Roadside Mysteries

On the way to Canyon City we saw this:

Big freakin Hurcules Beetle ?

Hey, it’s a metal sculpture as you get off I25 and on to Route 115 on the way to Canyon City. I recognized it right away as the “largest beetle in the world” or more likely, the marker for the gravel road going to the “Museum of Tropical Insects”

It’s the J.F. May collection of arthropods but mostly insects

So this guy James May collected insects for more than 80 years and what does he get? The world’s largest private insect collection and a special museum named after him.!

Example big bug

I forgot to pack my camera for this trip so I used my phone. The museum is not well lit but it is packed with over 7,000 dead bugs and I know I would never really photograph them all. Continuing on R1oute 15 we saw on the left side of the road an attraction called “The World’s Largest Rocking Chair”. We didn’t stop.

CSU Entomology Club goes behind the scenes at the Butterfly Pavillion

Super Stag Beetle

OK, behind the scenes means you don’t see any adult butterflies.  The pavilion has secret laboratories that have all kinds of arthropoidal types.

Centipede from Vietnam

This nasty little devil was confiscated at airport customs. They are quite venomous; I wonder if they could make a ‘Cenipedes on a Plane’ movie?

Not ready to come out butterflies

Butterfly Release Party!

This guy with the gloves gets to grab the B’flies in the little cage behind him and let them fly for the first time. I was there early to be up front; When one of the butterflies didn’t fly off right away and landed next to the feet of an 8 year old boy, the kid’s natural response was to raise his foot and attempt to stomp on the new animal! OK, the guy stopped him in time but WTF?

The Gillette Entomology Club is at it again:

Looking for bugs in all the right places

Wherever bugs be

Not enough bug posts here, so I added this little trip out to one of the CSU professor’s farm to watch the club members collect some insects.

This post is dedicated to the many volunteers who helped move the museum this week.

Jim Cleaning out an insect collection

This week we are at the new and improved C.P. Gillette Museum of Arthropod Diversity making sure the vast collection is properly preserved for future entomologists to enjoy.

Some bees on display

It looks like I’ll be leaving for the great feast of the Ragbrai soon, so I won’t see all the collection in it’s final resting place until I return from Iowa. I’m sure it will be in good hands.

It’s at CSU:

Located in the Plant Sciences Building

This is the New Bug Zoo that we visit often to see what new bug is being hatched in the name of science. It’s got room for coolers and a mini refrigerator and storage drawers. The old zoo had none of this.

Replacing the cramped quarters near Matt C’s office

There’s room to grow in this small lab that perhaps could have been used by a grad student. OK, giant roaches and spiders vs. grad student? Who would win?

Don’t touch this!

And the stuff on the bottom shelf too!

There’s a Lab Sink as well

This is sweet! The bugs just moved in so we will have to take another look in a month or two.  Applications for assistant zoo keeper are being processed now so get your paperwork  in ASAP.

Where are the teensy tiny bug experts?

A “small” insect collection

It seems getting these little hexapods in line is quite an arduous task. Sorry my ability to see really small objects is starting to ‘bug’ me, but it seems this is mere child’s play for Boris the K; I wonder how old he really is?

My own collection

So, I have submitted 21 clear glass bottles fitted with plastic screw caps containing immature insect varieties preserved in ethanol, properly labeled with name, date, GPS location, habitat, insect order/family name and any other information relative to the capture of said insect sealed in each tiny bottle. Thus ends Ento 555.

Is that Bill Murray from the movie The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou?

Nope, it’s Boris the K from the CSU Bio Sciences and Plant Management Department

He’s without a doubt one of the world’s formost experts in the study and identification of aquatic insects; Yes, yet another entomologist!

Sorting out the families

Together with a host of CSU entomology students, we were able to collect various insect species from the Poudre River right in the heart of Fort Collins.

Can you identify these immatures?

I’ve been trying to do some photo micrography but I can’t seem to get the lighting just right. Also, with aquatic bugs, they look more natural wet but the liquid reflects the light and screws up the photo. Probably not worth the trouble spending too much time on this. Also, the semester is almost over and there is much yet to do.