- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Plenty of interactions occurred among bugs, plants and people at the 12th annual UC Davis Biodiversity Museum Day, a Super Science Day recently held on the UC Davis campus and both free and family friendly.
Check out some of the activities at the Bohart Museum of Entomology, the Center for Plant Diversity and the Botanical Conservatory. They were among the 11 museums and collections showcased. Also a key part of the annual event: the Anthropology Museum, Arboretum and Public Garden, California Raptor Center, Nematode Collection, Marine Invertebrate Collection, Museum of Wildlife and Fish Biology, Paleontology Collection and the Phaff Yeast Culture Collection.
BioDiv Day, founded by the Bohart Museum, is traditionally held on Presidents' Day weekend. This year's event drew an estimated 3000, according to chair Tabatha Yang, education and outreach coordinator of the Bohart Museum.
A few photos of the interactions among bugs, plants and people....
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Just ask the scientists at the Bohart Museum of Entomology, UC Davis, who rear them in their petting zoo. They show them at their open houses, including the recent UC Davis Biodiversity Museum Day, and invite folks to get acquainted. But first, they ask "Would you like to hold one?"
The reactions range from "No way! I'm outta here!" to "Yes, yes, of course!"
Finn Jensen, 2 1/2, of Davis, is in the latter category.
He watched as UC Davis doctoral candidate Emma Jochim of the Jason Bond arachnology lab, UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology, held up a hisser.
Finn could hardly wait. As Jochim gingerly dropped the insect in his hand, he beamed with delight.
"He's been interested in bugs since he first went out and played in the dirt before he could walk," said Mom Jenna. "He loves exploring and helping in the garden while his dad gardens and they lift up logs at his preschool DCCNS (a parent cooperative pre-school) to search for bugs. I worked with flies in grad school so it's fun to see his be a little scientist too."
"This was his first time at both the Bohart Museum and Biodiversity Day," Jenna added, "and we are going back this week to see more. He loved seeing the scorpions that glowed and holding the walking stick bugs and touching the fish, turtles and snakes. He also loved coloring a 'frankenbat' and seeing the skull of a hippopotamus, it was huge!"
In addition to insects, Finn also likes trains "and things with wheels so the ag museum (California Agriculture Museum in Woodland) and railroad museum have been fun to go to lately. He enjoys gardening and yard work with his dad Brent, and going on walks at the Arboretum and Putah Creek."
The Bohart Museum, located in Room 1124 of the Academic Surge Building, 455 Crocker Lane, is open to the public Monday through Thursday from 8 a.m. to noon, and from 1 to 5 p.m. Directed by UC Davis distinguished professor Lynn Kimsey, it houses a worldwide collection of eight million insect specimens, a live "petting zoo" (Madagascar hissing cockroaches, stick insects and tarantulas) and an insect-themed gift shop.
Walking Sticks (5 species):
- Great thin stick insects (Ramulus nematodes), native to Malaysia, dimorphic (blue males)
- Borneo thorny stick insect (Aretaon asperrimus), native to Borneo
- Vietnamese stick insect (Medauroidea extradentata), native to Vietnam
- Golden-eyed stick insect (Peruphasma schultei) native to Peru/Ecuador
- Australian Leaf insect (Extatosoma tiaratum), native to Northern forests of Australia
- Princess Herbert, the Brazilian salmon-pink bird-eating tarantula (Lasiodora parahybana). She is estimated to be around 20 years old, the oldest current resident of the Bohart Museum
- Peaches, the Chilean rose hair tarantula (Grammostola rosea)
- Coco McFluffin, the Chaco golden knee tarantula (Grammostola pulchripes), native to Paraguay and Argentina
- Two black widows (Latrodectus hesperus)
- One brown widow (Latrodectus geometricus)
- Madagascar hissing cockroaches (Gromphadorhina sp.)
- Giant Cave cockroach (Blaberus giganteus)
- Beatrice the Vietnamese centipede (Scolopendra subspinipes), the newest resident
- Ironclad beetles
- Bark scorpion
Want to hold a Madagascar hissing cockroach? Be sure to attend the Bohart Museum open house during the 109th annual UC Davis Picnic Day on Saturday, April 15.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Well, if you were high school student Ziya Akmal, he journeyed--by car--nearly 400 miles from his home in Los Angeles to attend the 12th annual UC Davis Biodiversity Museum Day on Saturday, Feb. 18 on the University of California, Davis, campus.
