Photo: Scarab BeetleInsect Museum is the Place to Bee, Fly, Tick and Drone

Instructor Patrick Foley’s workspace in Sequoia Hall 120 is overrun with insects, but there’s no need to call the exterminator.

Foley runs the University’s Insect Museum, a collection of flying, crawling, and swimming bugs gathered locally and from around the world. Most are mounted on pins; aquatic species are preserved in alcohol.

How many insects are there in the many drawers and cabinets of the museum? “No one ever has an inventory in an insect museum, there are just too many things,” Foley says.

A rough estimate of individual specimens puts the number at about 100,000. That sounds like a lot, but larger museums might have 10 times that number. “We’re not competing with them,” Foley says. “We’re basically trying to serve the needs of the students.”

The museum is available to the public for research by appointment. It encompasses a wide range of species, from the smallest sweat bee, up to a 3-inch long scarab beetle and sphinx moths.

One of Foley’s primary interests is bees, and he says that there are 1,500 species of bees in California. “There is no other place in the world that has that many bees.”

One breed, the male carpenter bee, even sports Sac State’s colors. The insect has a gold body and green eyes.

The fundamental questions about life, Foley says, involve determining why something exists and where it comes from. Without insects, he says, most flowering plants would not exist.

Even some of the most annoying insects serve a purpose. Biting midges are probably the most irritating insect after mosquitoes, Foley says. But they pollinate the plant that gives us chocolate.

“You lose them, you lose chocolate,” Foley says. “The world is maintained by insects.”

To visit the Insect Museum, e-mail patfoley@csus.edu.

— Craig Koscho