Bug and Slug Investigation

Ya Ya has been on a bug collecting mission this week.  She has scoured the flower beds and the weeds and all the crevices of our yard collecting millipedes and centipedes and beetles, slugs and ants and a few spiders on the side.  It got even more exciting when Dr. Peds let her borrow some scientific tweezers.  The other kidlets are allowed to help her look for bugs and slugs as long as they do exactly what she says, but they aren’t allowed to touch the tweezers.  You have to be mature to use the tweezers.

I have to say,  I love bugs myself.  I have very fond memories of spending many summers collecting all sorts of bugs and sneaking them into the house.  I tried many times to start my own ant farm.  I caught butterflies and when they expired, I pinned them to styrofoam and made a collection.  I was thrilled when my Grandma Jan made me a bug catching net out of a coat hanger and cheesecloth.  I walked around with it for weeks.  I would catch hundreds of boxelder bugs on the south side of the house when I was in fifth grade.  I set up my own scientific experiment by sticking 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30 and more boxelder bugs in identically sized airtight jars to see how long different populations of boxelder bugs would survive with limited oxygen.  It was kind of morbid, I know.  One of my good friends in high school and I entered a competition in Science Olympiad that was all about identifying and classifying bugs.  We spent an hour in a classroom at Bismarck State College pouring over shadow boxes filled with amazing bugs and looking things up in our bug classification guide books.  We actually did very well in the contest.

My children’s fascination with bugs brings me internal joy.  Bugs are great.