Every year, the U.S. drops millions of tiny, hungry worms from planes over Central America, but it's not a prank or a bizarre experiment—it’s part of an epic battle against screwworms! These worms are actually baby flies, known as screwworm larvae, that can cause terrible infections in animals by eating living flesh. So why drop them? The worms are made special in a lab so they can't reproduce, and when they mate with wild screwworms, it helps wipe out the whole screwworm population without any new eggs being laid. By doing this, scientists keep screwworms from spreading and harming livestock, pets, and wildlife in both Central America and the U.S. It’s a powerful and clever way to protect animals, keep ecosystems balanced, and save millions of dollars in potential damage every year! Animation is created by Bright Side. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Music from TheSoul Sound: https://thesoul-sound.com/ Check our Bright Side podcast on Spotify and leave a positive review! https://open.spotify.com/show/0hUkPxD34jRLrMrJux4VxV Subscribe to Bright Side: https://goo.gl/rQTJZz ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Our Social Media: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/brightside Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/brightside.official TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@brightside.official?lang=en Stock materials (photos, footages and other): https://www.depositphotos.com https://www.shutterstock.com https://www.eastnews.ru ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- For more videos and articles visit: http://www.brightside.me ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- This video is made for entertainment purposes. We do not make any warranties about the completeness, safety and reliability. Any action you take upon the information in this video is strictly at your own risk, and we will not be liable for any damages or losses. It is the viewer's responsibility to use judgement, care and precaution if you plan to replicate.
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00:00Humans are at the top of the food chain, but despite this, some creatures cause us a lot of trouble, and we can't do anything about them.
00:10Look at these flies with red eyes and blue-green bodies. These are some farmers' worst nightmare in the United States of America.
00:18Meet the New World screwworm flies. These little troublemakers have been munching on livestock from Florida to California for centuries,
00:25racking up some serious damage to the agricultural scene.
00:30To combat these pesky flies, the U.S. Department of Agriculture dropped a whopping 15 million sterile screwworm larvae from helicopters along the Panama-Colombia border.
00:41There's even a factory in Panama cranking out these sterile larvae like it's factory fresh fruit.
00:47This action sounds weird, but it makes a lot of sense.
00:51The thing is, female flies only get one shot at mating in their entire lives.
00:56So if they happen to mate with a sterile dude, that's it. No offspring, ever.
01:02This clever trick means healthy screwworms can't reproduce when surrounded by sterile pals, which keeps their numbers in check.
01:10But how do we make these male flies sterile in the first place?
01:14Simple. A little radiation zap does the trick.
01:18You throw a bunch of flies in a lab, give them a quick spin through an x-ray machine, and then drop them from a helicopter into the wild.
01:25Where their relatives are hanging out.
01:28If screwworms start making a comeback, inspectors hop on ATVs and cruise thousands of miles to hunt down any infected animals and stop the spread.
01:38There's no magic trick to wipe out these parasites completely, but the game plan is clear.
01:43Keep the sterile fly drops coming and stay one step ahead of these pesky little critters.
01:50Do you know why it's too dangerous to move animals from one habitat to another?
01:55There's a possibility that they won't encounter predators in the new area and will become an invasive species that will provoke an ecological disaster.
02:03Here's a simple example.
02:05In the 30s, in the 20th century, farmers from Australia faced a serious problem.
02:11Cane beetles were spoiling sugar cane in the northern part of the country.
02:15Insects devoured a huge amount of the harvest and people couldn't stop it.
02:20They didn't want to spoil the cane with poisonous pesticides, so they brought a group of cane toads from South America in the hope that the toads would eat the pests.
02:29But when these toads found themselves in the reed fields, they couldn't reach the bugs, as they lived on tall reeds.
02:37The toads just couldn't jump at such height and get the pests.
02:41So instead of beetles, they began to eat other insects.
02:46Amphibians started multiplying at a tremendous rate.
02:50The female cane toad can lay about 30,000 eggs at a time.
02:54After three days, small tadpoles hatch from the eggs.
02:58They swim in the water for 20 weeks and then turn into grown-up toads that live from 5 to 10 years.
03:06Millions of jumping animals began taking over the entire northern part of the continent, destroying all the biodiversity around.
03:13Leaves, grass, insects carry on.
03:16Toads ate all this and didn't leave food for other animals.
03:20The problem was that the toads turned out to be very hardy creatures.
03:24Heat, cold, rain, droughts, they can breed anywhere and nothing can stop them.
