Donation Day

This past Tuesday, June 27, I donated my insect collection, all 115 Cornell drawers and 13 Schmidt boxes, if I counted correctly. The recipient institution is the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. They made a good case when myself and several other members of the Mile High Bug Club toured their new state-of-the-art collections facility a couple years ago. Oddly, I did not have mixed emotions about the move. It was time.

Frank (left) and Jeff (right) happily departing with my insect collection

Jeff Stephenson, Collections Manager in the Zoology Department, and Dr. Frank Krell, Senior Curator of Entomology, came down to my home with a U-Haul van and we set to work loading it up. Much to my delight, they even took the cabinets the drawers were in, so that our spare bedroom is now much, much roomier.

Heidi never complained about my collection, in fact she has been very supportive, unlike some spouses or girlfriends of entomologists, so I have heard anyway. Still, it is a relief to have this burden lifted, like a proverbial albatross around one's neck. I did not have space to work on further organizing the specimens, and they were doing no one any good locked up in my home. Once integrated into the museum's collection, they will be available for loan to scientists researching different genera and species. They may eventually be imaged and put into a growing online database accessible to everyone, not just scientists. That pleases me greatly.

One does get a few perks when they make a donation of scientific specimens. There is some brief acclaim or notoriety when the museum makes public its acquisition of your material. This will take the form of a blog post and maybe a newsletter blurb sent to museum patrons and volunteers. Then there is the tax write-off. This will be interesting because the museum can only count specimens and give an overall description of the collection's condition, not an appraisal. Even that can take weeks if not months, understandably. Thankfully, the entomological community is full of people who have experience in such matters. Meanwhile, Heidi and I have not itemized, taking the Standard Deduction instead, so that will be another adventure, possibly worthy of another trip to a tax expert for our returns next year.

I did not donate the collection for any of those gratuities. I did it to further free myself from the label of "bug guy," and continue my growth as a writer and artist. I did it to continue downsizing my possessions, which become increasingly burdensome as one ages. Simplicity and travel take priority more and more, and I find myself wishing I had done this sooner. I'd rather visit friends and make new ones than collect more specimens. Some of my colleagues still reprimand me, if kindly, for failing to take specimens I have photographed in their habitat. Some discoveries can only be properly documented with a voucher: the creature itself.

I do wish that donating my collection would cure me of my "trophy mentality," the need to provide proof that my time spent afield is worth something, not just a "hobby" or trivial pursuit. I sometimes wonder whether a suntan is some people's proof of status that they can afford to vacation frequently, an almost literal badge of affluence.

When "citizen science" became a....thing, I found myself lamenting that volunteers were putting real scientists out of work. I still think that is true to a degree, but now there are platforms on the internet that allow people to make real, concrete contributions to scientific knowledge. Those databases need refinement to be sure, but it is a step in the right direction, and it is a wonderful tool in recruiting a new generation of scientists, and launching whole new careers for retired folks. I am proud to be a part of that community, whether I am considered an authority or not. It is a constant learning curve, and I am happy to help those behind me, as others ahead of me generously lend me a hand in return.

I am looking forward to the next chapter in my life, however it unfolds, and happy to conclude this one, which began seriously when I was about twelve years old. I heartily recommend the process of self-evaluation and charitable donation. It is a sign that you are a responsible, adult human being who can think beyond himself.

Spider Sunday: Spider Workshop

Last Friday night, Heidi and I went to Cheyenne Mountain State Park, just south of Colorado Springs, to hear a presentation on the Western Prairie Rattlesnake. Besides learning a lot about that reptile, we learned that there was going to be a workshop on spider identification the next day (yesterday), from 1-5 PM. Heidi had to work at the zoo, so I took the bus as far as I could go and walked the last four miles to the park. It was well worth the effort.

This is the second year that Dr. Paula Cushing, Curator of Invertebrate Zoology at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, has held a spider workshop at Cheyenne Mountain State Park. Dr. Cushing seeks to promote a better public understanding of arachnids in general, and hopes to recruit volunteers to help with the Colorado Spider Survey, an ongoing project to document the distribution of the state’s spider fauna. She delivers a highly informative introduction to spider anatomy, diversity, and biology with liberal doses of humor.

Each participant in the workshop paid $5.00 for a handbook that includes a key to the spider families found in Colorado, and documents that essentially deputize us to collect spiders on certain public lands on behalf of the survey. But wait, there’s more. We also got a collecting kit that included a dry collecting vial plus two vials of alcohol into which we were to deposit our specimens.

Once we were coached in the best methods for collecting spiders, we dispersed from the Camper Services Building into the field to try our luck.

A brief shower earlier in the afternoon did not deter us from turning over rocks (where I found a gnaphosid spider that ultimately escaped), sweeping the tall grasses and herbs with sturdy nets, and beating the trees with beating sheets (note to self: Do not use a beating sheet on a windy day unless you want to be taken aloft somewhere). We collectively found at least eight (count ‘em, 8) families of spiders in only forty minutes of searching.

We took our catch back into the building and Dr. Cushing put some of the specimens under a microscope so we could better observe the different characters that define the various families of spiders. Here she is putting a juvenile Western Black Widow in view.

The preparation that went into this workshop was quite impressive. Dr. Cushing and one of her former students are to be commended for offering such a program. I would encourage other expert arachnologists to do similar public outreach. The benefits are many: You can change people’s attitudes, vanquish myths and stereotypes, and garner support for your research. People woefully underestimate the positive impact of spiders in the natural world, and the potential of spider silk and venom to advance technology and medicine respectively.

I will have to start taking vials with me again when I am in the field. Collecting spiders for research purposes helps increase our understanding of their species, and under most circumstances (cave and dune fauna excepted, perhaps) does not impact their populations.

Thanks also go to the administrators, naturalists, and volunteers at Cheyenne Mountain State Park for encouraging such informative activities as this workshop, and then participating in them as well.