National Pollinator Week

June 22 to 28 is National Pollinator Week. All over the United States, pollinators like bees, flies, butterflies and even bats are celebrated. Use the chance to find out more about the insects that provide us with sweet-tasting apples and juicy tomatoes; and see what you can do to help them. There are lots of activities planned in many cities and unviersities all over the country.

Click here to find out what the University of Urbana-Champaign will do.

Spring Has Sprung

Spring has sprung;
The grass has ris.
I wonder where
The birdie is?

There he is
In the sky.
He dropped some
Whitewash in my eye!

I am no sissy;
I won't cry.
I'm just glad
The cows can't fly!

But seriously, the bumble bee queens are emerging - if not already then very soon. This year they are a bit overdue, but judging by the nice Spring weather (at least here in Central Illinois) it won't be long now, so keep your eyes open ...

Then again, if there's any truth in Ogden Nash's poem up here, better keep them closed and listen for their humming sounds.

Festival about social insects

"Flip over an old log, or tear off some bark, and you can find termite workers and ants scurrying through wooden tunnels."

As part of the annual Insect Fear Film Festival at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, which will be held at Foellinger Auditorium on Feb. 23rd, an article appeared in the News Gazette on the role of social insects in our everyday life. You will see that social insects are virtually everywhere. And they are a lot more exciting when looking up-close.

This article was an episode of NPR's "Environmental Almanac". Go check it out at environmentalalmanac.blogspot.com. If you want to listen to the episode, download it here:

Real Audio | MP3

Welcome to the meadow!

Very few people have actually seen them, but many of the wonders of life can be found right outside your door, right down the street, under the old linden tree. Where the blossoms fall to the ground in late summer and cover the streets with white and pinkish petals. Right underneath the trees, among the fresh green grasses of the meadow, live some of the most astonishing creatures ever to walk the earth.

You may think I am now pushing it to hard, or merely hyperbolizing something that poets and composers like to use when painting their landscapes. But I mean it in the simplest form possible: The insects in your nearest meadow are amazing, nothing less.

And if you still don't believe me, if you still say that it is impossible to be amazed by some little six-legged bug, and even one that can sting and hurt you, just watch this space and I will prove you wrong. For if you've ever lain in the soft grass and felt the rest of morning dew wet in your neck; if you've blinked into the sun and turned your head to watch a bumblebee against the blue sky; and you tried not to breathe as the little forager landed on a yellow flower right by your face; and when you draw in closer to see the long tongue disappear into the corolla and you think there's nothing else in this world but you and the eager insect - the bumblebee will lift its middle leg to say "Please keep your distance, I'm eating." Then you'll realize that they know a lot more about you than you know of them.

An amazing world - so near our own!