www.ukbutterflies.co.uk

It’s approaching April Fool’s Day. I will be making one of my irregular contributions so maybe this year; others might also like to contribute. The perfect April Fool’s joke seems plausible or might even be true. Imagination is the only limit.

Come on guys. Post here.

Jack

I haven’t seen a single butterfly so far this year in the far north but good range of birds on a recent holiday in Orkney. Plastic rubbish on beaches got me thinking.

I wondered whether biological control might be one avenue to explore. It has already been done. There has been promising study by Mount Cook University (MCU) in New Zealand of the plastic waste on islands to the east of New Zealand. After painstaking experiments, it was found that a few larvae of the Tortrix Moth Cydia somonella in the absence of their natural food, will eat plastic and can complete their life cycle to become viable adults in a small number of cases. A very slight genetic modification resulted in larvae that actually prefer plastic.

However it has been found that GM somonella larvae will eat not only discarded plastic but some escaped larvae actually started nibbling at a bottle of a well know soft drink. The MCU researchers fear that more larvae might have escaped and could adopt this new artificial diet. Control is currently possible by use of insecticides such as Bacillus thuringienses but doubtless somonella will in due course evolve immunity. A world-wide infestation by plastic-eating bugs is thought not impossible. So if there is a spate of mysteriously bursting bottles of Coca Cola, then........you have been warned

Jack

You expect us to believe that, Jack?

Jack, your sense of humour is legendary!

I think Jack is having a laugh. This is all fake news spread by the government in order to cover up the alien base in Atlantis. When the mother-ship is reactivated, we are all doomed. Can we please stop talking about it and try and enjoy the summer while we can.

The voices in my head are telling me to get my coat.........

Vince

Mine was of course a spoof.

However 24th April:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-39694553

Jack