“We’re looking forward to the nationals,” said entomology professor and team adviser Richard Zack. And that means kicking it up a notch in preparations. While other students might spend the summer slapping insects, the WSU team will be studying them.
In the regional round of competition, team members Brian Bahder, Natalie Boyle, Bonnie Ohler and Amber Vinchesi first defeated Oregon State and then went on to win a close match against UC Davis at the Pacific Branch of the Entomological Society of America meeting in Boise. Both UC Davis and WSU will advance to the national competition at the 58th annual Entomological Society of America meeting Dec. 11-13 in San Diego.
“This is one of the stronger teams that we’ve had in the last 10 to 15 years,” Zack said. The four-member team, while relatively young, complements each other, he said.
“Every one of them represents a diverse sub-discipline of the field.”
Which is a good thing. The English language has about a million words, and all competitive spellers have to do is spell them. At the Linnaean Games, students answer questions drawn from a discipline that studies more than a million insect species. While spelling isn’t required, apiculture, biological control, ecology, economic entomology, medical and veterinary entomology, physiology, biochemistry, taxonomy and toxicology are.
And then there are the bonus questions, which focus on entomological history and people, including questions like, “Who is the keynote speaker of this year’s ESA meeting?”
“I can’t tell you how happy or how frustrated you can be by the questions,” Zack said. A simple question about legs on an insect might be followed by a question that stumps the contestants and audience alike, at least half of whom have Ph.D.s in entomology.
Zack, who has been advising Bug Bowl teams for more than 20 years, said it’s impossible to figure out questions in advance.
“I think you just do as much work as you can,” he said, “and be as well rounded as possible.”
Amber Vinchesi, a first-year master’s student, said her areas to focus on were the history of entomology and famous entomologists. Intelligence from previous teams suggested that they might be asked about the conference schedule, so Vinchesi memorized it, which was a huge help in the bonus round.
“We didn’t take ourselves too seriously,” she said, but they did hold a few practice sessions and discussed strategy. For instance, do you buzz in immediately and interrupt the question, or wait?
“We decided not to interrupt,” she said, because sometimes the questions started in one direction, but ended up in another. And other times the questions were very straightforward, but difficult nonetheless.
Bahder, a first year doctoral student, said the most rewarding answer he came up with was in response to a question asking for the family name of the insect that has cerci, or pincers, connected to its abdomen. It’s the Japygidae.
Bahder credits that piece of knowledge to a taxonomy class he took at the University of Delaware five or six years ago taught by entomology professor Charles Bartlett.
“I still remember 95 percent of what he taught,” Bahder said.
“That was one of those most people wouldn’t know,” Zack agreed. “He came up with a real great answer.”
To prepare for nationals, Zack said, students will divide up the categories and study over the summer. When school starts up in the fall, they’ll meet once a week to go over practice questions. Zack plans to arrange competitions between the Bug Bowl team and other graduate students, or between the Bug Bowl team and faculty members, to help simulate the tension and excitement of the national competition.
“Now comes the hard part,” he said.
Also at the Pacific Branch meeting, which includes 11 western states, WSU students Jeremy Buchman and Ann Vander Vliet were named first and second place winners in the Master’s Student Oral Presentation category in the regional competition, while the WSU Entomology Club was named the best for student activities.
The Pacific Branch of ESA encompasses Alaska, Arizona, California, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Oregon, Utah, Washington and Wyoming; several U.S. territories, including American Samoa, Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands; and parts of Canada and Mexico.
The final round of the Pacific Branch ESA Linnaean Games can be viewed at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BpFFAVaqDIU.