now in the collection of the National Museum of Natural History in Prague, turned out to be identical to the mystery London bug. But that specimen, it turned out, had been misidentified as Arocatus roeselii...
...There are two possible explanations," says Barclay. "One is that the bug is roeselii and by switching to feed on the [sycamores] it has suddenly become more abundant, successful and invasive. The other possibility is that the insect in our grounds may not be roeselii...
...Whatever the reason for the appearance of the mysterious new bug in London, Barclay says its rampant spread around the city is harmless. However, "it does show what's possible [if more damaging species invade...
Florida was once a swampy rural backwater, the poorest and emptiest state in the South. But in the 20th century, air-conditioning, bug spray and the miracle of water control helped transform it into a migration destination for the restless masses of Brooklyn and Cleveland, Havana and Port-au-Prince. Florida developed its own ventricle at the heart of the American Dream - not only as an affordable playground and comfortable retirement home with no income tax but also as a state of escape and opportunity, a Magic Kingdom for tourists, a Fountain of Youth for seniors, a Cape Canaveral...
...forests to the nub and how an absence of jaguars paradoxically caused a Panamanian reserve's bird population to wither. Stolzenburg narrates these cautionary tales with a conservationist's attention to ecological detail and a childlike reverence for flesh-tearing beasts. His infectious enthusiasm should spark even in bug-wary urbanites a renewed appreciation for nature's complexity...