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.