Contributors

Editor

Marcie O’Connor – Marcie lives on a farm in western Wisconsin.  She and her husband Mike are restoring the prairie and savanna habitat that were there before the land was settled.  In the process, she’s observing and learning all she can about the plants and animals that live there.  She keeps a blog about the restoration, and maintains the BugLifeCycles, and MothLists web sites. (Marcie’s Life Cycles)

Contributors

Abigail Parker lives in Philadelphia, where she seeks out wildlife of all sizes and often surprises those who don’t expect bald eagles or rare butterflies in the big city. She enjoys photographing and rearing insects, especially Lepidoptera and lady beetles. Learn more about her insect adventures on her blog, and see more of her images on BugGuide. (Abigail’s Life Cycles.)

Alan Chin-Lee has been a lepidopterist since childhood.  He has worked for Butterfly World in Florida, and the Florida Museum of Natural History.  Now he does nature photography, and especially Lepidoptera photography.  See more of his photos at his web site.  (Alan’s Life Cycles)

Anita Gould is a molecular biologist by training, scientific editor by vocation, and inveterate nature photographer by avocation.  Her photos can be found on Flickr, and many of the bug images can be found on BugGuide.  She lives in central New Jersey.  (Anita’s Life Cycles)

Ann Thering is an insect photographer in Madison, Wisconsin.  By capturing beautiful, intimate details of insects she hopes to encourage people to notice and enjoy them more.  She’s turned her back yard into a butterfly haven – with nearly 40 species seen so far.  She’s been planting nectar and caterpillar food plants, and does not use pesticides.  See her wonderful photographs on her web site.  (Ann’s Life Cycles)

Ashley Bradford does drawings and photographs of flowers, and photographs insects.  She’s interested in all things natural – the weirder the better.  She especially likes showing the small details that most people don’t see.   See her drawings and art photographs on her website, and a list of her bugguide contributions here.  (Ashley’s Life Cycles)

Beatriz Moisset is a retired biologist, originally from Argentina.  She is particularly interested in pollinators.  She has two web sites:  The Web of Life and Pollinators, and she also contributes many of her images to BugGuide. (Beatriz’ Life Cycles)

Berry Nall – Berry is a Baptist pastor and high school science teacher who lives in Starr County, Texas.  In his spare time he enjoys photographing lepidoptera in all stages of their lives.  He has a web site that documents the butterfly species, and some moth species, that he’s photographed. (Berry’s Life Cycles)

Betsy Higgins lives in Western Massachusetts, where she has been a Family Childcare Provider for 28 years. In her spare time, she is passionate about birding, butterflying, mothing, and is generally interested in everything in nature. She contributes to the Moth Photographers Group website, and to Discover Life.  See more of her insect images on Bugguide and Moth Photographers Group.  (Betsy’s Life Cycles)

Brandon W. has been an insect enthusiast since the age of seven.  He plans on pursuing entomology and environmental conservation when he attends college.  Right now he lives in southern Maine, and photographs insects in various environmental habitats around his home, and wherever he vacations in other states.  See more of his photos on Bugguide.  (Brandon’s Life Cycles)

Carl Barrentine is an Associate Professor in Humanities and adjunct Associate Professor in Biology in the Integrated Studies Program at the University of North Dakota in Grand Forks.  He has been building a digital video archive of non-game wildlife in eastern North Dakota and western Minnesota.   For the last few years he’s been working especially hard photographing moths from North Dakota and Minnesota.  See many of his photos on Bugguide and on his web page – Dakota Naturalist)  (Carl’s Life Cycles)

Charley Eiseman is the author, with Noah Charney, of Tracks & Sign of Insects and Other Invertebrates.  He conducts ecological inventories and surveys focusing on vascular plants, terrestrial vertebrates, and natural communities.  On Bugguide, he focuses on identifying eggs, cocoons, galls, leaf mines, and all the other mysterious objects and patterns that bugs leave behind.  See information about his work on his website, and more of his insect images on Bugguide.  He recently started a blog: BugTracks, to share natural history mysteries and discoveries.  (Charley’s Life Cycles)

Chris at JCM Digital Imaging does videos of butterflies and moths, and is particularly interested in the Lepidoptera of Santa Clarita and Northern Los Angeles County.   Visit his YouTube page, or his web site to see more. (Chris’ Life Cycles)

