Bug Jar

-
I may have mentioned before that Steven and I are currently serving as Webelos Den Leaders. One of our Webelos has a huge interest in bugs. He earned his naturalist badge some time ago, but he wanted to help the other boys in the den earn this badge, so the last two weeks, we have let him. The first week he led a discussion of venomous snakes and reptiles, as well as poisonous plants. This past week, he brought in everything necessary to build a terrarium/bug habitat.

Until Peter's eighth birthday next month, he is an honorary Webelos, and so he got to participate, and brought home his very own bug jar - complete with a bunch of meal worms and a couple crickets.

The next morning, I put the jar in a window sill, thinking that the the sun might do them some good. Then I left to walk the boys to school. When I returned home, the jar was still in window, but Momo, one of our cats was watching it intently. I was wondering how good an idea this was as I went back to the kitchen to finish cleaning up from breakfast. A short time later I came back into the living room to discover the jar - upside down - on the couch, with Momo still watching closely. I picked it up and turned it right side up again and put it in a safer place. Later I noticed one of the crickets looking kind of smooshed, like it had been impaled by one of the twigs in the jar. The other cricket is doing well and thriving. The meal worms seem to hibernate during the day, but  come out in the evening to eat the oatmeal scattered in the bottom of the jar. The cricket has an orange block that is supposed to contain all his dietary requirements for a while. Can we keep the remaining bugs alive for an entire month? I don't know.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

A Talk about Gratitude

-
I recently told my bishop that I enjoyed giving talks in Sacrament Meeting, and it is true. I didn't expect, however, that I would get an email from a bishopric member on Thursday last week to say that his talks for Sunday had to leave town, and would I be willing to speak? Here is the talk that I gave on Sunday, May 27th, 2012: For my topic today, I was given a talk which was given by President Monson in 1992, entitled “An Attitude of Gratitude”. In his talk President Monson begins by telling the story of the 10 lepers. I would like to share it with you. In Luke 17 we read: And it came to pass, as he went to Jerusalem, that he passed through the midst of Samaria and Galilee. And as he entered into a certain village, there met him ten men that were lepers, which stood afar off: And they lifted up their voices, and said, “Jesus, Master, have mercy on us.” And when he saw them, he said unto them, “Go show yourselves unto the priests.” And it came to pass, that, as they went,
Read more

How Clean is Clean Enough?

-
Image
How clean is "clean enough"? I realize this question is loaded and the answers are very individual, so for a moment, think about yourself and your home and consider, for you, how clean is "clean enough"? What is the difference between a "quick clean", a "daily clean" and a "deep clean"? At what point do you consider your home "clean enough"? Does "clean enough" mean having a clear path from the front door to the other rooms in the house? Is it having the clutter picked up and the floors vacuumed? Must it be dusted every week, every month, or at all? Is it a quick swipe on the surface to remove the dust or crumbs? Is it a scrub with disinfectant? Is it clearing tables and desks, or delving into cupboards and drawers, purging and organizing?    Does it depend on the day of the week? Is "clean enough" on a weekday the same as "clean enough" on a weekend? If not, is it more clean, or less? Is there a
Read more

School closing, Josh adventures, Back pain relief...

-
On Wednesday school was cancelled all over the Denver area because there was a credible threat that an 18 year old woman with a fixation on the Columbine shooting would attack a school. Apparently she arrived in Denver and bought a gun and then vanished, so they shut down everything just in case. (They found her body later that day... She committed suicide. More info here .) John was frustrated that school was cancelled because one acts are coming up (they are this week!) and he needed the rehearsal time. Instead, John took advantage of the free day to go to School of Mines to check out the campus and talk to someone about getting his admission deferred. I got a ride to my book club, and both of us were home again before Josh and Peter rolled out of bed. Early in the afternoon I took Josh to Children's Hospital to see a cardiologist about his seizures . They did an EKG, but the results were normal. He doesn't have a heart murmur or anything else they could identify. I still thi
Read more