Heatwaves can ’wipe out’ male insect fertility
▻https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/nov/13/heatwaves-wipe-out-male-insect-fertility-beetles-study
The research, published in the Nature Communications journal, found that exposing beetles to a five-day heatwave in the laboratory reduced sperm production by three-quarters; females were unaffected.
“Beetles are thought to constitute a quarter of biodiversity, so these results are very important for understanding how species react to climate change,” said Kris Sales, at the University of East Anglia, who led the work.
[...] After being exposed to a heatwave, the number of offspring produced by males fell by half. Even more worryingly, harmful effects were inherited by the males they produced – their lives were 20% shorter and they in turn produced fewer offspring.