Claude Pilon is a retired information technology manager with an interest in insects – especially aphids, hoppers, spittlebugs and true bugs.  She is a contributing editor to Bugguide, and she watches and photographs insects in Repentigny, Québec.  See more of her photos on his web site, and her guide pages and insect images on Bugguide.  (Claude’s Life Cycles)

Craig Biegler is a student majoring in wildlife science, specializing in entomology.  He has conducted research on moth diversity at Denison University, and is a member of the Ohio Lepidopterists.  You can see more of his photos on Bugguide. (Craig’s Life Cycles)

Edith Smith, with her husband Stephen, owns Shady Oak Butterfly Farm, near Gainesville, Florida, which raises and sells butterfly pupae.  She and Stephen also travel to do presentations about butterflies, their lives, their hostplants, and the habitats they need to survive. (Edith’s Life Cycles)

Eric R. Eaton is a freelance writer and entomologist currently living in Tucson, Arizona.  He is principal author of the “Kaufman Guide to insects of North America”, and a volunteer editor on Bugguide.  He writes a blog about insects called Bug Eric. (Eric’s Life Cycles)

Gary R. McClellan is an avid insect and nature photographer who lives in Sarasota, Florida.  He has a growing interest in the plight of the honey bee due to Colony Collapse Disorder.  See more of his photos on Bugguide. (Gary’s Life Cycles)

Greg Dodge is a naturalist, writer, and photographer living in Hillsborough, North Carolina.  He writes a blog for the NC Museum of Life + Science in Durham, NC, a personal blog called Exploring the Nature Around You, and has written and produced natural history DVDs on birds and insects.  (Greg’s Life Cycles)

Ilona Loser lives and photographs in Cross Plains, Wisconsin.  There is a small conservancy area near her home where she finds a great variety of insects.  See more of her insect images on Bugguide.  (Ilona’s life cycles)

James Durbin lives in Iowa.  He is past president and current membership chairman of Cedar Rapids Audubon, and does volunteer work teaching bird classes and doing species studies for the DNR and Linn County Conservation.  He photographs birds, flowers and insects and has two web sites: Insects of Iowa, and Birds of Iowa.  (James’ Life Cycles)

Jan Dauphin – Jan has been studying butterflies for many years.  Her Mission, Texas yard is planted strictly with native plants for the butterflies.  At 150 species, her butterfly yard list is the highest in the U.S.  She and her husband David have an extensive web site about wildlife watching in south Texas’ Lower Rio Grande Valley. (Jan’s Life Cycles)

Janeen Engleman Langley is a semi-retired registered nurse living in Tallahassee, Florida.  She has a special interest in birds, butterflies, gardening, and nature in general. (Janeen’s Life Cycles)

Janice Stiefel passed away in March of 2008.  She lived in Door County, Wisconsin, and was an enthusiastic photographer of flowers, butterflies and moths.  She was particularly interested in moths, and raised hundreds of them to discover their host plants and record their life stages.  She wrote regularly for several publications, and was editor of the Wisconsin Entomological Society newsletter until her death.  See more of her insect images on BugGuide. (Janice’s Life Cycles)

Jeff Hollenbeck collects and photographs insects, and especially spiders.  See his photos on BugGuide. (Jeff’s Life Cycles)

Jim McClarin is an insect photographer who is particularly interested in beetles.  He has photographed beetles in many parts of the U.S. and in other countries.  You can see his photos on Flickr, and on BugGuide. (Jim’s Life Cycles)

John & Jane Balaban are amateur botanists and naturalists near Chicago.  They are active volunteers in natural area restoration primarily along the North Branch of the Chicago River, and Volunteer Master Stewards for the Forest Preserve District of Cook County.  They teach classes locally on native wildflowers, tree, and dragonflies.  They are also contributing editors to Bugguide.  See more of their insect images on Bugguide. (John and Jane’s Life Cycles)

John Himmelman is an author of natural history books for children and adults.  For years he has been recording, with photographs, the moths he finds in his Connecticut yard.   See beautiful photographs of the moths, and information about his books and programs here, photos and information about amphibians he’s found here. (John’s Life Cycles)

