What bugs/diseases/critters have ya'll seen that weren't around 30-40 years ago?

[Suburban Plowboy]

A guy named Schmidt let himself get stung over and over and created an insect sting pain scale. Some people are blessed with too much free time.

 

[Eaglesfate]

Had an operator on 2nd come in and needed training, Co worker showed them how to do it, and they kept telling them that not how they would do it and that they would not do it, this led them to continue to make defective parts, when this was pointed out, they lost their S*it and forced themselves to vomit and let the plant for the day.

 

[TractorGunn]

When I was growing up around here we never saw skunks, coyotes, ground hawgs, armadillo, fire ants, even deer. In the mid 70's the state released I think it was 75 dakota whitetails in our area. First one I saw about 76 laying dead in the road, evidently they forgot to tell the deer cars would be around...

Fire ants, never saw them until 2000 ish.

Skunks started seeing them dead in nearby areas about 10 yrs go.

Ground hawgs started showing up about 30 yrs ago.

Coyotes maybe 20 yrs ago.

Armadillo's grandson saw the first one about 2 yrs or so ago.

Wildlife folks say these critters have migrated here. Seems mighty strange to me that as many years as has been around , they never "migrated" here before. I practically lived in the woods growing up. I read tracks, looked for sign, did some trapping, notta...

Fire ant debacle came from potted plants imported in.

Ain't gonna mention all the yankees that have been self importing in.

Has this happened in your area?

Ticks with alpha gal.

I wouldn't be surprised if it is man made for the anti meat agenda.

 

[WinterDeere]

There are coyotes in Florida now. Science tells us they walked across the Mississippi during a cold snap, but that's a lie. There have been cold snaps since the beginning of time, the Mississippi froze countless times, and the coyotes stayed out west.

Coyotes are nothing new in Florida, and in fact they DID enter during past cold snaps, going way back to the Pliocene. It’s hard to argue with bones and fossil evidence.

They seem to have wandered their way out prior to recorded history, which is why people at one time thought they were not native to Florida, when they started re-appearing there in the 1960’s. Evolution and migration happen on time scales longer than the very brief recorded history of Florida.

 

[paulsharvey]

On coyotes, and if they belong or not; It's entirely possible that they filled a void in the ecosystem. Although I dont think the panther population has ever that big, there are very few now. Bobcats, not endangered, but pretty small populations; so nature needed a medium sized predator, between panther and the small, fox/coon/house cat/ect.

One absolute constant in nature is Change.


The new animal shakes things up initially, and a new balance develops. Hogs arent native, but at the same time, they have been here for 500 years; and FWC doesn't even list a goal as removal. They kinda beat around the bush on the website, but eradication is not a goal. Give it 100 years, pythons will be similar. They will spread, but small ones will feed the hogs and gators. The ones that get large enough will eat gators and hogs. We might loose some specific water bird species, but not the entire ecological niche

 

[Suburban Plowboy]

Coyotes are nothing new in Florida, and in fact they DID enter during past cold snaps, going way back to the Pliocene. It’s hard to argue with bones and fossil evidence.

They seem to have wandered their way out prior to recorded history, which is why people at one time thought they were not native to Florida, when they started re-appearing there in the 1960’s. Evolution and migration happen on time scales longer than the very brief recorded history of Florida.

Web says an extinct ancestor existed in the east, but not the modern coyote.

 

[Jstpssng]

Web says an extinct ancestor existed in the east, but not the modern coyote.

The coyote we have here is slightly larger than it's western cousins. They apparently have some wolf blood mixed in. As somebody mentioned above they arrived to fill a void created when the wolf population was wiped out.
Nature abhors a vacuum.

 

[Suburban Plowboy]

The wolf population was decimated long before the coyotes came in, so that can't be the main explanation.