First came the heat. Then the lovebugs invaded Seoul
Seoul – They are bombing pedestrians in diving, carpet hiking trails and national titles.
Known as “Lovebugs” or PLEcia LongiforcepsThis species of the invasive fly of March is the conference of the capital of South Korea, annoying public officials and launchers of the government, who try to keep these “non -invited summer guests” – as they were called by the media – remotely.
They are called love bridges because they are often seen in the mating act, with men and women attached to the hip while they fly. They began to appear in the capital area in 2015, and some experts think they crossed south-eastern China.
Why their populations explode this year is still a mystery, according to Shin Seung-Gwan, biologist at the National University of Seoul who is doing research on the phenomenon.
Although the media cite climate change as a reason, Shin says that this explanation does not take into account an important detail: they are concentrated in areas near Seoul, not the hottest regions of the country further south.
“I think that, more than climate change, it may have more to do with the effect of the urban heat island [occurring when a city has much warmer temperatures than the surrounding area]”, He said.” But the scale of the rise of the current population is certainly not normal and is something that justifies a new observation. »»
Lovebugs are harmless for humans; They don’t bite, and they don’t wear a disease. According to a Youtuber who recently collected a bag and consumed them In the form of a hamburger type pancake, they are even edible.
“The flavor is not a level A but I think you can eat them,” he said in a video detailing the experience. “They have a taste for the unique scent they give off in the mountains. They have a taste for trees. “
Their only sin, with regard to things, is an exciting disgust.
The only insects more insulted by the residents of Seoul are cockroaches and bedbugs, according to a survey by the local data company, set in last year. Eighty-six percent of respondents said they considered them as parasites.
The complaints of residents concerning city Lovebugs more than doubled between 2022 and 2024, from 4,418 to 9,296, according to government data.
It is so omnipresent that the move that the conservative legislator AHN Cheol-Soo recently summoned a metaphor of Lovebug to criticize the last rental of the president of Liberal Lee Jae-Myung, a former provincial governor who was sentenced to his involvement in a political scandal in 2019.
“Like Lovebugs, ex-denominations seem to have a way to stick to other ex-relaxes,” Ahn wrote on social networks.
Last year, some argued that the city should officially designate lovebugs such as parasites – a decision that would allow them to be chemically exterminated – citing the threats they posed for mental health. But municipal legislators finally abandoned this idea after environmental activists raised concerns about health and security.
This year, while public patience is thinning, the city is trying a different campaign: a public relations campaign to ignore the public image of Lovebugs.
“Lovebugs, these are not parasites! Excessive control of pests ends up harming the environment and our health and should be avoided as much as possible,” said an animated video published by the Government Department of Seoul last month.
“Despite their disgusting appearance”, lovebugs also offer environmental advantages, the video note: adults pollinate flowers, while larvae help natural soil composting.
Although research is always carried out in their broader ecological impacts, Shin, the biologist, says that, like many invasive species, lovebugs can find their own benign place in the natural order.
“In the process of organizations to adapt to a new environment, it is common that their populations explode in the absence of natural enemies,” he said. “But over time, these natural enemies or pathogens appear, and their population density decreases.”
This was the case for another formerly clever invasive insect: the spotted lantern.
According to South Korea, as clandestine on agricultural imports from southeast China, they have invaded urban areas and destroy cultures until their populations begin to stabilize with the emergence of a natural enemy: a parasitic wasp that kills its eggs.
