Picture this: you are a single mother, and to ensure the success of your children, you’ll have to immobilize a still-living animal almost twice your weight and haul it back to a tunnel…

Intolerance of disturbance, specific habitat requirements, and narrow distribution: these are characteristics that threaten species with extinction. Unfortunately, the Chittenango ovate amber…

More than 400 million years ago, when invertebrates ruled Ordovician seas, the Anostraca, or fairy shrimp, evolved within the branchiopod crustaceans. They moved from oceans up through…

One of the year’s first insects to appear on my deck railing is the winter firefly, Photinus corrusca, which shows up on warm days throughout winter. A brown beetle with pink parentheses…

Goldenrods in bloom are the Grand Central Station for insects. Some insects come in search of nectar, others for pollen, more for mates, and still others are predators for whom the diverse…

Twenty-five years ago, a student brought me a dead, tattered specimen of a moth. Its prodigious wingspan, colorfully banded fuzzy body, and spectacular wings were unmistakable: cecropia moths…

During our first autumn in Westford, Vermont, a wave of ladybugs attempted to make our home theirs for the winter. My wife expressed concern that our toddler might eat one. I replied,…

Winter rambles often take me to East Woods in South Burlington, Vermont. While birders gaze skyward, I find myself drawn to movement on the ground. Snow cover reduces invertebrate numbers, and…

If you look beneath the damp undersides of cardboard and other packing materials, you’re likely to find tiny creatures that typically hide under fallen leaves and rotting wood, where…