Lessons From Class Insecta
How beetles, butterflies and other wonders of nature play a supporting role in my life
“It can never be too strongly impressed upon a mind anxious for the acquisition of knowledge, that the commonest things by which we are surrounded are deserving of minute and careful attention.” - James Rennie, ‘Insect Architecture’, 1857
Introduction
Insects have always fascinated me. In this collection of short essays, you’ll see how they’ve impacted me over the years of my life as I share stories from my childhood all the way through how I share my love of insects to my children, and even strangers, now. The most remarkable take away from all of these encounters, is the realization that we can learn so much from insects, but they need not learn anything from us.
It wasn’t until our family moved to a large piece of property backing up to a forest and a horse farm that I began taking a greater interest beyond fascination in insects; mostly because my youngest, and only child at the time, was playing in those woods and we were exposed to a whole host of new creatures compared to where we had lived prior to moving to that home. Our screened porch, the one I reference in the ladybug and aphid story below, was a sort of death trap for many-an-insect as we left the door open for our dogs to be able to freely come in and out of the yard. This open door invited all walks of fauna (literally all) into our living space and because it was nearly impossible to keep them out, we decided to research everything we could about them, thus empowering our minds to address our fears, and co-exist with them.
The more I learned about insects, the greater my interest grew. The greater my interest grew, the more love and respect I had for all insects and this appreciation opened my eyes to the understanding that we are all connected here on this earth - insect, animal, human, plants. In my early 40’s, I decided to invest in my education of the natural world and completed a nine month course to become a Master Naturalist.
As a Christian, I see God through His handiwork in the minute and wonderfully remarkable details of insects and the role they play within this universal connectivity I reference above. Only God could create such a diverse, complicated, connected and beautiful masterpiece and this reverence I feel initiates a constant praise and worship. Nature always points me to my Creator.
Nature journaling has also played a big role in my curiosity, wonder and learning. Through journaling, I have learned to ask questions, truly ‘see’ my subject through sketching or painting, seek refuge from the busyness of the world, and surprise myself. John Muir Laws, a very skilled nature journaling mentor, said, “The feeling of surprise is a gift. It is your mind’s way of telling you that something in your environment is not the way you thought it was: you may be wrong about something.” I enjoy being surprised over and over again when I am studying insects and nature. And the good news is, there is an endless supply of surprise all around me - I just have to open my eyes and see it.
So, what role do these creatures play in my life? They are a continuous source of wonder and surprise; they make me praise my Maker; they provide endless entertainment; they teach me; they humble me; they surprise me; they bring me joy; and taking the time to slow down, observe, listen, sketch, and wonder about them has been incredibly therapeutic as I’ve lived through a season of long-suffering. I find such peace in knowing that God has created these tiny creatures to continue doing what they know to do, and no amount of stress, anxiety, hurriedness, or striving on my part will change that. So, in a way, they also center me.
I have so many little stories like the ones below. I hope to publish them all together one day and I hope my words will change a few hearts about insects in the process.
I. Yellow butterfly
I watched a yellow butterfly crossing a busy intersection the other day as the cars were coming to a stop; I was in one of them. It bobbed up and down, dodging the cars; living on instinct. It reached the other side of the road, the light turned green, and it vanished over the bushes.
This short encounter reached the depths of my banked memories and reminded me of a time when I was a very young girl, when the world had more insects, and I found a yellow butterfly stuck dead, in perfect condition, to the front of our family car’s grille. I knelt to look at it and wept a few tears.
It was so beautiful and I didn’t understand why beautiful things had to die. I didn’t understand how something that was dead like that could still look so perfect.
I wished I could have saved it but in that moment, as an inquisitive and tender-hearted young girl in pigtails, I realized everything must die.
{Most of my pinned butterfly specimens are from finding them dead in nature. Most of the time, their bodies are pretty well intact. It’s always exciting when my kids or I find one to bring home and pin.}
“Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature.” - Helen Keller
II. Beautiful moth
A year ago, I rescued a moth. Or, I thought I was rescuing the moth.
