Iowa Insects

Insects of Iowa

I did this for Urban Sketchers Weekly Theme: Insects.  I've lived in the same big, old house for 25 years. The big means that there are endless places to stash things. Like the over 10-year-old, junior high school biology project done by my now 24-year-old daughter, found in the basement. The insects, mounted and labeled in a balsa wood/Plexiglas shadow box, were all collected in Cedar Falls, Black Hawk County, Iowa, in autumn, Many of the bugs had disintegrated to dust or fragments. But the remaining were great fun to inspect and draw. The insects, by the way, are not to scale. The tiny green bee on the right was ~5/16". The Grapeleaf, under the smaller magnifier, ~1/2"

I reserve this pocket-size, watercolor Moleskine for nature studies. It is my only sketchbook that I make any attempt at homogeneity. Here and here are earlier drawings in this sketchbook.