03:29But what about other animals?
03:31Australia is full of alligators, big birds, and other creatures that would love to feast on croaking amphibians.
03:38Yes, it's true.
03:40But any animal that tried to eat these toads didn't survive.
03:45The problem is that cane toads are venomous.
03:48There are special glands behind their eyes that produce strong toxins that cause serious health problems in any animal.
03:55Some farmers saw birds falling from the sky after they had swallowed these amphibians.
04:01More than 80 years have passed since farmers brought 100 cane toads to Australia.
04:06Now, there are about 1.5 billion of them.
04:10They have already covered 386,000 square miles, which is about the same area as the states of Texas and Oklahoma combined.
04:19And so far, scientists and biologists haven't come up with an effective way to deal with them.
04:25People tried to catch them, but it was useless.
04:29Even if you catch 98 toads out of 100 next to a small pond, the two remaining toads can produce 30,000 eggs per night.
04:37Nature may be able to restore balance when some animals with immunity to toad toxins appear in Australia.
04:44But at the moment, cane toads are unstoppable.
04:50How can we stop the uncontrolled population of mosquitoes that are dangerous to humans?
04:55The correct answer is to create 735 million genetically modified mosquitoes and mix these two groups.
05:04All over the world, many species of mosquitoes carry infections that cause serious health problems to humans.
05:10Almost no one likes mosquitoes.
05:13These buzzing insects prevent us from sleeping, and their bites are incredibly itchy.
05:18Many people would probably be happy if these creatures disappeared from the face of the Earth.
05:24And scientists might have found a way to make this wish come true.
05:29Only female mosquitoes bite us because they need food to produce eggs.
05:33So, scientists released genetically modified male mosquitoes with a special protein in their bodies.
05:39After two mosquitoes come into contact, this protein is transmitted from the male to the female and then prevents it from producing offspring.
05:48All this happens before the age when females begin to bite.
05:53So, females can't create offspring, which means they don't need to bite people and animals anymore.
05:59And the more of such protein scientists spread, the smaller the mosquito population will be.
06:05It sounds good, but about 240,000 people have signed a petition to cancel this experiment.
06:12Many scientists believe that the disappearance of one insect species can lead to a biological catastrophe.
06:19Nature is a complex, balanced system where the slightest change can lead to serious problems.
06:26Mosquitoes are a food source for many reptiles and amphibians.
06:30The extinction of mosquitoes can trigger the disappearance of many species.
06:35It's like a chain reaction of catastrophes, the end of which is unknown.
06:40Nevertheless, modified mosquitoes have already been released in Florida, and it seems that nothing terrible has happened.
06:48The good news is that people have fewer health problems after that.
06:53Moreover, since 2019, about 1.5 billion mosquitoes have been released worldwide.
06:59It has saved millions of lives and hasn't disrupted the delicate balance of nature yet.
07:05Recently, scientists have released another group of safe mosquitoes in East Africa.
07:10Well, let's hope that scientists have everything under control.
07:15Invasive species are not always mosquitoes, flies, or amphibians.
07:20These can also be large animals, such as feral pigs or super pigs.
07:25These pigs are a mix of domestic swine and wild boar.
07:29There are already almost 7 million feral hogs in the south of the USA.
07:35Thanks to people's efforts, these animals haven't spread to the north yet.
07:39But the danger to the northern states comes from Canada.
07:44Pigs were brought there in the 80s to support agriculture.
07:47But in the early 2000s, wild boars lost their popularity.
07:51They just stayed in the wild, and farmers were sure that those animals wouldn't survive the harsh Canadian winter.
07:57Oh, how wrong they were!
07:59Wild pigs turned out to be hardy, mobile, and capable of rapid reproduction.
08:06These animals dig and tear up the ground, eat almost everything they come across, and thus, take food from other animals.
08:14By the way, other creatures can become their lunch too.
08:18Wild pigs attack mice, geese, ducks, and some species of deer.
08:23They trample crops, grass, and flowers and are not afraid of anything.
08:28They're like natural bulldozers.
08:31Any farm is in danger of extinction if it's in the path of thousands of super pigs.
08:37And people can't do anything with them.
08:39The northern states understand that an invasion is imminent, so they're preparing for a long battle.
08:45Super pigs love swampy areas with tall grass.
08:49Canadian and American farmers will try to drive them into more open areas and fence those places off.
08:55The plan is not perfect, but it can slow the pigs down and save some time.
09:01That's it for today.
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