It fluttered helplessly on the ground, right outside of the automatic sliding doors of a hotel. I almost stepped on it. I picked it up gently and walked it to a nearby grassy area to put it down where it would be safe and not trampled on.
It was a beautiful moth.
I placed it down on the ground, beside a bush, and reached for my phone to take a photo of it to help me identify it.
I wasn’t able to get the photo.
The moment I laid it on the ground, a lizard came out from under the bush, snatched it up into its mouth, and ran back under the bush. All in a flash.
I was stunned. I didn’t move for a minute, thinking about what I had just seen. And then, a brief sadness came over me; had I caused its death?
Surely I had.
“There is no such thing as death. In nature, nothing dies. From each sad remnant of decay, some forms of life arise so shall his life be taken away before he knoweth that he hath it.” - Charles Mackay
III. The worm (though not an insect, it’s often mislabeled as one)
A few weeks ago, my husband and I grabbed our water bottles and took our dog for a short walk on a hot June day. Because it was so hot, we didn’t go our usual, longer route on the trail by the river; we walked on the sidewalk in the neighborhood.
We came upon a worm, squirming in the middle of the hot sidewalk.
Hot sidewalks are baking sheets for worms so I grabbed a skinny stick to pick it up and moved it to a shady part of the grass.
We poured water over it and said our goodbyes.
A moment later, a robin flew down, picked it up and carried it off in its beak. I immediately thought of the moth and the lizard.
I felt sadness for the worm. But understood the robin. I understood the lizard.
{Robins are exceptional worm hunters and voracious worm eaters. They can eat up to 14 feet of worms a day!}
“Nature knows no indecencies; man invents them.” - Mark Twain
IV. Ladybugs
A few summers ago, we had a tree in our front yard full of every stage in the lifecycle of a ladybug, from eggs to larvae to pupas to the adults.
This tree, and its inhabitants, became a great source of entertainment during a time when the world shut down and everyone was told to stay at home.
We watched an adult ladybug lay her tiny, ovoid yellow eggs on a thin piece of pine straw that had fallen and become tangled in the tree from a towering pine whose canopy overshadowed the small tree. She remained unphased as I picked the piece up to observe her through my macro lens attached to my phone. She walked down the pine straw piece, laying her eggs, one at a time, all in a tight cluster.
She then sharply turned around and ate all of the eggs, one at a time, while walking back up the pine straw.
We couldn’t believe our eyes.
Luke, newly six, stated, “She must not love her babies.”
Yes. She must not.
{Research suggests that engaging in cannibalistic behaviors is advantageous for ladybugs because it results in metabolic gains and a reduction in potential predators.}1
“The wilderness holds answers to questions man has not yet learned to ask.” - Nancy Newhall
V. Ladybugs and aphids
From the same tree that summer, we became incredibly fascinated with the little black and orange alien creatures, the ladybug larvae, busily crawling all over the leaves and limbs.
We created a habitat for them in a box that we kept on our screened porch and gathered a few of the larvae to keep in the box until they pupated.
We discovered they were voracious eaters and we had to continually harvest tiny green aphids from our tomato plants to keep the larvae well-fed.
Some leaves of the tomato plants had little aphid colonies, with the matriarch, much larger in size, keeping close watch over the babies, all in a cluster. I learned that technically, that is the grandmother, as the female aphids are born impregnated, so the babies are born moms.
This made harvesting aphids a little harder to do.
Why did she have to watch over them like that - did she care? And here I was, grabbing up her babies to feed to the alien creatures.
We’d put the tip of a paintbrush right in front of the aphids on the tomato plant and wait for them to walk on. Once we gathered a small collection of them, we’d bring them back to the larvae in our box on the porch for them to eat the aphids.
