Scientists believe life appeared on Earth almost four-billion years ago, about half a billion years after our relatively young planet formed. It would be fascinating to see how life arose and managed to hang on.

If scientists were to invent time travel to take us back through Earth’s history, we’d see little life for most of the four-billion years. Plenty was happening but at a microscopic level as organisms worked out all the intricacies of survival: finding food and energy, evading predators, fighting off disease (even bacteria get virus infections), reproducing and eliminating waste.

Once those fundamental details were worked out, more complex cells arose by incorporating other cells within themselves to perform specialized functions like capturing energy from the sun (photosynthesis) or generating energy from stored molecules. The stage was set for the final blossoming of life into forms visible to creatures like us: multicellularity. Once an organism was made up of many cells, a division of labour was possible. Various cells specialized in movement, eating, digestion, excretion and reproduction. All of this occurred in the last fifth of life’s existence as seas and land filled with wondrous animals and plants.

It’s a magnificent story and we only know the barest outlines. We tend to focus on big life forms like trees, elephants and whales. That’s understandable. They’re often spectacular. But our bias toward the big and impressive overlooks the importance, and beauty, of what are often dismissed as “creepy crawlies”, such as worms, insects, fungi and bacteria.

I was an avid bug collector as a boy. To me, insects were endlessly riveting. Many of them display spectacular colours and patterns and occur in shapes and forms that are far more bizarre and surprising than any Hollywood sci-fi creation. My childhood fascination evolved in college to a focus on heredity in an insect, a common fruit fly, which has revealed so much about genetic principles in humans.

In our concern with protecting grizzlies and polar bears, whooping cranes and redwood trees, wolves and caribou, we give short shrift to the small creatures that keep the planet livable. Tiny organisms and plant roots filter water as it percolates through soil; insects, bacteria and fungi help plants, animals and dung decompose to create soil; bacteria in legumes capture atmospheric nitrogen and fix it in soil; all green things exchange carbon dioxide for oxygen as they capture sunlight that animals like us can consume and store for our own use. In fact, bacteria directly produce up to half the oxygen we breathe. Microbes in the human body outnumber cells by 10 to one, and many of them keep us alive by helping us digest food and combat infection, among other services.

Years ago, scientists in Norway showed that a single teaspoon of soil from a beach contained more than 4,000 different species of bacteria. Another teaspoon taken from a nearby deciduous forest yielded a similar number of species, most of them different from the beach group. Soil is not dirt or inert material; it is a complex community of living organisms, yet modern farming techniques often wipe them out.

Scientists estimate that for every human, there are 200-million insects on Earth. They are important parts of ecosystems, providing services such as pollination, food and pest control. Of all insect species, very few are harmful to humans, yet we spray powerful chemicals that kill all insects just to get at the tiny fraction that causes problems for us.

Because all life forms have evolved ways to find food, avoid being eaten, heal from infection, reproduce and eliminate waste, we have much to learn if we show some respect and patience to see how they create solutions. Scientists discovered penicillin as a fungus’s way of warding off bacteria. They found cancer-fighting vincristine in the rosy periwinkle and taxol in yew trees. Restriction enzymes, vital tools of genetic engineers, are used by bacteria to fight viral infection.

We focus on charismatic species like whales, pandas, cedar trees and seals as poster children for conservation. But the small things that keep the biosphere going for creatures like us are probably more threatened because we ignore them. If we spend time studying them, they have much to teach us.

When a swarm of bees landed on a tree in their yard a few years ago, a David Suzuki Foundation staffer and her husband became accidental beekeepers. They called an apiarist relative who came over and helped them capture the bees, build hives and round up equipment. Now they’re enjoying fresh honey and wax and have developed a fascination for the amazing insects. Staff shared that wonderment when she brought honeycombs and tools to the office for an impromptu lesson on beekeeping and bee behaviour.

Bees are endlessly intriguing, and incredibly useful to us – and not just for honey and wax. If bees disappeared, it would be difficult, if not impossible, to grow much of what we eat. Bees pollinate crops ranging from apples to zucchini. Blueberries and almonds are almost entirely dependent on them. Some experts say they’re responsible for one of every three bites of food we eat. The economic value of pollination services from honeybees alone is estimated at $14 billion in the U.S. and hundreds of millions in Canada.

Bees are good pollinators because – unlike some birds and other insects that are after nectar alone – they also seek out pollen, which they use along with nectar to feed the hive. In the process, they transfer pollen from the male part of one flower to the female part of another, fertilizing plants so they can develop seed-carrying fruits. Wild bees and domesticated honeybees are both important pollinators.

In fact, research indicates wild bees may be more important for food-crop pollination than honeybees. That’s in part because a single species, such as honeybees, is vulnerable to mass disease outbreaks. Wild bees also use a wider range of pollination techniques and visit more plants, and so increase chances of cross-pollination, according to an article in the Guardian.

Sadly, both wild and domesticated bees are in trouble, and that means we could be, too. Causes of phenomena such as colony collapse disorder and other declines in bee populations are not entirely understood, but scientists are getting closer to knowing why bees are dying. Ironically, much of it relates to agricultural practices. Modern methods of growing food are killing one of our biggest helpers in food production.

