LARAMIE, Wyo.
It's summertime, the season of insects, and if you spend any time outdoors (or even indoors), you've probably been swatting and stomping your way toward fall. Mosquitoes and midges dance over ponds, butterflies and bumblebees tussle on daisies, crickets and katydids trill melodies, moths zigzag around lights leaving dusty trails.
In North America, 87,000 insect species have been identified. Most are microscopic and mysterious. The tiniest, fairy fly wasps, are too Lilliputian to see; they're so small that several can have a dance party on the head of a pin. You might actually inhale and exhale a fairy fly, just as you might a dust speck.
Insects are the products of 3 billion years of evolution. They may seem alien, full of greenish goo, but they are complex creatures with intricate organs and elegant sensory systems: multifaceted eyes, ornate antennae, and pits, pegs and pores across their cuticles.
They may be tiny, but they're tough. They have adapted to some of the most extreme conditions on the planet. And try as we might, over the last century we have not managed to extinguish even one pest species. The malaria mosquito, housefly, human-body louse and hundreds of others have developed resistance to insecticides. These poisons have also stimulated the production of new secondary pests (by killing beneficial predators), as well as posing threats to wildlife and humans.
Since the pests we encounter are often highly adaptable and seemingly indestructible, it is tempting to assume that all insects possess those qualities. That's not the case; many of them, such as bees, butterflies and dragonflies, can be easily harmed by our incursions on their habitats.
The one species that seems immune to our best efforts at eradication is the American cockroach. Despite its name, it is an invasive species, having arrived here from Africa at least as early as 1625. In the forests of Africa, or even in Central Park, they're beneficial as scavengers, recyclers and food for other wildlife. But when they move into our homes, they become pests.
The point being, what might be a pest in one context may not be in another. I enjoy seeing Cabbage White butterflies visiting flowers in my yard, but when their caterpillars riddle my broccoli, they become pests.
The popular assumption is that cockroaches can survive anything, including nuclear explosions. You may have heard the joke: After the nuclear apocalypse, all that will remain will be cockroaches and Keith Richards. There's a bit of truth to that, at least about the cockroach. They're more tolerant of radiation than humans.
So the next time an insect crawls across your path, master your impulse to squash it immediately and instead kneel down to observe its microscopic majesty. You're seeing a creature whose buggy ancestors survived asteroids, volcanoes, continental drift, climate fluctuations and glaciers. Admire it, respect it. And rest assured that most insects will survive, while we are just a brief phase on this planet of bugs.
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Scott R. Shaw is a professor of entomology at the University of Wyoming, where he is curator of the Insect Museum.
Editorial on 08/26/2014