We’d use the paintbrush again to pick up the aphids from our gatherings and drop them in front of the larvae. The larvae would plunge forth, grabbing the aphids using their front legs and devour it with their tiny mouthparts. Occasionally, an aphid would begin walking away when we dropped it into the box and we’d watch as a larva would follow it, walking all around the damp paper towels we had lining our box, and sneak up right behind the aphid, grab it with its front legs, and devour it. A sneak attack. Those always warranted some, ‘oooohs’.
We watched all of this through a macro lens attached to my phone’s camera.
We were able to observe our larvae pupate, and emerge as a brand new-to-the-world ladybug. Newly birthed ladybugs are bright yellow, with no spots when they first emerge. It takes a little time before their redness comes in and before black spots appear.
All of this provided wonderful entertainment for our quarantine summer. I highly recommend observing ladybugs if you have the opportunity, or would like to create one for yourself.
“Learn from nature. See how everything gets accomplished and how the miracle of life unfolds without dissatisfaction or unhappiness.” - Eckhart Tolle
VI. Roly poly (also not an insect, but a crustacean!)
When I was about seven, I remember needing to entertain myself at the ballfield while my dad played softball; my mom and brother cheered him on from the metal bleachers.
I enjoyed playing under the bleachers. Mom was close by, I was separated from the world, yet in my own little safe world under there.
One time under the bleachers, I found a dead roly poly, balled up. After playing with it, rolling it around in the loose, dusty dirt, and examining it thoroughly, ‘It looks like a mini armadillo’, I thought to myself, I decided it needed a proper burial.
I sat on the ground, legs crossed, leaned forward and used my finger to draw a circle in the dirt. I fingered a small pile of dirt into a mound in the center of my circle. I carefully poked the roly poly into the mound and made sure it was fully covered and the mound smoothed out. I ventured out from underneath the bleachers to find some dandelions, clover flowers, and choice sparkly rocks to decorate my burial circle.
I remember sitting upright, straightening my back, looking down on this beautiful scene I had made honoring death there in the barren ground lacking any grass, under the hard metal bleachers as clinking-metal sounds, cheers and ruckus filled the space above me.
I thought about the blood running through the veins of life sitting above my head, and my eyes landed on the band aid partially covering my skinned knee. Red scrapes and maroon-crusted scabs poking out from the top and bottom of the too-small band aid. I thought about the roly poly and how it had no blood. Just death.
Why didn’t it bleed when it died? Doesn’t everything bleed?
It had no family to mourn its loss. It had no place, other than its own ball of armor, to retreat into when it died.
I remember feeling proud about the beautiful burial circle I had made and decorated for this tiny, insignificant, unloved creature and feeling that it finally had something, someone to care about it; blood or no blood. But it was already dead and would never know or feel it.
{Many crustaceans, pill bugs included, have hemocyanin in their blood. Unlike hemoglobin, which contains iron, hemocyanin contains copper ions. When oxygenated, pill bug blood appears blue2 }
“If we go on the way we have, the fault is our greed and if we are not willing to change, we will disappear from the face of the globe, to be replaced by the insect.” - Jacques Yves Cousteau
VII. Excerpt from my 2021 nature journal
August 11, 2021 - Neighborhood stroll, time 11:13am, temperature 87 degrees
(I omitted all of the parts about animals and various flora)
A beetle that I’ve never seen before walked across the sidewalk. I picked it up and immediately it fell to its side, playing dead. It’s legs curled up - it looked completely dead. I laughed at loud at this over-the-top behavior from such a small little beetle.
I used my phone to pull up the iNaturalist app. It identified this beetle as a ‘false potato beetle’ (Leptinotarsa juncta). I sat it down on the sidewalk and took a step back. About two minutes later, it began to move its legs a bit and almost popped back up on all six legs and began walking slowly away. It caused another audible chuckle.
