---
title: A Bug Club’s Life
date: 2023-03-15T05:30:00-04:00
author: University of Maryland
canonical_url: "https://today.umd.edu/a-bug-clubs-life"
section: Articles
---
# A Bug Club’s Life

*March 15, 2023* — by [Karen Shih ’09](/author/karen-shih)


> Bio Major’s New Student Org Gives Undergrads Chance to Explore Entomology

*Bug Club 03072023 JC 3194 1920x1080 — Bug Club founder Sophia Athanas ’24, left, shows a wood roach to Lily Humke ’24 as Sabrina Purtee ’24 looks on. “I love how shellacked their shells are,” said Humke, a biological sciences major.*

Crunching through the woods behind the lacrosse and field hockey complex on a gusty afternoon, nearly a dozen students squealed in delight.

Their discovery was no squirrel, baby deer or turtle, but a tiny, red, curled-up millipede, nestled into a crevice of a rotting branch. Then they discovered a roly-poly (known to some as a potato bug) and—alarmingly to some, but not to this crew—a roach, but not the type you’d find scuttling around your apartment when the lights go out. This was a wood roach, smaller than a fingernail, dedicated to breaking down the fallen trees along Paint Branch Trail.

Welcome to collection day with the Bug Club.

Launched in the fall by Sophia Athanas ’24, a biological sciences major, the new student organization brings together undergraduates with an interest in entomology.

“Helping people learn about bugs and look for bugs brings me back to being a kid and playing with worms in the dirt,” said Athanas, who is pursuing an entomology minor. “I don’t want people to look at a bug and say, ‘Oh, that’s disgusting, or it’s terrible, or it’s going to sting me.’”

In the spring and fall, she leads weekly collection trips in the woods and streams around College Park, teaching fellow students how to search for insects, catch them with their hands or nets, and place them into collection jars or tubes, as well as offering to help identify them. She personally purchases all the materials, such as nets, tubes she pre-fills with ethanol (to preserve specimens), as well as Styrofoam and pins (to create displays), since the club doesn’t yet have funding.

Athanas also has scheduled talks with researchers and faculty on invasive species, marine arthropods and scientific illustrations, and prepares workshops on topics like ethnoentomology, describing how Native American and other Indigenous populations incorporate bugs into their cultures. She hopes to raise awareness of problematic Latin and common names (such as the recently renamed gypsy moth, now known as a spongy moth) and to encourage underrepresented populations to explore the profession.


*closeup of student holding bugs in a jar — Clark Bacwaden ’23 holds a jar with a dragonfly nymph and shrimp found in Paint Branch Creek.*



- **Carousel Slide: Bug Club 03072023 JC 3036 1920x1080**
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- **Carousel Slide: Bug Club 03072023 JC 3330 1920x1080**



**Sidebar note:**

Interested in tagging along on the next collection or just learning more about creepy-crawlies? [Contact Sophia Athanas](https://umd.campuslabs.com/engage/organization/bugclub/contact) to get on the Bug Club mailing list.





**Topics:** [Campus & Community](https://today.umd.edu/tags/campus-community)


**Tags:** [Biology](https://today.umd.edu/topic/biology), [Entomology](https://today.umd.edu/topic/entomology), [Student Experience](https://today.umd.edu/topic/student-experience)


**Units:** [College of Agriculture and Natural Resources](https://today.umd.edu/topic/college-agriculture-and-natural-resources), [College of Computer, Mathematical, and Natural Sciences](https://today.umd.edu/topic/college-computer-mathematical-and-natural-sciences)