Julie A. Gorges

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People ask where I come up with ideas for children’s magazines. Since I’m fascinated with science, some of the articles like “Caterpillar Cows,” “In the Blink of An Eye,” “Why Do You Hiccup,” and “Master Builders” (about termites) deal with subjects I found interesting. Others are based on my own experience, like “How to Make A Newspaper,” an idea that came from the three years I spent as editor of a children’s newspaper.

 

If you’re looking to break into the children’s magazine market, one of the best ways is to look for articles in your local newspaper about interesting kids for interview/profile pieces. An article in our local paper described a 10-year-old who proposed a law that required children to be seated in non-smoking areas of restaurants. This inspired an article published in Child Life (October/November 1995 issue).

 

Here’s part of an article I wrote when my boys were catching bugs and I wondered what to feed the poor things. Wild Outdoor World published the article in its July/August 1998 issue and SIRS Discover Online later republished the article for a CD.

Insect Pets

Insects make interesting pets. True, you can’t hug a cricket or pat a praying mantis. But a cricket will sing for you and a mantis might take food from your fingers. A whirligig may not fetch a ball, but it’s fun to watch it whirl around and around.

 

When you find an insect, be careful! Hurting an insect is easy because it is so small and fragile. To collect insects, you’ll need a jar with holes punched in the lid. Keep your insect in this jar until you can put it in its new home.

 

Most insects eat live food. You can try catching other small insects by hand, with a net, or in a trap. Or you can buy mealworms at the pet store to use as food. If you have trouble getting enough live food or simply get tired of your insect pet, put it back in the field or park where you found it. Let it live the rest of its short life.

 

Praying Mantis

 To keep a praying mantis, you need a six- or eight-gallon fish tank with a screen lid, two branches, each about 18 inches long, and one or two small plants in pots.

 

Put the plants and branches in your fish tank to create a habitat. When you find a praying mantis, pick it up gently but firmly just behind its two front legs. Do not squeeze too tightly or you will injure it.

 

Don’t try to keep two adults in the same tank. Not only will a mantis eat another mantis that comes too close, but the female almost always devours the male after mating.

 

Make sure the tank is not in the sun. Sprinkle water on the plant leaves every day. Your mantis will drink when it is thirsty. A praying mantis eats only live food. You must feed your mantis several insects a day. Any insect will do.

 

A female makes a friendlier pet. (You can tell males from females because males are more slender and smaller than females.)

 

A mantis is about the only insect that can actually learn to recognize you! Move slowly around. The mantis’ head will move too. It is following you with its big eyes. When a mantis is finished eating, it cleans itself with its front legs like a cat. Then it folds its front legs and patiently waits for the next meal.

 

After the mantis gets used to you, try giving it water from an eye dropper. It might hold the eye dropper like a bottle between its front legs as it drinks. If your mantis gets very tame, let it loose in your room (with your parents’ permission). It will sit on houseplants or rest on a curtain.

 

A mantis lives five to six months in the wild. Indoors, it may live two or three months longer.

 

Crickets

 You need: a jar and lid with holes, soil or grass to cover the bottom, a stone for the cricket to hide under and paper cups to hold food.

 

A male cricket gives away its hiding place when it sings.  When you find one, cup it in both hands. Put it in the jar among the grasses or soil you’ve fixed for it. Put the jar in a warm place but not in the sun.

 

Crickets eat many different foods, including lettuce, raisins, apples, cereal, bread and cake crumbs. Cut down the sides of a paper cup to make it smaller. Put all the cricket’s food in the cup. A cup makes it easier for you to remove any food your cricket doesn’t eat. Don’t let food spoil in the cup. Water your cricket by wetting your fingers and shaking them into the jar every day.

 

Use a magnifying glass and you will see how a male cricket sings. A cricket chirps faster in warm weather and slower in cold weather. Count how many chirps the cricket makes in 15 seconds. Add 39 and you will have the temperature!

 

Crickets live about one year.

 

Whirligigs

 You need: a six- or eight-gallon fish tank with a screen lid, enough pond or stream water to fill the tank, two inches of sand for the bottom, two or three water plants, a stick or large plant leaf on which your whirligigs can rest, and a large sieve (SIV), a kind of strainer.

 

Whirligigs are shiny, black beetles that look like fat watermelon seeds. Find them in ponds and small streams. (To be safe, have an adult with you. And be sure to ask permission if you go on someone else’s property.)

 

There’s a trick to catching whirligigs. If you sweep through the water with your sieve, the insects move away quickly. Instead, slowly lower the sieve under the water near the beetles. Wait a minute or two. Then suddenly lift it out of the water.

 

Whirligigs like company, so catch four or five. Put them in a small jar filled with the water in which they were swimming. Fill two pails with water from the pond or stream, enough to fill your tank. Add a few water plants, too. When you get home with the pails, put sand or pebbles in your tank. Then add the plants. Slowly pour water from the pails into the tank. Put your whirligigs in the fish tank. They will be very active for awhile.

 

Drop live or dead flies into the tank. If you can’t find enough live or dead insects, feed the whirligigs a small amount of turtle food from a pet store.

 

Study a whirligig with a magnifying glass. Notice the two antennae that look like little horns. They are used to locate nearby objects. That is why whirligigs can swim so fast and not bump into one another.

 

Whirligigs live about one year.

 

Parts Make the Whole

 After you’ve observed insects through a magnifying glass, you’re bound to be amazed. Now you know that even the smallest parts of nature are complex. And all the parts work together to form the web of life.