And then, for a brief moment, I felt like something of an intrusion, to cause the beetle’s survival skills to kick in and play dead before me so I wouldn’t consume it. I - a mere curious observer, made it - a beetle doing its beetle thing in the world, do that. I felt it should save those moves for the bird or frog. But it knows no difference - human, bird, frog - we are all the same to it. It knows little yet is armed with instinctual behaviors to survive death.
Did it learn how to do this over time? No. It was created this way.
These details assure me that there is a Creator who is in all the details of the world; even the tiniest.
“Nothing is more humbling than to look with a strong magnifying glass at an insect so tiny that the naked eye sees only the barest speck and to discover that nevertheless it is sculpted and articulated and striped with the same care and imagination as a zebra. Apparently it does not occur to nature whether or not a creature is within our range of vision, and the suspicion arises that even the zebra was not designed for our benefit.” - Rudolf Arnheim
VIII. The beetle that didn’t die
Every chance we have, our family will check pool skimmers to see what important work needs to be done, or what dead specimens we may find to keep and pin later. The important work, of course, is rescuing fauna that is still alive - mostly frogs, beetles and moths. We have rescued the occasional wasp and spider, too.
Last July (2022), Luke found a really cool, intact pine borer beetle in the skimmer of our neighborhood pool. It was huge and still in great shape so we decided to keep it as a specimen that we would pin later. We have pinned many retained pool skimmer specimens with great success.
We laid it on the table where all of our belongings sat for the rest of our time at the pool, which ended up being several hours.
On our way home, Luke carried the beetle in his palm, taking care not to break off a leg or antennae. When we brought it home, we examined its impressive mouthparts under a microscope. It really was quite a beautiful specimen.
I prepared our pinning materials -the pinning board and the pins. I held the beetle in one hand between my thumb and index finger and gently pushed a pin into the beetle’s elytra on its abdomen, to the immediate right of its midline. That was my anchor pin. Now, I could position its legs and use thinner pins to keep the legs and antennae in place.
By the end of our pinning session, I had used 14 pins, with only one actually going into the beetle, the others were just placed all around it.
The beetle remained on our table overnight. We had planned to leave it there for a few days, as we also had some moths and butterflies that we had pinned and wanted to wait a few days to allow sufficient time for the specimens to dry in place.
The next morning, I heard Luke yell out, “Mommy! The beetle is alive! Come quick!”
I ran to find that, indeed, the beetle had escaped from the pins and pinning board and was on the floor walking away from the table with the pin still pierced through its abdomen and elytra. The tip of the pin, like a fine needle, was scraping along the floor as the beetle moved slowly.
A little stunned, we captured this experience with my phone’s camera. Then, proceeded to carefully pull the pin out of his body.
We took him outside for his second chance at life. I decided as a consolation prize, I’d offer it a nice grassy spot at the base of a pine tree in the nearby woods, even though pine beetles are extremely destructive and considered terrible pests.
“Hurt no living thing:
Ladybird, nor butterfly,
Nor moth with dusty wing,
Nor cricket chirping cheerily,
Nor grasshopper so light of leap,
Nor dancing gnat, nor beetle fat,
Nor harmless worms that creep.”
- Christina Rossetti
VIIII. When they were bugs; a summer moment in the early 80’s
I remember walking the steep, wood-planked steps, separated by grassed earth riddled with weeds that tickled my ankles, to descend to the lake where my parents and their friends sat - unaffected by the discomfort of the erect old school hollow metal and braided-mesh plastic chairs that were an 80’s staple.
As I approached them, I could hear their joyous murmuring chatter and laughter. The sky was black, like the lake; the two indiscernible where they met. A porch light from the cabin up the steep cliff I was descending, moonlight, the reliability of one planked step coming after the other, and the assuring sounds of my family were the only guiding sources for my senses.
However, family and friends weren’t the only sound-makers interfering for the awakening of my senses; the incessant buzzing of the masses of mosquitos, the flapping of the bats wings as they swooped down, always too close (when you‘re a little child), the chorus of toads, frogs and crickets, seemingly crooning in harmony, all competed for my attention.
