By Rob South, WKAR News
http://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/wkar/local-wkar-977358.mp3
East Lansing, MI – Entomologists at Michigan State University are hosting an open house today at the "Bug House." This often overlooked exhibit is not to be confused with the university's popular Butterfly House. But it is a useful tool used to teach the importance of all things creepy-crawly.
AUDIO:
Summer time and the livin' is buggy. Let's be honest, one of the drawbacks of a warm Michigan summer is having to put up with all those bugs flies, mosquitoes, wasps, ants...they're literally everywhere.
Some bug facts to consider: there are 140 kinds of mosquitoes, 35,000 kinds of ants and 300,000 kinds of beetles. In fact, 95 percent of all known animal species on Earth are bugs.
MSU's Bug House isn't nearly as populated, but it is a hive of information about things that go buzz in the night and day. It even has a resident honey beehive.
"This is the bee hive," explains outreach coordinator Barb Stinnett. "And the bees go in and out through the tube up out the window and they forage and bring pollen back into the hive. This hive has lasted all year; this is the first time in a long time we've had one make it all winter, but they had enough stored...(speaking to child) "Those are lots of bees, yes." CHILD: "And they could sting you!" STINNETT: "Yeah, they could sting, but see, they can't get out of there."
That's because the bees are all busy in a special glass hive, which lets my um assistant, Bennie, see what they're up to without enduring the indignity of a painful sting.
The bug house has more than bees, obviously. While there are plenty of dead, pin-mounted specimens, there are also plenty of live critters.
"And we have spiders, and walking sticks and hissing cockroaches and stink bugs and millipedes, scorpions..." Stinnett explains. SOUTH: "What are some of the favorites?" STINNETT: "The very favorites are always the walking sticks. Walking sticks or the tarantula." SOUTH: "Why do you think that is?" STINNETT: "I'm not sure. The walking sticks, because we don't see a lot of them, and the tarantulas because of size. This one over here...her name is Vivian. She's probably the star."
Vivian is orange and black and hairy and as big as my fist. Stinnett says kids can touch Vivian but they can't hold her.
But they can hold the walking sticks, as she demonstrates by putting her hand into an aquarium swarming with what looks campfire kindling come alive.
"They look pretty scary, but they're not scary at all," Stinnett says. "They can't bite you. These are from Australia. And if you look at their legs, they look more like leaves than they do sticks. Now these guys, they do hang onto you, because they have to be able to hang onto a tree."
Bugs are beneficial, of course. They pollinate our crops, eat our garbage, aerate the soil, and we can eat some of them.
"Cockroaches have a lot of protein in them," Stinnett explains. "And so, in some countries they eat them to get protein because they don't have meat."
Without any hesitation at all, Stinnett opens another aquarium full of hissing cockroaches.
SOUTH: "Do they hiss?" STINNETT: "They do; they don't a lot when I take them out anymore because they're used to being held. They hiss to scare away people or predators. And because we handle them so much, they're kind of bored, you know. They sort of hiss and say, hmmm...again?" (laughs)
So much for the sound-rich radio piece. And, no she didn't eat one. And neither did I, and neither did my special assistant, Bennie. But we did finally get them to hiss a little bit.
(hissing sounds)