Fragile as Butterfly Wings

On days that I really really hate my job, I try to think of all the ways I have benefited from working there.  A surprising opportunity to learn more about entomology, occurred shortly after I started at the lab.  My coworker Ronda had been working with monarch butterflies for years.  Another coworker  had started the tradition at work and passed it onto her as she did us.

 Our company has a field behind the garage of prairie grasses and flowers that we utilized.  On lunch breaks we would walk the field searching for monarch eggs, finding all kinds of interesting insects in the process.  

None of us have tried our own butterfly rearing, but instead helped Ronda gather milkweed leaves and eggs, and watched the beautiful process unfold.  When the transformation was complete, she let us help her release some of them!

This is me in our hallway outside the O.E.P. room holding a monarch we are about to release.

Watching an egg the size of a pin head change into a tiny caterpillar and then into a delicate butterfly is a patient amazing process.  Like every girl I always loved butterflies, but it wasn't until I watched their transformation that I really understood how fragile they truly are.  How cruel the world can be to something so tiny.  How insignificant such a little speck can seem to us, but oh the rewards we receive from them.

We now have what seems like an unending plethora of synthetic organic insecticides.   These insecticides function in various ways.  Insecticides can kill by disrupting the nervous system, acting as an endotoxin, damaging the exoskeleton, or causing infertility.  While some insecticides claim to target certain species, most do not discriminate.  That means we're not just killing pests, we're killing all the beneficial insects that make this world flourish with foods and flowers of every color.  Not only that, but aquatic species specifically have shown high mortality rates in the presence of pesticides.

 We need to remember what it is like to be in nature, remember that it is nature we belong with, not the artificial walls of the cities or the synthetic chemicals we think we need.  What we really need is to let nature do as it was intended to do, and the fruits of nature will unfold.  

While we're on the subject of pollinators, I followed this little friend around the yard after work the other day.  It's a spicebush swallowtail butterfly on my pesticide-free butterfly bush.  I used this very handy blog for identification so thank you for the pictures!

 http://louisiananaturalist.blogspot.com/2009/06/four-dark-swallowtails.html?m=1#butterfly

Links
http://ipmworld.umn.edu/ware-intro-insecticides-a good read into some of the uses, histories, and lasting impacts of insecticides

http://www.askdrmaxwell.com/2013/03/the-gut-destroying-toxin-you-eat-everyday/

Blinded Me with Science

A transformer went down somewhere and the neighborhood is out of power.  The backup generator isn't running the lab at full capacity.  Every hallway has flickering lights and the hoods are acting possessed. It's like we're in the middle of a horror movie or haunted house attraction.  It's pretty awesome!!! So now I'm on break and getting paid to work on my blog! Thursday you're alright!  We even got to leave and get coffee!  We heard more booms and saw sparks from an electrical pole across the street on the way back. This is the closest we get to a snow day and I'll take what I can get and enjoy it fully. This is what I was working on today.  Making reagents can be fun and very messy.  This is the carnage left after I made a reagent with sulfuric acid.  Behold the power of the tiny drops of acid.