Then, there were the smells; charcoal barbeques from neighboring pockets around the lake, the pungent scent of the summer cocktail of weeds, wildflowers and grasses, and the ever-present, familiar mix of the toxic bug spray layered on our skin, mixed with sweat and ozone.
Arriving to the dock, greeted by smiles and open arms, I cautiously took steps onto the floating dock, finding my rhythm to rock with it to not lose my balance. Though I appreciated my parents’ demeanor, the relaxed shoulders and smiles that I saw mostly on weekends or vacation, and how they beckoned me to enjoy this moment, here and now, with them, too, I didn’t see the charm of the lake at night.
Perhaps to a six year old, the mystery of it outweighs the beauty. Eventually, I decided I had taken enough abuse from the mosquitoes, so I made the trek back up to the cabin.
The steps felt further apart on this leg of the trip. The porch light was my guide and as I approached it, the glass door, also emitting a low glow from the lamp inside the cabin, was covered, every possible square inch of that nearly 7 foot rectangle, with insects of all shapes and sizes. It was most certainly a scene from a science fiction movie with the shapes and sizes of these intruders, blocking my way into safety. I didn’t even know an insect could be so large as some of the ones that were right in front of me, on that door.
I remember a wide-eyed panic paralyzed me for several minutes until a large-winged offender flew into my hair, causing me to stumble back and lose my balance as I swatted with every bit of might a five year old could muster. What good would it have been for me to make a peep? I wouldn’t be heard.
A deep breath followed. I had no other choice but to be brave and enter beyond this scene of terror because I knew I didn’t want to walk all the way back down to the dock and endure more red welts from scratching my legs and arms to blood from the terrorizing mosquitos. I reached for the door handle, which fortunately was not covered in insects, turned the knob, flung the door open wide and jumped inside, slamming the door behind me. I immediately turned around to see the scattering cloud of insects and panted in appreciation for the place I finally stood: safety.
It was a feat of strength, mental and physical. And I conquered it.
I also conquered my fear of insects.
Perhaps my love for insects began after conquering that encounter with the glass door. Perhaps it developed over time. I’m not sure. But I know that I wouldn’t want to live in a world without them.
“The world is a museum in which all men are destined to be employed and amused, and they cannot be too much interested in the objects around them. Goldsmith the elegant imitator of Buffon, says “The mere uninformed spectator passes on in gloomy solitude; while the naturalist in every plant, in every insect, and in every pebble, finds something to entertain his curiosity and excite his speculation.” - Charles Willson Peale
X. The pool bugs - part one
Last week, while at the beach with my family, we spent a significant amount of time in the pool at our hotel.
Daily, we checked the skimmers for specimens.
We found a gorgeous metallic/iridescent* green beetle, dead and in perfect condition one day. Naturally, we were excited, no, actually giddy, over this new specimen.
*Whenever I encounter anything iridescent, I always think to myself, ‘only God could create this’, because the swirling of gorgeous colors is always so captivating to me.
We kept it on our table by our belongings (much like the story of the beetle that came back to life) while we remained at the pool.
When it was time to leave, Luke picked it up and then asked me to hold it. I held it and then realizing I needed to carry more items as we were leaving, asked Andrew to hold it. It wasn’t until we reached the door to enter the hotel when we realized an overwhelming smell of death mixed with vomit mixed with feces took over our senses. It was like this awful smell was everywhere. I thought I had pinpointed the smell from Andrew’s life jacket, but I couldn’t understand why a life jacked could smell so badly.
The entire walk to the elevator, we couldn’t help but make a scene and draw attention to our awful smell. It was making us gag and we thought surely others would smell us so better call ourselves out on it first. Of course, it was the life jacket’s fault, not ours.
In the elevator, somehow the beetle had made it back to my hand and I bent my neck down to quickly smell it, not really thinking it would lead to anything.
