ENTOMOLOGY

In college, Entomology was a 300 level biology course. I took it my junior year in the fall. There were about a dozen of us in the class along with our professor, Charlie Newlon. Charlie was the best teacher I had in college, maybe the best ever; I had him for two other classes as well. He loved it all, Biology; and he truly enjoyed sharing that passion with us, his students. His enthusiasm and deep well of knowledge pulled us in like fish on a hook. At the time I wondered, ‘How can anyone know that much about anything?’ 

Insects; you may find them fascinating, absolutely gross or you may not care at all but these creatures are there, and there, and over there. Insects are everywhere. I was fascinated from the get-go. I particularly liked beetles (Coleoptera) and bees (Hymenoptera.) The Lady Bug was a favorite; not a bug at all, a beetle. They feed on aphids, mealy bugs and scale which makes them precious to vegetable farmers. They buy live Lady Bug Beetles by the thousands to turn loose in their green houses and veggie patches to control destructive insect pests. My mother showed me when I was a toddler; put a Lady Bug on your hand and point a finger upward. The bug will climb up your hand to the end of the finger. Then you have to watch closely. The black spotted, little red or orange insect, a little bigger than a split pea, will spread its elytra like garage doors swinging open. Ninety percent of what you see of the Lady Bug are its elytra, covering its back and protecting its flight wings. Then the fine veined flight wings unfold like tiny umbrellas and they fly away so quick they just seem to disappear. It was so cool then, still is. 

2015 is going to be a banner year for Cicadas. We have two different broods coming  out together. The 17 year Cicadas are in sync with the 13 year brood and the noise should drive us nuts. They live as larva in the ground for all those years until Nature prompts them to crawl up out of the turf and up a tree. Their hard, tough outer shell (Exoskeleton) dries out and splits down the back from end to end. Then they crawl out of the old shell, sort of like we crawl out of our long johns, unfold their wings, finish drying and begin to sing. That ‘Rheeeee-a-Rheeeee-a-Rheeeee-a’ cacophony of Cicadas, calling out, all craving sex, looking for a mate, not understanding why; but it all works out and they lay their fertile eggs, restarting the 13 or 17 year cycle all over again. Soon the spent insects dissolve back into the food chain and some other species profits from their demise. All that is left are thousands of old, dry Cicada shells, clinging to the twig or tree trunk where they emerged only a few days before. Bees follow an entirely different protocol but then that’s another story.