Biodiversity Museum Day, billed as a Super Science Day, is an annual opportunity to meet the scientists, see their work, and ask questions. It's a great opportunity for students to gain career ideas, said Biodiversity Museum Day chair and co-founder Tabatha Yang, education and outreach coordinator for the Bohart Museum of Entomology.
Akmal said he hopes to enroll in UC Davis, major in entomology, and study ants with Professor Phil Ward, an international authority on ant systematics. Akmal met with the professor in his Briggs Hall office, and talked to three Ward lab members--and one alumnus--at their table in the Academic Surge Building on Crocker Lane.
The Biodiversity Museum Day showcased 11 museums and collections, drawing almost 2000 visitors alone to the Academic Surge Building, where the Bohart Museum of Entomology and the Museum of Wildlife and Fish Biology provided displays. More displays lined the Academic Surge hallway: the Phil Ward lab (ants), the Jason Bond lab (spiders), and the Bohart Museum's separate petting zoos (Madagascar hissing cockroaches and stick insects). Martin Hauser, senior insect biosystematist at the California Department of Food and Agriculture and a regular volunteer at the Biodiversity Museum Day, delighted visitors with a scorpion that he fluoresced.
But across the hall from Hauser were "The Ant People" or "The Myrmecologists" from the Ward lab, who staffed a table and answered questions about not only ants, but a wide variety of arthropods. Doctoral candidates Jill Oberski and Zachary Griebenow and third-year doctoral student Ziv Lieberman were there, as was 2020 alumnus and ant researcher Brendon Boudinot, an Alexander von Humboldt Research Fellow at the Institute of Zoology and Evolutionary Research at Friedrich Schiller University Jena.
Those who listened to Professor Ward deliver a webinar on ants at the 10th annual Biodiversity Museum Day (during COVID-19 pandemic), remembered his presentation (see https://youtu.be/d8eRNsD8dxo.) Ants originated about 120 million years ago (early Cretaceous period), evolving from "wasp-like creatures," Ward said in his webinar. California has some 300 species of ants, but thousands more are in the tropics. Globally, "there may be as many as 40,000 to 50,000 species of ants," but only about 14,000 are described.
Boudinot, Griebenow and Oberski are veterans of UC Davis teams that won national championships in the Entomological Society of America's Entomology Games or "Bug Bowls." The Games, played between university-sponsored student teams, are lively question-and-answer, college bowl-style competitions on entomological facts. To date, UC Davis teams have won four national championships: 2022, 2018, 2016 and 2015.
The UC Davis Biodiversity Museum Day is traditionally held on Presidents' Day weekend. It's free and family friendly.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Volunteers will be wearing green T-shirts featuring a logo or symbol of each of the participating museums. The artwork and design are by Heesun Kim, a UC Davis undergraduate student in the Department of Food Science and Technology. Kim works with research microbiologist Kyria Boundy-Mills, curator of the Phaff Yeast Culture Collection.
Helping with the event this year are volunteers from the Career Advisors for the UC Davis Sacramento Valley College Corps fellowship program, affiliated with the Office of the Governor. Senior career advisor John Lee of the Sacramento Valley College Corps/UC Davis Internship and Career Center, told Biodiversity Museum Day officials that "the program focuses on three areas: K-12, Food Insecurities, and Climate Action. Our mission is to allow our students to go into their communities, provide services to members who need it, and make a difference. We have students tutoring at various K-12 schools, working at Food Banks, 350 Sacramento, any many more."
That organization is part of the #CaliforniansForAll College Corps, which aims to create debt-free pathways to college while engaging students across the state in solving problems in their communities.
A news release issued Feb. 1 indicated that more than 3000 students will be selected from partner campuses to participate during the 2023-2024 academic year. From the news release: "College Corps is a statewide, paid service program, launched during the 2022-2023 academic year, which provides meaningful work to college students in exchange for serving their community. The program helps participants graduate on time and with less debt while gaining valuable work experience. Students will receive up to $10,000 for completing up to 450 hours of community service."
