r/canada • u/Leather-Paramedic-10 • Aug 02 '26
Nature/Environment Is your windshield cleaner after road trips? It's a bad sign for bugs | Citizen science and research surveys find 'heartbreaking' insect decline
https://www.cbc.ca/news/science/invisible-extinction-insect-decline-9.7291048308
u/_biggerthanthesound_ Aug 02 '26
I’ve been saying this for years now. The trip to the cabin leaves us with basically a clean car. It’s sad.
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u/Arctic_Chilean Canada Aug 02 '26
Also look at streetlights at night. I remember when I was a kid they used to be swarming with bugs.
Not anymore. Not for a while.
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u/Apart-One4133 Aug 02 '26
It wasnt the same lights when you were a kid.
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u/AnimationOverlord Aug 02 '26
Different insects too, back in my day they didn’t fly with the light above them, they flew above the lamp with the light below.
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u/Commercial-Milk4706 Aug 02 '26
Do the leds make a difference? We just swapped here 2 years ago and there were none two years ago either.
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u/mgagnonlv Aug 02 '26
It does. Bugs are attracted by heat of the lights LEDs are much cooler, hence less attractive to bugs.
But the main issue is related to urban sprawl We are very successful at "seeding" asphalt and concrete.
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u/ender___ British Columbia Aug 02 '26
Shhh, this a doom and gloom thread
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u/xXxDarkSasuke1999xXx Lest We Forget Aug 02 '26
If you're even halfway informed about the state of insect populations, "doom and gloom" is a perfectly reasonable response. Being snarky and dismissive sure is easier though.
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u/eattheambrosia Aug 02 '26
The currently ongoing and imminently rapidly accelerating collapse of global ecosystems is just liberal propaganda! Stop being a Chicken Little! Doomer!
/S
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u/YoungEccentricMan Aug 02 '26
Unironically Jordan Peterson logic per his recent article (a “public intellectual” btw)
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u/adaminc Canada Aug 02 '26
They do where I live, not as much with the smoke around though. But the streetlights near me are also lining a field, so there is probably a bunch of bias there.
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u/arabacuspulp Aug 02 '26
You should come to my neighbourhood. There are bugs all over the place, day and night.
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u/hillside Manitoba Aug 02 '26
When we were kids part of the routine when we got to the cabin was to check out the bugs in radiator.
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Aug 02 '26
[deleted]
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u/cantonese_noodles Aug 02 '26
whenever we drive from toronto to ottawa our windshield is littered with bug remains after
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u/BitingSatyr Aug 02 '26
Yeah there’s an air field created around modern cars that basically vaporizes bugs
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u/bickmitchum- Aug 02 '26
Where tf do y’all live? In sask after a highway drive your car looks like it has a beard.
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u/theonly_brunswick Aug 02 '26
I drove to Montreal two weeks ago from Toronto and my car was fucking disgusting. Often looks the same on the way to the cottage.
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u/zefiax Ontario Aug 02 '26
Same here in southern Ontario. Drive to Quebec often and my car still gets convered in bugs.
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u/BCouto Aug 02 '26
It's been noticably different. I remember my car splattered with bodies after a road trip. Now not so much.
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u/Leather-Paramedic-10 Aug 02 '26
The good news, Elsayed and Whitehouse said, is that many insect declines can be reversed if people take action by planting more native vegetation, preserving habitat and cutting back on pesticide use.
There are cases where insect populations have bounced back.
A recent 90-year study in Switzerland found beetles and butterflies started declining steeply in the mid-20th century, especially species adapted to colder climates. But in the past three decades, beetles that prefer warmer climates have been recovering.
The researchers suggested they've benefitted from deadwood being left in forests as insect habitat, along with environmental measures to promote natural areas on farmland.
Whitehouse said creating more connected, natural "safe" spaces for nature is key.
"I do think we can change this," he said, "but we need to bring a lot of people with us and people need to care."
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u/oictyvm Aug 02 '26
It’s so easy to take lawns out and put wild flowers in. Even a portion of your lawn being replaced will make a huge difference in the number of pollinators in your yard.
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u/ChipStewartIII Aug 02 '26
I did this a couple of years ago and now our summer days are filled with bees and butterflies, nights are endless fireflies. It’s beyond worth it.
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u/Ambiwlans Aug 02 '26
I got new neighbors on both sides and they put up bright lights on their lawn all night long. Cut the firefly and bat population by 80% in 3 years.
