Customer Reviews

The Handy Bug Answer Book (Handy Answer Books)

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I really enjoyed this book. It has a very wide scope, and is broken down into these sections: 1)bug basics 2)bugs that are not insects 3)fossilized insects 4)insect bodies; the outside 5)insect bodies; the inside 6)insect diversity 6)growth and metamorphosis 7)finding a mate & mating 8)caring for offspring 9)insect behavior 10)social insects 11)eaters of insects 12)escaping from predators 13)beneficial insects 14)insects that people eat 15)pest insects 16)contolling pests 17)the downside of insecticides 18)more interesting insect info I discovered many answers to questions I had wondered about for years: "do insects feel pain?" "how is the silkworm cocoon coverted to silk fiber?" "how do insects survive the winter?" "is there any concrete evidence that large eyespots frighten birds?" "do people eat insect products other than honey?" "are centipedes venomous?"...and many more. The answers range in length from a few sentences to half a page, just enough to satisfy your curiosity. There are also some good, close-up color photographs.

After listening to Dr. Waldbauer's interview on Public Radio I was captured by his passion for the interesting world of bug trivia, and bought the book. A compendium of bug facts and fables, presented in a format that allows you to read the book from cover to cover as well as use it as a quick reference guide. Both educational and entertaining, it answers questions that range from "how does a spider spin a web?" to "how do mosquitoes locate their victims?". Also includes a very useful index and exhaustive references.

This book has some of everything and I mean in terms of all sorts of insects and all sorts of aspects of their lives. It talks to the different orders of insects, fosilized insects, their bodies, inside and out, diversity, mating, metomorphosis, caring for offspring, escaping from predators, etc etc. The text is set up such that a question is posed (e.g. How fast can insects run?) and then there is an anwer (e.g. One of the fastest running insects is the American cockroach.......which has been clocked at running at a rate of about 32 inches per second or 1.8 miles per hour......) Lots of really fun infomation and it just seems to cover everything - some parts are more technical that others. Great pictures/photographs as well.

Of course, this book doesn't just deal with bugs, but really discusses insects, arachnids and some of the other invertebrate life primarily on land. This book is a reminder of just how interesting life is out there in the garden and in our yards as this massive food web of tiny mites to the largest beetles look for food and sex and try to avoid being eaten themselves. You learn to appreciate the resilience of these marvelous multicellular creatures and marvel at their success in filling so many niches on this life-teeming planet.

This is a great book for someone just getting into entomology as well as those who would just like a know a little bit. The reading is easy to understand for the novice and succeeds in the books objective, of introducing people to the interesting world of creeping and crawling invertebrates.