The Cupertino Courier

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Making the case for protecting bugs

By ANNE WARD ERNST

Squeals of delight--and revulsion--ricocheted off the walls of a first-grade classroom at Cupertino's Garden Gate Elementary on May 8. The source of the outbursts? Big nasty-looking bugs.

No, not spiders or cockroaches or other unwanted guests. These insects were making a guest appearance to teach children that insects aren't here just to bug you. They play a vital role in the environment, the students were told by ecosystem experts from the Center for Ecosystem Survival.

As part of the center's interactive science-based program, presenter Torsten Hasselmann brought in several species from the center's Insect Discovery Lab. With, in some cases, a lot of encouragement, children could touch, even hold, the impressive-looking bugs.

The program's goal is to help children become adults who understand why it is necessary to protect all species and the habitats in which they live.

With each bug Hasselmann brought out, he explained its defense mechanisms, eating behavior, habitat and what physical characteristics make it an insect. For example, an insect has three pairs of legs and a segmented body: head, thorax and abdomen.

When he brought out a 240-legged giant African millipede that resembled a wiggling, squirming cigar, 7-year-old Michael James looked to his neighbor and asked, "Are you going to hold that?"

As if she were an experienced entomologist and he had asked a silly question, 6-year-old Tejasvi Desai said, "Of course. We're going to hold everything."

The rubbery-looking millipede would feel in their hands like a toothbrush, Hasselmann said.

"We don't want to put it on our teeth," a grimacing Tejasvi said.

Curiosity and excitement was on the faces of most of the students. Even Alekhya Yallapragada, who rapidly recoiled her outstretched finger with each tentative touch, still found the exercise enticing enough to not miss out on the opportunity to feel the belly of an Australian walking stick.

First grade is the perfect age group to give such presentations, Hasselmann said.

"They are full of wonder and they are still innocent," he said. "This is the age before science is uncool. They learn that science can be full of discovery."

Hasselmann is a wildlife biologist who has worked for the center for about a year, he said. Though he had not previously worked with children, his question, "Who can show me they are ready to see the next animal?" worked like magic.

It was a science and conservation lesson hidden behind hard skeletal shells, long-bended legs, and camouflage colorations.

He showed how the Australian walking stick blended in with dried leaves because of its bland light brown color variations. When it feels threatened, it bends itself into the shape of a scorpion. Though it is not poisonous--all of the bugs shown to the children were safe--the walking stick had evolved to learn that its predators would not touch it if it looked like a bug that delivers a lethal sting.

Hasselmann made three presentations that day. In each, he wove in a message: People need to work together to save ecologically rich and diverse environments such as rainforests and coral reefs.

The San Francisco-based Center for Ecosystem Survival partners with zoos, aquariums, botanical gardens, natural science museums and other science agencies to protect wildlife and nature.

Executive director Norm Gershenz said the nonprofit group works with more than 3,000 schools across the country and conducted 645 presentations over the past year--300 more than any other organization of its type.

The conservation message includes a call to donate money to the center's main projects: Adopt an Acre and Adopt a Reef. Funds raised by "Rainforest Rangers" and "Coral Reef Crusaders" go directly to the purchase and protection of critical habitat of endangered or threatened animals, plants and ecosystems in places such as Bolivia, Costa Rica, Micronesia and Indonesia, Gershenz said, adding that the ultimate goal is to create stewardship.

The classrooms receive follow-up communication from the center, too, he said. "They will get a letter from the Millie the millipede. It will be sent to the kids, and it will say, 'We hope you had a great time, but we hope you can help us [the animals] too. We're on the ground, we're in the tops of the trees, and each of us has our place.'"

The environmentally focused group doesn't limit its pitch to children.

"We do birthday and cocktail parties, too." Gershenz said. "Once you get people around bugs and booze, the next thing you know you're talking about conservation."

For more information about the Center for Ecosystem Survival and its programs, visit www.savenature.org.