Everyone loves crayfish, or crawfish as most people I know call them. The delicious little swamp bug tantalizes the taste buds of millions of Americans every year. What most connoisseurs don’t know, however, is that the creatures we’re putting in our mouths are closely related to the pests we squash at fist sight. Recent genetic […]
It’s October and in honor of our 31 Days of Death I’m exploring the deadly reputation of everyone’s favorite yellow berry. For at least a century now, it has been a common superstition among seafarers that to bring a banana on board a ship is bad luck. Nobody know’s where this myth came from, however […]
Lecture – Beauty and Morphology of Insects by Erin Mills Characteristics and adaptations of these unique and misunderstood creatures will be explored by Erin Mills, Director of the Cockrell Butterfly Center. Living exotic beetles, giant katydids, walking sticks, hissing cockroaches, beautiful butterflies and other exciting arthropods will compliment this special presentation and tour of the […]
By Jeff Cummins, Horticulturalist at the Cockrell Butterfly Center A sea of green surrounds people living in even the most urban environments, and yet almost nobody can see truly the plants. We see the trees, manicured hedges, or notice when our neighbor has taken a little too long to mow the lawn, but that’s […]
Attention Readers! Please play this song as you read this blog. You will not regret it. You hear that? It is the Gabriel’s horn of the banana world. The chiming of the yellow berry’s (yes, it’s actually a berry, not a fruit) doomsday clock. Titled “Yes! We Have No Bananas” the song puts to […]
If you live in Texas, then chances are you might have had a brush or two with poison ivy. I know I have! It’s a sneaky unassuming vine that can cause weeks of itchy blister-filled anguish. Poison ivy, Toxicodendron radicans, belongs in the family Anacardiaceae, more commonly known as the sumac and cashew family. Can […]
With National Pollinator Week behind us, it may be easy to focus on other issues and forget that pollinators need our help to bounce back. While many people only envision little honeybees when they think about pollinators, they couldn’t be a more diverse group of animals, including mammals, birds, insects, and even reptiles! Here […]
With the start of summer, people around the state are looking for fun activities to fill the long summer months. Citizen Science is a great way to learn, have fun, and contribute to important research all at once. For people who enjoy looking at our beautiful native butterflies, the newly formed Texas Butterfly Monitoring Network […]
In 2013 a unique aberration made its appearance at the Cockrell Butterfly Center. A Great Southern White (Ascia monuste) butterfly emerged from its chrysalis with a perfect bilateral split down the center of its body. One side of the butterfly was male, the other was female. Since the Great Southern White is a sexually dimorphic […]
By Jeff Cummins, Horticulturist at the Cockrell Butterfly Center in the Houston Museum of Natural Science The Cockrell Butterfly Center was graced (?) a couple of weeks ago by a very special event. One of our corpse flowers, Lou, bloomed for the very first time! Lou is an Amorphophallus peaeoniifolius, a smaller species […]
