Insects and other bugs

The most numerous animals in our environment are certainly the smallest. Even when you don't see or hear any animals around you, and you think you are alone, just sit down, move a few leaves if you are in the woods, then carefully stare at the ground and take a close look at the miniature world unfolding before your eyes. Chances are you will soon see small creatures going about their own business, seemingly oblivious from all that is going on in our "big" world.

But the fact is, their world is not that independent. Small and big creatures alike live in the same ecological environment. We are all connected and in many ways, depend on one another.

A lot of the insects and other bugs are near the bottom of some foods chains. They serve as food for bigger creatures like frogs or small birds, which, in turn, are eaten by bigger meat eating animals like eagles or minks. When animals at the top of the food chain die, they are decomposed in the soil by small creatures which break down animal corpses and thus create available nutrients for plants to grow.

And plants are the basis of all food chains, including ours, as they are eaten either directly by us, or by those animals which, in turn, end up in our kitchens.

Take the lowly earthworm. It is a key animal of the food chain. It eats all dead organic matter and transforms it into the rich forest soils, or, if you have a garden, into compost! Compost is the best natural fertilizer there is for any garden vegetable. The more earthworms, the healthier the soil!

Some bugs are useful in other ways. The spider, for example, is a small, eight- legged creature giving many people the creeps. But they feed on so many common and annoying flying insects, like mosquitoes and flies, that if they were not there to do so, we would be invaded by these pests. So when you come across a spider web during an outing, leave it alone, it is the home of an ally.

When you go out on an excursion, observe the bugs. Write down in a logbook the species you find. If you don't know them, look them up in a field identification book, or if you don't have one, describe them in as much detail as you can and sketch them. You can look them up later on in books at a library. Take note of their numbers and the location where you observed them. Some bugs live in groups, others prefer a solitary existence. Many bugs live in particular environments. For example, dragonflies live where there is water, bees live near flowering plants. How can you tell if the bugs you find are insects? (Remember: insects have 6 legs).