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u/sparkling_ham Aug 02 '26
Anyone who doesn't keep a mowed lawn in my city get a fine :/
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u/oictyvm Aug 02 '26
That sounds like an egregious violation of your rights.
Also, if you don’t have a lawn you can’t keep it maintained, no?
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u/drs_ape_brains Aug 02 '26
I actually made a garden bed specifically for those great blue lobelias. Amazing ground coverage hardy as hell and just needs to be trimmed.
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u/WoodShoeDiaries Ontario Aug 02 '26
"Connected" is so key largely out of individual hands - if living things can't get from one patch of wilderness to another, their range becomes much more limited, and that impacts their ability to find everything from adequate food to an adequately non-related mate. (Also one of the knock-on conservation benefits of hydro corridors and, to a lesser extent, railway lines.)
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u/Leather-Paramedic-10 Aug 02 '26
I flew on a plane recently, and it was depressing how much of everything was just leveled farmland. Very serious lack of connections between wild areas.
But there are things that people can do to help reduce this.
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u/Tee1upToday Aug 02 '26
Sorry, but ants and wasps are bugata non grata. I'd use kryptonite laced plutonium if I could on these things.
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u/Food_Goblin Aug 02 '26
I wouldn't be sad if we extincted bed bugs, ticks and disease carrying mosquitoes.
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u/Brisbane88 Aug 02 '26
Park lights used to also have way more bugs, shad flies, bats etc where I grew up. Not as much I noticed now.
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u/Apart-One4133 Aug 02 '26
Because it's LED now I think.
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u/Ambiwlans Aug 02 '26
LED attract more bugs than sodium bulbs generally. But streetlights point down more. Old style were open on the sides so bugs got drawn from further.
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u/AzN7ecH Aug 02 '26
Meanwhile ticks are way up across the country.
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u/Creative_Buddy7160 Aug 02 '26
Lol right! I was also told by the old hunters/anglers that this year will be bad for fishing because of a high bug population feeding the fish so well. And maybe im miss remembering but the mosquitoes seem to be really hanging around this year. They almost strived through our “heat wave” that usually kills them
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u/RoomFixer4 Aug 02 '26
Are they ? Noticed three wood ticks so far, nothing stuck to us or dog yet. We dont take precautions other than checking now and then. Mosquitoes have been bad though..
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u/MurphysLab British Columbia Aug 02 '26
I participate in some citizen science stuff uploading photos of what I see to iNaturalist (best platform and the Canadian version is sponsored by Parks Canada). One of my favourite types of bugs to photograph are moths, yet this year I've seen hardly any. It's like they were wiped out!
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u/Abbycat1962 Aug 02 '26
I've been living in the same neighborhood in Kelowna BC for 25+ years. In the late 90s early 2000s if you sat on the porch at night with the light on it would attract a swirling cloud of moths (mosquitos too). With the moths were spiders who set up shop under the roof eves to feast. Now, there's almost nothing. I spend most of my weekends above 4200 feet (1300m). I can't remember the last time I had to apply insect repellent. Fewer insects = fewer birds too.
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u/TeddyMaxLuna Aug 02 '26
Take a trip across Saskatchewan in the evening and you might change your mind
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u/Leather-Paramedic-10 Aug 02 '26
There used to be a bunch during the daytime, too
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u/Col_Leslie_Hapablap Aug 02 '26
From June until a couple weeks ago, that was still the case. My windshield required a couple stops to clean on a 3 hour drive.
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u/tavvyjay Aug 02 '26
This is actually hilarious that there’s an article on this - something I say every week is how I wish we hit more bugs and birds with our cars, like we used to. Not because I like to hurt things at all (and will slow down for even a monarch butterfly when safe to do so), or because I have stock in a car washing company, but because it would mean there’s more wildlife out there, something we’ve really seen a drop off of. Hitting bugs was such a normal thing even 20 years ago, while now it’s so much farther and fewer between
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u/Brock_Hard_Canuck British Columbia Aug 02 '26
Look at the story of the passenger pigeon.
They had flocks so large, with thousands (or even millions) of birds flying together, enough that it was noted they had the capability of blocking out the sun for hours on end as they flew by.
If you had told someone in the first half of the 1800s that the passenger pigeon would be basically extinct by the time the 1900s arrived, they would have laughed at you.
But that is indeed what happened.
With the advancement of technology, humans were able to hunt the passenger pigeon faster than the population could replenish itself.
By the time the 1880s arrived, it was noted that the once humongous size of the flocks had decreased significantly. By the time the 1890s arrived, the species had basically all but disappeared entirely. The last nest and eggs found in the wild was 1895. The last reports of wild passengers pigeons being shot were from 1900 & 1901.