John R. Maxwell (Max) lives in a suburban neighborhood built into the New Jersey Pine Barrens.  There is a wide variety of nature around his house – lawns and gardens, as well as the Pitch Pine and Scrub Oak forest of the Pine Barrens.  He raises many spiders and insects to adulthood to discover what they will turn into.   He is also a volunteer editor on Bugguide.  See more of his images on Bugguide. (Max’s Life Cycles)

John Sloan lives in Whitecourt, Alberta, Canada.  He’s currently working on a degree in general science through Athabasca University, and he’s particularly interested in spiders.  See more of his images on his website, and on Bugguide.  And read his guide pages about spiders on Bugguide. (John’s Life Cycles)

Joyce Gross is a computer programmer for the UC Berkeley natural history museums, but she’d rather be outside  photographing interesting wildlife.  She has a homepage with information about her work and her photos. (Joyce’s Life Cycles)

Karen Anthonisen Finch is a certified Florida Coastal Master Naturalist.  She studies the behavior of invertebrates and documents the defensive adaptations of lepidoptera.  She is one of the principal contributors to the Terra Explorer Project – a web-based project that focuses on identifying interesting and unique adaptations of plants and animals.  (Karen’s Life Cycles)

Ken Childs studies and photographs moths in Henderson, Tennessee.  See more of his images at his Gallery of Moths from Finish Flag Farms, and on Bugguide.  (Ken’s Life Cycles)

Linda & Robert Scarth are Iowa photographers interested in all the beautiful and fascinating subjects in nature.  They especially enjoy close-up and macro photography, so insects often capture their attention.  Examples of their work may be found on their web site and their blog.  The University of Iowa Press is publishing their book: “Deep Nature: Photographs from Iowa“. (Linda & Robert’s Life Cycles)

Lynette Schimming has an Elementary Education degree, and is very interested in insects, and insect photography.  She has many photos on BugGuide.  (Lynette’s Life Cycles)

Machele White lives and observes insects in central Florida.  See more of her images on Bugguide.  (Machele’s Life Cycles)

Marie Schmidt got her degree in biology in Austria and now lives just outside of Philadelphia. Her work was unrelated to invertebrates but since she retired she pursues her lifelong interest in insects, spiders and other small critters.  See more of her photos on Bugguide.  (Marie’s Life Cycles)

Matt Simon is especially interested in insects in urban environments.  He lives and works in Boston, and has a web site about his urban insect finds. (Matt’s Life Cycles)

Michael Cook – Michael raises wild and domesticated silk moths, and uses their silk in weaving and embroidery.  He started raising caterpillars for silk in 2001, and has a web site about raising the moths, and about how he processes the silk from all the different kinds of cocoons. (Michael’s Life Cycles)

MJ Hatfield – MJ is a retired UPS driver who discovered insects by way of native plants:  planting corn ground to prairie.  http://tinyurl.com/Corn2prairie She’s particularly interested in whether the success of a prairie planting can be measured by the insects that utilize it.  MJ manages the Iowa Insects Mailing List which is sponsored by the University of Iowa and supported by the Iowa Native Plant Society. (MJ’s Life Cycles)

Molly Jacobson is a Wildlife & Conservation Biology major at the University of New Hampshire. She’s loved nature, especially insects, since childhood, and hopes to become an entomologist in the future. She uses her photography and passion for the outdoors to create insect ID guides for local nature preserves, and wishes to educate the public about the importance of protecting insects and native ecosystems as much as possible.  See more of her photos on Bugguide.  (Molly’s Life Cycles)

Moni Hayne has been interested in insects since childhood.  She grew up on a small farm in Indiana, and her mother was a naturalist, so she learned names for lots of insects and plants.  She got two degrees in entomology, and has worked in agriculture.  Currently she lives in Jefferson County, Iowa – gardening, photographing, and volunteering.  She enjoys sharing her knowledge of plants and insects and looks forward to learning more.  See more of her photos on Bugguide.  (Moni’s Life Cycles)

Nancy Collins studies insects, especially Tree Crickets (Oecanthinae), in southeastern Wisconsin.  She’s raising Tree Crickets to learn more about their identification and behavior, and maintains a web site about them. (Nancy’s Life Cycles)

