Growing With Science Blog

Today our post was inspired by the picture book A World of Bugs (Comparing Bugs: Acorn Read-Aloud) by Charlotte Guillain.

Way back when I started this blog, I purposely chose the title “Bug of the Week” for the long-running Wednesday feature because I knew I would want to include spiders, pill bugs, and other creepy crawlies, as well as insects.  A World of Bugs shows children the range of arthropods and other invertebrates that are often called “bugs.” It tells what their features are, how they grow, where they live, and how they move. It is filled with huge, full color photographs that are very attractive. On the last page, the book also has some suggestions for activities to do before and after reading the book.

Identification of insects and their relatives requires careful observation of their anatomy.

Insects are part of the phylum of animals called Arthropoda.  All arthropods have:

• supporting skeleton on the outside, called an exoskeleton
• bi-lateral symmetry, which means if you draw a line down the center the two sides will be symmetrical
• jointed appendages
• segmented bodies
• specialized appendages, like antennae

The major arthropod classes can be separated by comparing their number of body regions, legs, and antennae.

Activity 1. Compare various creatures to discover features using live arthropods to observe, pictures and rubber or plastic models to explore. Give the children free explore time at first, and then start to encourage them to observe the following features:

Arachnids are the spiders, ticks, mites, scorpions and their relatives

• Have 8 legs
• Have 2 body regions, the cephalothorax (literally head-thorax), and abdomen

Spiders have 6 or 8 eyes at the front of the cephalothorax. Spiders’ mouthparts are called chelicerae and typically end in a fang. Around the mouth are the pedipalps.

For detailed information about spider anatomy, see Invertebrate Anatomy Online, the Garden Spider.

Crustaceans

The Isopods, which are called pillbugs, roly-polies, or wood lice, and other common names, have:

• 12 legs
• 2 antennae (one pair small)

Pill bug activities for kids

Centipedes and millipedes

• Many legs per segment
• Many segments
• One pair of antennae

Millipedes have 2 pairs of legs per segment.

Centipedes have one pair of legs per segment. (Photograph from Wikimedia).

Insects have:

• Three body parts:  head, thorax and abdomen
• Six legs
• One pair antennae
• Many adults have wings, but not all

Next time we will discuss how to recognize the major groups of insects, the orders.

A World of Bugs by Charlotte Guillain

Reading level: Ages 4-8
Paperback: 24 pages
Publisher: Heinemann-Raintree (August 1, 2011)
ISBN-10: 1432955063
ISBN-13: 978-1432955069

Book was provided by publisher for review purposes.

My son pointed this one out to me. Doesn’t it look like it is hanging in the air?

Did you flip a rock today? Below are photographs of what I discovered. As soon as I get linked up with Wanderin’ Weeta, I will post a list of the participants so you can see what everyone found.

The rocks:

A pile of what we call “river rocks” used to stabilize a drainage area. This particular area is mowed grass, so it is irrigated often.

You would expect to find an isopod (also called rolypoly or pillbug), after all there’s one on the International Rock Flipping Day badge.

But what is that with the isopod?

What is that brownish coiled object in the lower right of the photograph?

It is a tiny snail! There’s another with its head out.

It’s blurry, but definitely a snail. Finding snails is amazing in this hot, dry climate.

The snail wasn’t the only one carrying it’s house.

What is the gray object that looks like a small tube of mud? It is moving!

There is some sort of insect larva inside.

I think it is a beetle larva carrying a case. It is most likely a member of the leaf beetle family (Cryptocephalinae). It probably got washed to the drainage area during a recent storm.

Another tiny beetle scurries away.

Mites were common. Here’s a brightly colored one.

Spiders were also abundant. This tiny jumping spider seems to have its eyes on something.

Maybe it was trying to catch one of these Indian house cricket nymphs.I don’t envy any predator that hunts these.

I know I had trouble capturing them with my camera. The springtails that were everywhere were even worse. I never did get a photograph of them.

Finally, I did find some ants. I posted those results at Wild About Ants.

Overall, I was pleasantly surprised by the number of creatures I found. And in addition to finding different kinds, I also learned a little bit more about my neighbors that live under rocks.

Did you flip any rocks this weekend? What did you find?

For more information about the creatures featured here try:

Isopods

Indian house crickets

Jumping spiders

Mites

Snails and raising snails