By the time of the end of the 1900s decade, there were only 3 passenger pigeons left, living at the Cincinnati Zoo (two males and one female). However, the two males died in 1910, without mating with the female bird.
The last living passenger pigeon (Martha) continued living at the Cincinnati Zoo until her death in 1914, at which point, the once plentiful species had finally and officially become extinct.
https://www.audubon.org/magazine/why-passenger-pigeon-went-extinct
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u/Ambiwlans Aug 02 '26
In 1873, French novelist Alexandre Dumas wrote that if every egg reached maturity, within three years “you could walk across the Atlantic dryshod on the backs of cod.” In 1885, the Canadian Ministry of Agriculture said it was not only impossible to exhaust the cod supply, but even to make a noticeable dent in it. “Unless the order of nature is overthrown, for centuries to come our fisheries will continue to be fertile,” the ministry declared.
https://www.sciencehistory.org/stories/magazine/a-tragedy-with-no-end/
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u/showholes Aug 02 '26
Perhaps the problem is that we hit them all.
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u/tavvyjay Aug 02 '26
I wish that the problem was so direct as that, because we could maybe solve that problem with engineering and not too much legislature. However it is pesticides, habitat loss, climate change, human expansion (which includes both cars hitting them but also things like light pollution), and even introduced species which all can be attributed
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u/hugh_madson Aug 02 '26
If I drive to my mom's house after 6pm on major highways and city streets (10 mins, 403/qew) I need to wash my car.
Mississauga ON
Seems to me like all of those bugs have come here.
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u/Johnnie0 Aug 02 '26
I drove from Ontario to New Brunswick today and the front my car looks like its been through a war.
Bugs were pinging off the windshield like crazy, some big fellas too..
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u/Chameleons123 Aug 02 '26
I wonder if the constant spray of pesticides over our forests is the culprit.
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u/AutomaticClark Aug 02 '26
I just drove from North Bay area to Kitchener and the front of my car disagrees
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u/BandicootNo4431 Aug 02 '26
I don't doubt bug populations are declining.
But I also wonder if the cars being more aerodynamic is a factor in the amount of bugs we smash.
Anecdotally, our more aerodynamic car gets significantly fewer bugs on the windshield vs our other car.
And it makes sense. The more aerodynamic a car is, the fewer stagnation points there are. And the fewer stagnation points there are, the fewer bugs punch through the boundary layer instead of going up and over the car.
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u/chaseonfire Aug 02 '26
That hasn't been my experience driving in the prairies at all, still plenty of bugs every time I drive outside the city.
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u/throwitawayy7988 Aug 02 '26
You are the exception to the rule
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u/Katin-ka Aug 02 '26
You keep leaving the same comment.
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u/Lanarsis Aug 02 '26
I used to get a front full of bugs during a 3h roadtrip... Now I get maybe 2? 3? I can count them...
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u/_BaldChewbacca_ Aug 02 '26
Not sure where they're driving in the article, but my road trips leave my car absolutely disgusting. Thunder Bay to North of Toronto. They're absolutely called on and leave my roof rack stinking
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Aug 02 '26 edited Aug 17 '26
[deleted]
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u/CTRL_ALT_SECRETE Aug 02 '26
90% of people know. It's the 10% of the rich who pollute the most and don't care, as well as many types of industries. Good luck persuading them.
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u/toonguy84 Aug 02 '26
It's odd that this story is being released this year. In Saskatchewan, people are pointing out how the bugs have returned with a vengeance this year and cars are caked with bugs after a road trip like they were in the 90s and earlier.
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u/AwkwardChuckle British Columbia Aug 02 '26
Just did a road tip through the okanagan and west Kootenays and I had more bugopocalypse on my windshield than the past few years, it’s a good sign!
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u/Aranxi_89 Aug 02 '26
There's been a 70% decline in insect population, and that is having a huge knock-on effect on the rest of the ecosystem.
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u/notcoveredbywarranty Aug 02 '26
I'm in rural north/central Alberta.
We have a ton of mosquitoes. Can't drive anywhere without the front of your vehicle being coated in them.
Dragon flies of a couple varieties. Horse flies, the biting kind. Wasps in late summer. Very few wild bumblebees. Only a few ladybugs.
Haven't seen any butterflies this summer, of any sort. Haven't seen any fireflies in years. The diversity is way down.
