Article 70HY9 As forests are cut down, butterflies are losing their colours

As forests are cut down, butterflies are losing their colours

by
Phoebe Weston
from Science | The Guardian on (#70HY9)

The insects' brilliant hues evolved in lush ecosystems to help them survive. Now they are becoming more muted to adapt to degraded landscapes - and they are not the only things dulling down

  • Photographs by Roberto Garcia-Roa

The world is becoming less colourful. For butterflies, bold and bright wings once meant survival, helping them attract mates and hide from prey. But a new research project suggests that as humans replace rich tropical forests with monochrome, the colour of other creatures is leaching away.

The colours on a butterfly's wings are not trivial - they have been designed over millions of years," says researcher and photographer Roberto Garcia-Roa, who is part of a project in Brazil documenting how habitat loss is bleaching the natural world of colour.

Amiga arnaca found in a eucalyptus plantation, where scientists observed butterflies were less colourful than in native forests

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