Finding Bugs!

Mary Katherine:
Ander:
Last weekend Ander and I went out to my family's farm to look for bugs! It was a good weekend and really pretty to look for bugs. At first we did not find much and were irritated. So we went over toward the lake and started to look for some bugs. We looked under rocks for the first thirty minutes and there we found three earwigs, a beetle, and a yellow jacket. the earwigs looked like the first ones we already had but we kept them just to make sure. After we looked under rocks we went into the forest that surrounded the lake and looked under logs. We really did not find much under the logs except for some baby beetles but we thought they may be too hard to identify so we left them. We them searched the barn for some insects. There we found several wasp of different species. Some were blue wasp and some were yellow and then some were dark brown. We also found a dead ladybug so we were able to keep it and identify it for our collection. When we identified them the last couple days we were able to identify two different species. It was a good day for insects and I am glad we decided to go! 

Last week our search for insects continued, but this time we were in a new territory. We decided to go to Gadsden, Alabama which is the home of Mary Katherine. Her family has a farm about 20 minutes away from her house. We knew that this would be a great place to find some insects. However once we got there we quickly found out it would not be as easy as we first thought. The first insects that we found were earwigs. For some reason every time we go look for insects we find earwigs. We found a total of three earwigs and they looked pretty similar to our previous finds. After this we continued to look under some rocks and found some more insects. We found a beetle and a yellow jacket. This was very exciting because we knew we would have something for our collection. After this we took our search to the area by the lake because there were some rotted logs. However we did not find anything other insects that we already had. After this we went to the barn where we found some wasp. This was one of our better days for insect hunting. Mainly because we found something other then earwigs. It was great to find the yellow jacket and the wasp. They were different then our previous insects. After this our collection seemed to be getting better and we were not as worried. After identifying our insects from this adventure in Gadsden we found two new species. This was a great trip and I enjoyed it. I think it would be good as a class to go to somewhere farther away like Gadsden because I think it helped with finding different insects. Also it was just fun to see a different environment even though I did not enjoy the drive.