Interested in purchasing Biodiversity Museum Day t-shirts or hoodies? Following the event, a website (the URL yet to be announced) will be offering them for sale in multiple colors to the public. This is a first-of-its-kind fundraiser for Biodiversity Museum Day.
- Anthropology Museum, 328 Young Hall and grounds, noon to 4 p.m.
- Arboretum and Public Garden, Habitat Gardens in the Environmental GATEway, adjacent to the Arboretum Teaching Nursery on Garrod Drive, 9 a.m. to 1 p.m.
- Bohart Museum of Entomology, Room 1124 and main hall of the Academic Surge Building, Crocker Lane, 9 a.m. to noon and 1 to 4 p.m.
- Botanical Conservatory, the greenhouses along Kleiber Hall Drive, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.
- California Raptor Center, 1340 Equine Lane, off Old Davis Road, 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.
- Center for Plant Diversity, Sciences Laboratory Building/Esau Science Hall, off Kleiber Hall Drive, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.
- Nematode Collection, Sciences Laboratory Building/Esau Science Hall, off Kleiber Hall Drive, 9 am. to 3 p.m..
- Marine Invertebrate Collection, Sciences Laboratory Building/Esau Science Hall, off Kleiber Hall Drive, 9 am. to 3 p.m.
- Museum of Wildlife and Fish Biology, Room 1394, Academic Surge Building, 455 Crocker Lane, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.
- Paleontology Collection, Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, 1309 Earth and Physical Sciences Building, 434 LaRue Road, 12 noon to 4 p.m.
- Phaff Yeast Culture Collection, Robert Mondavi Institute Brewery and Food Processing facility, Old Davis Road, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. (See news story)
Maps are available online and also will be handed out at the Biodiversity Museum Day, said Tabatha Yang of the Bohart Museum, chair and a co-founder of Biodiversity Museum Day. Visitors can purchase food from assorted food trucks. Those who wish to donate to the event can access this UC Davis crowdfunding page.
- Author: Kathy Keatley Garvey
Other sounds will include the "sound of silence" at still-life displays, but not really, as questions and answers will flow, says Biodiversity Museum chair,Tabatha Yang, education and outreach coordinator at the Bohart Museum of Entomology.
Billed as a Super Science Day--a day in which visitors can chat with scientists and see their work--the event is free and family friendly.
The insects are housed in the Bohart Museum of Entomology's petting zoo; the raptors at the California Raptor Center; and the yeast in the Phaff Yeast Collection, which will be shown in the Robert Mondavi Institute Brewery and Food Processing facility.
The Biodiversity Museum Day will showcase 11 museums or collections:
- Anthropology Museum, 328 Young Hall and grounds, noon to 4 p.m.
- Arboretum and Public Garden, Habitat Gardens in the Environmental GATEway, adjacent to the Arboretum Teaching Nursery on Garrod Drive, 9 a.m. to 1 p.m.
- Bohart Museum of Entomology, Room 1124 and main hall of the Academic Surge Building, Crocker Lane, 9 a.m. to noon and 1 to 4 p.m.
- Botanical Conservatory, the greenhouses along Kleiber Hall Drive, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.
- California Raptor Center, 1340 Equine Lane, off Old Davis Road, 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.
- Center for Plant Diversity, Sciences Laboratory Building/Esau Science Hall, off Kleiber Hall Drive, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.
- Nematode Collection, Sciences Laboratory Building/Esau Science Hall, off Kleiber Hall Drive, 9 am. to 3 p.m..
- Marine Invertebrate Collection, Sciences Laboratory Building/Esau Science Hall, off Kleiber Hall Drive, 9 am. to 3 p.m.
- Museum of Wildlife and Fish Biology, Room 1394, Academic Surge Building, 455 Crocker Lane, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.
- Paleontology Collection, Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, 1309 Earth and Physical Sciences Building, 434 LaRue Road, 12 noon to 4 p.m.
- Phaff Yeast Culture Collection, Robert Mondavi Institute Brewery and Food Processing facility, Old Davis Road, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. (See news story)
Maps are available online and also will be handed out at the Biodiversity Museum Day. Yang said visitors can purchase food at the assorted food trucks. Parking, she added, is also free. Those who wish to donate can do so by accessing this page.
