Butterfly book and supplies info needed...

[Kurt Jacobs]

I agree with you Anne.  Supervised collecting by an authority would prevent
poor collecting practices.  If children that young can get into the pinning
and mounting part of entomology, my hats are off to them.  I am by no means
against collecting.  And you make a great point that it is really important
that the children of today learn how important insects are.

I had a conversation recently with someone who could not understand the
importance of a species of insects.  In their opinion, if it becomes
extinct, it makes no difference to the world.  How can anyone grow up and
believe this, is it a lack of care when the knowledge is presented to them
at a young age, or is it the absence of the teaching in the first place.
Maybe in the worst cases it is both.  For me to explain to this person that
a dragonfly larvae of an endangered species might be the only thing
responsible for keeping the whole Marsh from destruction was complete
hogwash to this person.  Not a chance of convincing this person;  the fewer
of these types that slip through the cracks the better.  SO, I applaud all
you efforts with children!!!!

"Anne Kilmer" <viceroy at gate.net> wrote in message
news:38E3492D.BD661947 at gate.net...
> What we're doing in Florida is having the school children plant
> "butterfly gardens." These collections of nectar plants and larval host
> plants attract plenty of local butterflies, and children can obwerve egg
> laying, the development of caterpillars and so forth, in nature ...
> where dramatic events can happen to them. This, too, is educational.
> There's no reason not to take a few caterpillars into the classroom for
> closer observation, and practice at keeping accurate records.
> There's no reason not to collect a few adults, for practice mounting and
> observing. In fact, off-season butterflies reared in a classroom make
> fine practice specimens, and there's no sense in releasing them into a
> snowy landscape.
> We have children planting and studying at hospitals, nursing homes,
> churches and shopping malls, state and county parks, vacant lots ...
> wherever an area has been scraped bare by "progress", the children can
> claim it for their gardens.
> It doesn't take long before the "butterfly garden" becomes a wildlife
> garden, and the birds and beasts flock around.
> Now we're learning to fine-tune our environmental gardens, preserving
> and restoring scrub, wetlands and other special habitats.
> In such a situation, random collecting is frowned on (you might be
> netting Maude, who is my personal friend), but supervised collecting can
> be a large part of the study and maintenance of these habitats.
> Obviously this doesn't mean that everyone is enlightened. We still have
> the highschool biology teacher whose assigned "bug collection" merely
> requires that 50 assorted bugs be pinned into a cardboard box.
> We've had kids bring such a "collection" to the Mounts Building for the
> Master Gardeners to identify (for free, for fun). Hopeless, of course.
> When I was a sophomore in highschool, we watched Mother Gregory pith a
> frog. (You take a dissecting needle and poke it through the frog's brain
> and down its spine. It dies.)She had read a book, so she knew how. I do
> not think she had ever handled a frog before, and the book did not
> mention that the frog wouldn't like it.
> It was pretty traumatic for all of us, and most of us begged for the
> frog's life, but we needed to see how the heart continued beating ...
> and I'll admit that I've never forgotten it.
> I think kids need to spend a lot of time with living animals. Handling
> and dissecting dead ones is also necessary, and, if we intend to eat
> meat, maybe we should have killed an animal and eaten it ... once, at
> least ... so that we know how we really feel about that.
> As for whether it's OK for kids to kill insects to study them, any time
> the pesticide companies turn their sprayers into pruning hooks and the
> farmers hang up their helicopters, by golly, I'll be right there with
> the anti-collection brigade. (And the lion will lie down with the lamb
> ...) Meanwhile, words like hypocricy, sentimentality and so forth are
> going to creep into our conversations.
> We need millions of kids to care passionately about insects, if we are
> going to continue having a nice assortment of the latter. There are a
> lot of good ways of producing such kids, and one of them is teaching the
> kids to collect insects and and mount them.
>  I happen to prefer field studies, myself, but there's room here for all
> of us.
> Anne Kilmer
> South Florida
> Kurt Jacobs wrote:
> >
> > Randy,
> >
> > It is a great idea to teach children about lepidoptera, and hands on
study
> > will keep the attention of younger minds.  I have to wonder though, are
> > these children exceptionally gifted, because to take it to the level
that is
> > beyond most high schoolers may be a bit overwhelming.  Most modest
> > collectors will admit that it takes years to learn how to properly mount
> > lepidoptera to what an experienced entomologist would consider
> > "professional".  Many collectors with any love of the environment who
hold
> > collections feel that taking butterflies or moths without using the
proper
> > mounting and storage techniques is just throwing away a living animal.
It
> > is a waste.  Many lepidopterists also feel that people who hold
collections
> > and are not affiliated with a university or museum or such are also
wasting
> > the environment, even if they house a collection that rivals the most
> > respected.  If noone learns or sees the collection but the collector it
is
> > truly a waste.  In your case, however, your students would greatly
benefit
> > from seeing some mounted insects.  The children would not most likely
know
> > if they were taking a female regal fritilliary or a male great spangled
> > fritilliary until after it had been killed.  So to rush right out and
start
> > collecting insects at age 10 is wrong.  NOOOO, but it would be nice if
the
> > children learned respect for the fauna and if they could get a sense of
what
> > type of collecting is proper.  Collecting etiquette.
> >
> > My suggestions would be to get some donated mounted specimens from a
> > lepidopterist.  Have the children raise some living butterflies that
they
> > collect.  Maybe have a butterfly house for a couple caterpillars that
> > children find.  Catch and releasing butterflies after identifying them
is
> > also a better way to find out you have a threatened species then to see
it
> > dead in a jar.
> >
> > I have no problems with collecting, mounting and storing lepidoptera,
but
> > arent children in 4th grade a little young to be doing the work that
college
> > students sometimes have trouble learning?
>