Entomology

Lat: 47.65461893881919, Lon: -122.30878036466777
Day, 2012
5/3/12
1:30-3:30

Today we spent the day in Johnson Hall learning about entomology. We learned all about beetles, bees, and wasps. Before this lecture I knew there were tons of insects but I had no idea they made up 1/5 of all animals on earth and that a third of them were beetles. Insects are the most diverse group of organisms but we are losing a lot of them to extinction due to humans.

On the subject of moths, we learned that butterflies are a kind of moth. I had always thought they were a separate species but I guess they are very similar so that makes sense. Butterflies are just colorful moths that fly around during the day.

The most interesting part of this lecture to me was the section on bees. Bees are the most tightly evolved with the environment as pollinators because of their relationship with flowers. We learned that most of the bees' lives are spent as larvae, when they are fuzzy that's in order to attract pollen, they have nests. Bumble bees are native, social, and have a Queen and worker bees. They are super important for the environment but are becoming endangered because they are sensitive to pesticides and prefer to live in the ground in undisturbed areas.

We also learned about honey bees. In contrast to bumble bees, they are native to the Old World but have become naturalized to the US and are now the most efficient way to pollinate crops. Also unlike bumble bees, honey bees die after stinging just once whereas bumble bees have smooth stingers so they can sting multiple times. Another thing I didn't know about bees is that the Queen Bee is actually selected by the worker bees when she is just a larvae. The worker bees just feed her a "supercharged" diet so she can reproduce the most.

Posted on June 1, 2012 08:30 PM by lisad22