Wild bees also face threats from climate change and habitat loss. A recent study published in Science found half the wild bee species in the U.S. were wiped out during the 20th century. That’s been partly attributed to “an increasing mismatch between when plants flowered and when bees were active, a finding consistent with climate change,” according to the Guardian.

Causes of honeybee deaths are more complicated. Colony collapse disorder has wiped out millions of hives over the past decade, with pesticide use, parasites and poor nutrition eyed as likely culprits. Scientists from the University of Maryland and U.S. Department of Agriculture recently found pollen collected by honeybees was contaminated with a toxic mix of pesticides and fungicides. It appears the toxins make the bees more vulnerable to a parasite called Nosema ceranae, which is believed to cause colony collapse disorder. Pollen samples contained an average of nine different agricultural pesticides and fungicides, and as many as 21 in one case.

The European Union has imposed a two-year ban on three neonicotinoids, a class of pesticides thought to be responsible for the dramatic declines in Europe’s bee populations, but only for use on “crops attractive to bees”. However, according to the Maryland study’s lead author, Dennis vanEngelsdorp, quoted in the online news outlet Quartz, “It’s a lot more complicated than just one product, which means of course the solution does not lie in just banning one class of product.”

We need to get a handle on the toxic chemicals we use to grow food. If our practices kill insects and birds that make it possible to grow crops, we’re defeating their purpose and putting ourselves and the rest of nature at risk. As individuals, we can help bees. Stop using pesticides and join the call to ban the worst ones. Plant bee-friendly plants and gardens, make wild bee “houses” and learn more about our fuzzy, buzzing friends. Like our DSF staffer, you could even adopt a hive.

Written with contributions from David Suzuki Foundation Communications Manager Ian Hanington.

We can’t live without birds. Beyond being fascinating and beautiful, they play a crucial role in keeping the world habitable for all life, including people. They disperse seeds, pollinate plants, control insects, provide food and are indicators of the overall health of ecosystems. They also create recreational and economic opportunities, through the immense popularity of birdwatching.

So we should be concerned about the findings of the report, “State of the world’s birds: indicators for our changing world”: One in eight – or 1,313 – species of Earth’s birds is in danger of disappearing.

“The status of the world’s birds is deteriorating, with species slipping ever faster towards extinction,” notes the assessment by Birdlife International, a global partnership of conservation organizations. This represents rapid acceleration of a troubling trend: 151 bird species are believed to have gone extinct since 1500.

But the study, released at Birdlife International’s 2013 Congress in Ottawa, offers hope: “An annual investment of US$4 billion, used wisely, could improve the status of all known threatened species and virtually halt human-driven extinctions. A further US$76 billion could effectively protect and manage all known sites of global conservation significance. These sums are insignificant in comparison with both the size of the global economy (roughly US$70 trillion per year) and an estimate of the total value of ecosystem services delivered by nature each year (US$22–US$74 trillion).”

Many threatened birds are common species, including turtle doves, meadowlarks, barn swallows and purple martins. In Canada, insectivores, grassland birds and Arctic shorebirds have been declining rapidly since 1970, all because of human activity. But conservation efforts, including regulating pesticides such as DDT, have helped some raptor and waterfowl populations bounce back.

Sadly, we’re to blame for the current plight of birds. The report shows industrial-scale agriculture, logging and invasive species are the gravest immediate dangers. It also concludes climate change is an “emerging and increasingly serious threat to species” and “often exacerbates existing threats.” Among other problems, a warming planet changes migration and nesting schedules, hindering birds’ ability to find insects to eat. It also damages habitat.

One solution for safeguarding bird populations is to ensure habitats critical to their survival – known as Important Bird Areas, or IBAs – are protected, through legislation if necessary. That doesn’t mean shutting out human activity, just managing these areas in ways that allow birds to survive and thrive.

As the report shows, investing in conservation comes with benefits beyond helping birds. The more than 12,000 IBAs identified worldwide offer valuable ecosystem services, such as regulating climate and air quality, purifying water and preventing floods, maintaining genetic diversity, providing food and medicines and creating recreation and tourism opportunities.

Education is another component of protecting birds and all threatened plants and animals. As we better understand our connection to nature, the importance of biodiversity and the value of services healthy ecosystems provide, we’ll make conservation and biodiversity higher priorities in our decision-making, which will lead to wiser development.

While the BirdLife study identifies climate change as a major threat, it also notes the challenge in balancing environmental factors in energy-project development. Critics oppose wind power because of potential harm to birds, but bird deaths from windmills are minimal compared to those caused by fossil fuels, climate change, pesticides, highrise buildings, automobile collisions and house cats. A National University of Singapore study shows fossil fuel power generation kills 17 times as many birds per gigawatt-hour of electricity as wind power. And wind farm problems can be overcome with proper siting and improved design. In the Rift Valley/Red Sea flyway, an important area for birds migrating between Eurasia and Africa, BirdLife developed research materials and a web-based tool to map flight patterns and identify places where wind installations should be avoided to keep birds safer.

Plummeting bird populations reflect the state of the global environment – but it’s not too late to do something. As Leon Bennun, BirdLife’s director of science, information and policy, says, “Effective nature conservation is affordable and it works. It’s time to make it happen. The result will be a world that is in every way wealthier and healthier – and that remains diverse and beautiful too.”

We need birds. Let’s do all we can to avert an extinction catastrophe.

Written with contributions from David Suzuki Foundation Communications Manager Ian Hanington.