🚀 go-pugleaf

I'm curious about the claim that wild flies 'evolve' to recognise
steriles.  Where did you encounter it, etc.,.

In my (admittedly very limited) experience working with Drosophila
melanogaster fruitflies, including some that bore chromosomal lesions
making them sterile with respect to wild flies, I knew of no phenotypic
difference...unless the sterility is produced by environmental insult
(like x-raying them nearly to death, which would make them pretty
unattractive...the fact that they breed them in Hawaii would tend to
support environmental insult.)  In any event, I would like to at least
half-heartedly track down your source.  

Incidentally, it is conceivable, though absolutely improbable, that
these sterile flies, due to the very large numbers they are released in,
could in fact do some harm:  for example, they could edge out some
marginally stocked indigenous population by pressure on an ecosystem or
feed some predator throwing the pred/prey balance off....but again, this
is somewhat farfetched.  The point, however, is that in principle
sterile flies are not necessarily innocuous.

On two different tacks this brings us to our evil organo-phosphate
arch-enemy malathion.  Malathion does have the effect of throwing off
predator prey balances in the insect world  (Research done by someone at
UCDavis.)  The point I would like to make is that no one at the state
agencies responsible for evaluating the environmental impact of spraying
ever did anticipate/consider this.  While I agree that this is not
necessarily a question demanding utmost human concern, (1) it is
relevand and (2) one must wonder whether this is at all reflective of
any other evaluation procedures at their points of contact with human
relevance....

Incidently, I should hope that it has been mentionned in the ongoing
discussions already, but I will belabour it for completeness:
The cheif scientist responsible for drafting the report on malathion's
effects on humans for (I beleive it was) the State Dept of Agri had his
first report returned to him by superiours and then resigned or was
fired over conflicts over rewriting it with numbers that were more--for
lack of a better term--aesthetically pleasing.  Dispassionate science at
its best.  His successors had to resort to assumptions that were a
little rediculous, like incredibly small outdoor play areas for
children, etc. to get acceptable 'acceptable level of death' statistics.

Ely Rabani
	as the thumb-screw turns
 
agencies responsible for evaluating its environmental impac