Good news--fewer tropical insects with global warming

AFP:

Global warming could pose a greater risk to tropical insects and other species sensitive to the slightest shifts in temperature than to creatures living in the world's tundra, US scientists warned Monday.

While cold weather animals are used to huge temperature changes, tropical species live under a much smaller temperature range and face a bigger risk of extinction with an increase of just two or four degrees Celsius, according to a team led by University of Washington scientists.

"In the tropics many species appear to be living at or near their thermal optimum, a temperature that lets them thrive," said Joshua Tewksbury, an assistant professor of biology at the Seattle, Washington university.

"But once temperature gets above the thermal optimum, fitness levels most likely decline quickly and there may not be much they can do about it," he said.

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I hope one that does go away is the mosquito. It would be a better world without it. I could also do without scorpions and a few other troubling insects. What I find strange about the thesis of this article is that the insects will stick around and die rather than migrate to a cooler area. This defies nature and logic. If you consider the migration of fire ants, killer bees, and termites it is easy to call this premise into question. But, it would be a wonderful world if all three met Darwin's demise, i.e. extinction.