Patrick Coin is an environmental engineer and toxicologist with a passion for birds, plants, and insects.  He has been photographing insects seriously since 1992, mostly in North Carolina.  He was one of the first users of BugGuide – beginning in 2004 – and is one of its contributing editors.  See more of his photographs on his Flickr page, his insect photos on Bugguide, and his Guide pages on BugGuide.  (Patrick’s Life Cycles)

Phil Huntley-Franck is a retired project leader and computer analyst who loves taking pictures of bugs.  For the past few years he’s been compiling an image catalog of every bug he finds in his Elkton, Oregon yard.  You can see more of his insect photos on his website, and on Bugguide.  (Phil’s Life Cycles)

Randy Hardy photographs moths from his yard in Tucson, Arizona.  He is one of the editors on Bugguide, and works with Bob Patterson at the Moth Photographers Group as an associate editor for photo acquisitions.  See more of his insect photos on MPG,  and see his insect photos and guide pages on Bugguide.  (Randy’s Life Cycles)

R. Berg lives in Alameda County, California, and photographs the amazing variety of tiny creatures that she finds in her urban yard.  You can see more of her photos on Bugguide. (R. Berg’s Life Cycles)

Scott N. is a student at Bloomsburg University in Pennsylvania.  He is interested in many kinds of insects, but especially social wasps.  See more of his images on BugGuide. (Scott’s Life Cycles)

Stan Rehm lives in Madison, Wisconsin, and watches butterflies and other insects as a retirement hobby.  He publishes his observations and photographs on his blog. (Stan’s Life Cycles)

Stephen Luk has been interested in nature and especially in insects since he immigrated to Canada in 1996.  He is currently a M.Sc. student at the University of Guelph in Ontario, studying with Dr. Stephen Marshall.  He is reviewing the neotropical sphaerocerid fly genus Aptilotella.  See more of his images at his web site and on BugGuide. (Stephen’s Life Cycles)

Stephen Tapsak lives and observes insects in Columbia County, Pennsylvania. He enjoys gardening, collecting wild fruits and berries, and raises moths and butterflies from cocoons and caterpillars that he finds. He also has a garage light that attracts many moths which he observes, and sometimes gets eggs from, in order to rear them. See more of his images on Bugguide.  (Stephen’s Life Cycles)

Teá Handly rears and sells butterflies and moths, specializing in local and tropical Saturniidae.  Her goal is to educate people about them, and to preserve habitat for these amazing creatures.  She has worked on many research projects, including ones at the Museum of Science in Boston. Massachusetts, and with graduates and professors at Harvard University.  See more about her work at her web site, and her Wiki page. (Teá’s Life Cycles)

Terry Harrison is in the Department of Entomology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.  He has had a longtime interest in North American “micro” moths and has an extensive web site about them. (Terry’s Life Cycles)

Tim Eisele lives on 9 acres on the Keeweenaw Peninsula of Upper Michigan.  He working on a project to photograph all the arthropods that he and his family find in their house and yard, and to learn and write about them in his blog.  (Tim’s Life Cycles)

Todd Stout has been raising butterflies in northern Utah for the last 20 years.  He is a Member at Large of The Lepidopterists’ Society and current President of the Utah Lepidopterists’ Society.  He started Utah Bug Club, and Utah Butterfly Field Trips, and has extensively researched the life histories of many Western U.S. butterflies as provided in his web site.  (Todd’s Life Cycles)

Tom Murray is a sales rep with an interest in nature and nature photography.  See more of his nature photos at his web site. (Tom’s Life Cycles)

Vernon Antoine Brou Jr. is an independent lepidoptera researcher based in Louisiana.  He has been collecting and studying butterflies, moths and some beetles from his various light and bait traps since 1967.  He and his wife, Charlotte Dozar Brou, have described many new moth species.  They have also donated thousands of specimens to various scientific institutions, and they do displays and outreach work for many organizations including the Audubon Institute in New Orleans, and the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries.  See more about their work at this link, and this link.  (Vernon’s Life Cycles)

Virgiliu Marius Aurelian lives in Vancouver, BC, and is studying the chemical ecology of the Apple Clearwing Moth (a recent introduction from Europe), as well as trying to figure out the impact of the mass trapping traps he uses on non-target species.  He’s also creating a checklist and key (with maps and photos) of all British Columbia species of clearwing moths.  See more of his photos on Bugguide.  (Marius’ Life Cycles)