Jeff Dlott gets back to his entomology roots

Dr. Jeff Dlott is the father of one of the students (Chloe Dlott) where I am teaching this year. We connected early in the year when he realized we are both Switzer Fellows and have been in communication. Jeff did his Ph.D. in entomology, but now runs a sustainable agriculture company. I asked Jeff if he was willing to come and run two lab sessions with junior biology students. He spoke to them about classifications of insects, biological traits (like mimicry and parasitism), and careers in entomology. We then went out onto the lawns and woods of the campus and used his collection equipment to collect insects. He helped students identify them in the field and then we looked at them in the laboratory under microscopes. Insects caught included beetle larvae - which students found especially interesting after learning from Jeff that there are more beetle species than all other species combined!