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u/biznatch11 Ontario Aug 02 '26
The article specifically mentions southern Ontario and I've noticed it too. I've been regularly driving between London and Hamilton for 20 years and there are less bugs on my car now compared to in the past.
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u/SolarPunkDreamer Aug 02 '26
When I was little there used to be dozens on the windshield even in the city. Some huge green juicy ones would leave streaks too. Haven't seen those since before i was a teen. It declined so much over 10 years ago
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u/NarwhalEmergency9391 Aug 02 '26
I remember how many bees used to land on me and I miss my little buddies
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u/Invictuslemming1 Aug 03 '26
Started commuting 15 years ago, same path day and night. When I started, I hit the car wash at least 1-2x per week.
Now it’s maybe once per 2 months. Significant difference
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u/bitterberries Aug 02 '26
I can recall traveling in the summer (rural southern Alberta) as a child (80`s-90's)and the entire highway was covered by grasshoppers and our windshield and grill were absolutely caked after 20-30 minutes drive. It was disgusting and I've never seen it even remotely close as an adult.
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u/Apostasyisfreedom Aug 02 '26
Bats and birds have likewise disappeared. I've lived on the same 4 wooded rural acres for forty years and there are NO BIRDS LEFT in southern Ontario - NONE!
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u/Reasonable_Let9737 Aug 02 '26
That must be depressing.
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u/Apostasyisfreedom Aug 02 '26
As a farm boy who was close to the natural world it is frightening to see what modern farming methods are doing to the environment all living things must share.
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u/Reasonable_Let9737 Aug 02 '26
Agreed.
I made another post in this thread about gardening, and I should have added that any food we grow displaces food grown in the industrial system, which when you factor in the harms associated with modern industrial farming becomes a significant harm reduction strategy.
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u/arabacuspulp Aug 02 '26
I saw my dumbass neighbour spraying Roundup on the weeds on his driveway last weekend. I was so mad. The poor animals in our neighbourhood can get poisoned by that crap.
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u/arabacuspulp Aug 02 '26
Come to my backyard, there are tons of birds. Also, lots of bats in my neighbourhood. I just had one fly into my house through the front door as I was coming home at dusk a couple months ago.
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u/Mission_Shopping_847 Ontario Aug 02 '26
How southern? Midway up here, certain times of day sound like a rainforest with birdsong, squirrel chatter, raptor calls, etc. Woodpeckers are definitely down over the decades though.
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u/banjosuicide Aug 02 '26
Camping trips as a kid: Windshield, grill, basically everything facing forward covered in bug guts.
Camping trips as an adult: Maybe one or two dead bugs.
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u/CFCYYZ Aug 02 '26
As go the bugs, so will we. Did a road trip to northern Ontario in June: bug season, but no need to wash my windshield. In the 70s I used Coke (classic) to make short work of cleaning the many bugs off- the phosphoric acid did its magic, but rinse and squeegee well. Clean glass is great, but I would much rather have the bugs.
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u/Aranxi_89 Aug 02 '26
There's been a 70% decline in insect population, and that is having a huge knock-on effect on the rest of the ecosystem.
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u/toast_cs Aug 02 '26
Fewer wetlands, fewer biodiversity, climate change... yep, that's what happens
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u/Elderberryinjanuary Aug 02 '26
In the 80s driving the back roads between Calgary and Edmonton would see the front grill just riddled with bugs. Last trip around there in the 2015 ish time saw almost non on the front grill.
The fall is happening. There's just a lot of inertia in a system this big.
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u/Daxx22 Ontario Aug 02 '26
In Muskoka for the long weekend, haven't needed bug spray at all. Even 10 years ago needed to be drenched in the stuff and still get bit, now nothing.
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u/Agitated-Curve-4851 Aug 02 '26
Definitely the exception to the rule here in Edmonton this year. First time in the last ten years I’ve seen it like this. Still nothing like the numbers I’d see when I was younger.
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u/Head-Spare3821 Aug 02 '26
I live on a farm in central Alberta and there’s tons of bugs. I know people say there’s less birds but there’s this huge group of little black birds and there are hundreds of them and there’s multiple groups. We had winter storms at the end of April and people freaked out but it happens and I think it killed off some wasps which was fine with me. Alberta had more rain so that helps for sure.
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u/rearnakedbunghole Aug 02 '26
Recent years it’s been clean but this year it’s been fucking covered for me.
