Thinking about insects a bit this week after reading yet more distressing revelations about the long decline of the Insectarium in Philadelphia.
Reptiles and amphibians were my chief fascination as a child—I once spent an afternoon in central California scheming to catch a swift garter snake, and once I triumphantly succeeded, I made the mistake of showing off my catch to my mother and her friend at precisely the moment the snake decided enough was enough and bit me on the forearm. Nonplussed, I released the snake and confidently informed my audience that this was no big deal, which had no effect on their escalating panic. One tetanus booster and much scolding did little to deter future tracking, watching and occasional catching of snakes, lizards, toads, frogs and salamanders. (I knew better than to hold California newts, at any rate.)
But insects and other small invertebrates often confused for insects were always a close second in my book—as a young child I could spend hours turning over small rocks and bricks in my backyard to see whatever might be hiding underneath.
I’ve written before about my irritation with a subgenre of insect photography that stages insects and arthropods in seemingly cute, somewhat anthropomorphic poses, because sometimes the photographer has staged those photos with recently dead subjects or is using very thin fire or fishing line that has been threaded through the body of the organism to achieve the pose. It irritates me because the cruelty, and because it misses the point. The interesting thing is to see them better as they are in the world and to help people who see a photograph share in that seeing—seeing what they do, being where they are, being as they are. I don’t mind the tricks that I’ve recounted before—sugar water sprayed on a flower, maybe even putting an insect on a light table to get a better look at its colors and locomotion.
Much as with birds singing, they’re also intensely seasonal. Insects aren’t out and about in the heart of winter except perhaps inside of houses or other heated spaces, and even then not too much. That’s a mercy when it comes to mosquitoes, ticks and flies, but it’s also yet another reason that winter seems so still and muted as you walk through the world.
And the fearful thing is that insect populations may be one of the canaries in our global coal mine that have already given us the alarm about climate change. It’s hard to rigorously demonstrate in a comprehensive way because our data on insect populations haven’t been consistently kept over a very long time period—we don’t see them as well or as consistently as many mammals and birds.