A Natural History of Insects in 100 Limericks

Insects are often overlooked because they are small or ignored because they are deemed trivial, and many are dismissed as nuisance pests. But their numbers and diversity are mind-numbing, and under even a modest hand lens they are beautiful or bizarre.

Insects dominate the centre ground of all terrestrial and most aquatic ecosystems. They inform us of the conservation value of ancient woodland and chalk downland. They help monitor the purity or pollution levels of ponds, streams and rivers. And they can demonstrate the effects of climate change, acting as warning lights to alert us to the damage that humans are doing to the world. Recent insectageddon headlines are starting to make people sit up and take more notice.

What better way to promote an interest in these fascinating creatures than by poetizing them? This cornucopia of discordant nonsense, with some quite frankly dubious rhyming clashes, is offered up so that entomological outreach will at least benefit from their shock value.

Richard Jones is an entomologist and writer – he has a way with worms. And before some bright pedant chips in, there are plenty of quite legitimate insect worms: glow-worm, wood-worm, meal-worm, horn-worm, wire-worm, silk-worm, inch-worm.

Calvin Ure-Jones has been on face-to-face and hand-to-bug terms with natural history all his young life, so when it came to drawing picture of insects he was raring to go.