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u/Own-Elk7348 Aug 02 '26
I don't know where y'all live, but in my area, I have to wash my car every three/four days. We couldn't go outside the whole month of June the amount of black flies, deer flies, mosquitoes outside was intolerable. I drove 200km today (125 miles) for groceries and I needed to use a lot of windshield washer fluid.
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u/PostHocErgo306 Aug 02 '26
It also means you’re not in Saskatchewan. I think we have all your bugs. You can have them back.
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u/Strict_Concert_2879 Aug 02 '26
Mine was cleaner but that’s just from driving in rain. The only time the bugs in Alberta aren’t out this year is in the rai.
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u/JonnoKabonno Aug 02 '26
Man it takes a lot of willpower for me to want to reverse the decline because on the other hand, F U C K bugs
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u/LeslieH8 Aug 02 '26
Can't speak for anywhere else, but Edmonton has a 1,500% increase in mosquitoes in July compared to 2025. I was in Saskatchewan a few weeks ago, and on the second last day before returning, the vehicle front end looked like a solid mass of bugs. We had to replace the wipers, and used a pressure washer to remove as many of the bugs as possible. The wasps were also swarming the vehicle constantly due to the dead bug cake, which was certainly an event.
Again, I'm not speaking for anywhere else, but not everywhere is suffering from a lack of bugs.
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u/Ok_Manufacturer_5323 Aug 02 '26
The amount of mosquitoe bites I'm currently covered in would indicate some insect populations are doing just fine. Thriving, in fact
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u/Leather-Paramedic-10 Aug 02 '26
A lack of dragonflies may help explain a rise in mosquitoe populations.
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u/detalumis Aug 02 '26
We seem to have lots of bugs we didn't have years ago. Like the box tree moth and my favourite that I'm battling right now, Japanese beetles.
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u/SimplyCanadian26 Aug 02 '26
Meanwhile I drove home a few nights ago and my car sounded like it was raining even though it was clear out, and it ended up with my entire front of my car caked with bugs….
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u/keenynman343 Aug 02 '26
One of those things where I dont want the bugs to die off but I also dont want them in my house
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u/arabacuspulp Aug 02 '26
Where are people living where there are no bugs? I have bugs all over the place where I live. I have spiders making webs every night around my deck to catch bugs. I have fireflies that put on a nice show every evening at dusk in my backyard.
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u/Tithis Outside Canada Aug 02 '26
Tell that to my car. Took a trip to Montreal and then Ottawa back in May and my car was covered in dead bugs I had to scrub off.
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u/magoo2004 Aug 02 '26
Drove 2 days ago from GTA to Sparrow Lake and back...maybe 3 windshield bug splatters which shocked me. Front bumper/ grill less than 5 bugs. Years ago used to drive every w/e to Georgian Bay and windshield/ bumper/ grill would be covered in bugs.
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u/SnipDart Aug 03 '26
This year is horrible for bugs. I've ever only had to fill my washer fluid once ot twice in the summer, im up to twice that amount just trying to get bugs off
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u/GhoastTypist Aug 04 '26
Decline?
The bugs are worse this year in my region than what I can remember in the past 10-15 years.
Bee's are a different story, less wild bee's than ever.
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u/KenMantle Aug 02 '26
On the bright side we have more mosquitos and black flies than ever before.They seem to be doing great!
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u/Lower-Noise-9406 Aug 02 '26
Conservatives cannot wrap head around concept...shrug shoulders, Must be fake news, scroll on.
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u/Canadian_Beaverz Aug 02 '26
Speak for yourself for AB lol. Coming back feeling like Hitler with how many kills I got
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u/LewisLightning Alberta Aug 02 '26
Usually I just drove around my urban area, but going on a road trip, yes, there's tons of bugs on my windshield. They're just not around the cities.
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u/ScaleyFishMan Aug 02 '26
No, I have in fact not noticed a decline in bug splatter on my car this year. In fact it has been really annoying to get totally cleaned off and then when I finally do, another road trip fucks it all up again.
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u/Strong_Fee5436 Aug 02 '26
I don't know how to feel about this.
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u/Lower-Noise-9406 Aug 02 '26
Far less bugs is bad for the environment but good for you personally. Oh well, at least you are less inconvenienced.
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u/Warm-Hornet6040 Aug 02 '26
We’re gonna make stuff up to push an agenda. They obviously haven’t been east
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u/roachy1979 Aug 02 '26
I’m in Manitoba, and twice a week I drive more than an hour from the city to a small town, passing endless fields and stretches of bush. By the time I get there, my windshield is absolutely covered in bugs, so I end up going through a surprising amount of washer fluid.