Windshield phenomenon

[2][3][4] In 2016, Canadian naturalist John Acorn noted that the phenomenon had recently become a meme but questioned whether it is "reasonable to assume that windshields can tell us something about the overall numbers of insects" and also that "humans are notoriously bad at detecting trends".

[5] The windshield phenomenon was discussed widely in 2017 after major publications and other media reported the topic of reductions of insect abundance during the last few decades.

Adjusted for variables such as time of day, date, temperature, and wind speed, the research found an 80% decrease of the number of insects.

A parallel study using sweep nets and sticky plates in the same area correlated positively with the reduction of insects killed by cars.

[10] In 2004 the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) asked 40,000 motorists in the United Kingdom to attach a sticky PVC film to their number plate.