If I had socks on in that moment, they would have been knocked off. I gagged, choked and coughed heartily and naturally, encouraged my family to smell the beetle up close, also. Of course, they all did, too.
When we got back to the room, I searched what type of beetle smells and looks like this. It was identified as a Calosoma scrutator, also known as a Fiery Searcher and “the adult beetle may excrete a foul smelling oil when handled.”3 Um, yep. Sure did. Even when dead! No wonder everything we had touched smelled like this.
It took a long time to get the smell off of our hands and items. We had to leave the life jacket and towels on the balcony overnight to help the the smell dissipate. The beetle stayed there, too. Even when we left. No beautiful specimen to bring home this time.
The pool bugs - part two
Three other things happened at the pool involving insects and deserving a space here in this collection of insect stories that I’d like to share with you.
One - I was across the pool with my youngest child when I noticed a girl, about 5 years old, screaming in terror at something squirming, and tiny, in the pool.
I knew how this was going to go.
She stood up onto the nearby ledge, which was about a foot deep, bent over the tiny wiggling creature, and continued to scream.
I started to slowly make my way to that end of the pool, ready and armed to educate. From my view, it looked like a small copper-colored beetle, still alive.
Before I could make it over there, her father swooped in with a wadded up napkin, scooped up the beetle from the water and very dramatically smushed the beetle, overexaggerating his motions, probably to ease the daughter’s mind.
I wish I would have gotten there sooner to scoop it out and demonstrate to others how easy and kind it is to help a living creature out of the pool and simply place it in some bushes nearby. The joy of the save; that’s how you spin it. And then, of course, educate that not all bugs, in fact, most of them, don’t really deserve our screams. I would have explained that it just flew in, by accident and got stuck, and needed our help to save him.
I wish I could have, but I didn’t. I will next time, though. And I’ll be faster. I know how fathers like to be the hero.
Two - There were many dragonflies flying over the pool one day. Several were mating and some were quick-dipping their tail ends into the pool water to lay eggs.
A little girl was with her mother and father in the pool, in the safety of their arms. She was probably three, maybe four. The dragonflies were swooping all around and she began screaming, inconsolably. Her parents tried to tell her that they were not going to hurt her but she was not having it.
My mind immediately flashed to when Naomi was about 15 months old and we were staying at a cabin in the mountains of North Carolina. She was sitting in the graveled driveway as my husband and I were nearby walking our dog, about 4 yards away. I noticed her eyes were fixated on something and she wouldn’t turn her head towards us when I called. I started walking toward her and noticed her subject; a giant centipede was slowly making its way across the driveway. It was a magnificent creature and it clearly captivated my darling girl. I knelt down to allow it to crawl onto my arm, showing no signs of fear or disgust. She watched me carefully and reached one little adorable finger out to pet it. She gently stroked its segmented armor as I told her what it was. I reached for my phone to snap a picture.
I think of this image often when I encounter other young children showing fear and disgust over insects.
My advice, start nurturing their curiosity for the natural world when they are very young. Even if you aren’t comfortable with insects, fake it. They will tune into how you react to them and mirror your reactions.
Three - The third thing that happened was this: a little girl, about 7 or 8, watched me scoop a moth that was still alive out of the water. She was right beside me as we both walked to the edge of the pool to set it down. She asked me, ‘Why are you doing that?’ I said, ‘Because he’s still alive and when his wings are wet, he can’t fly out of the water. I’m rescuing him. I’m going to put him over here so his wings can dry and he can fly away.’ She said, ‘Oh’ and smiled at me. She smiled at the moth. Then, swam away.
That’s all.
I just have a feeling that made an impact on her and I have a feeling that the next time she’s in a pool and a moth, or perhaps any living creature, is stuck
and in need of a rescue, she will be my gal.
“Nature never did betray the heart that loved her.” - William Wordsworth
source: iNaturalist