Entomologist of the Month: Oliver

Interviewed in March 2021 by Cathie Murray, Maine Entomological Society (MES) member. Please email Cathie (cathie.murray@gmail.com) with any questions.

Note: This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

On a warm March afternoon I had a chance to visit with my favorite amateur entomologist, Oliver Paisley. Oliver is also a self-published author, artist, Luna moth rearer, and 7 years old. He and his mother were kind enough to let me interview him for the Maine Entomological Society.

Oliver with his first reared luna moth, Actias luna.

MES: Oliver, what was the first insect that captured your imagination?

It was a Seven Spotted Ladybug. I was 4 years old when I found it in the garden and I noticed how different it was than ants. It really showed up against the dirt. It crawled and then flew and I couldn’t catch it.  I didn’t count the spots then but later I found a dead one and could count the seven spots.

Drawing of a seven spotted ladybug, Coccinella septempunctata by Oliver, Age 5

MES: When did you start drawing insects?

I was 4 years old when I drew my first bug.  My friends were squishing ants and I tried to stop them. When I found bugs, I wanted to draw them.  I thought it would be fun to color my drawings and that other people might like coloring insects more than killing them.  We made copies of my first book when I was 5.  It is a coloring book of insects. There is a Lantern Fly on the front and the Seven Spotted Ladybug is on the back cover.  I was given an old book with paintings of insects in it. [MES Note: The book is “Insects” by Bernard Durin.] Sometimes I draw those insects, or make models of them, like this one of the Fuller Beetle.

Oliver’s drawing (lower right) and model (left) of the Fuller Beetle from “Insects” by Bernard Durin

(note - this beetle’s common name appears to have been lost to time - this beetle is likely in the family Scarabaeidae. A Google search for “Fuller Beetle” now brings you to a completely different species!)

MES: Do you have a collection of insects? 

Yes, I do and I’ll show it to you. I don’t kill any of the insects for my collection. I put them in after I find them already dead. One of these is the Luna moth that laid the eggs. 

Oliver with his insect collection.

MES: Oliver, please tell me that story again, about the Luna moth you found when you were 5 years old.

It was summer. We were staying over by the ocean with my friend’s family. My good friend Nolan found the Luna moth. I put it in a bucket with leaves the day we were packing up to go home. We kept her on the passenger seat. She laid eggs on the leaves while she was in the bucket.  Some of the eggs didn’t hatch but about 50 did. About 10 of them died but the rest lived.

We looked up what Luna moth caterpillars like to eat and found out they like birch leaves, so we put birch leaves in with them. I also put in black walnut leaves from my tree. [Oliver’s mom noted they have a special black walnut tree in their yard that was planted when Oliver was born. His grandfather loved that particular kind of tree and had planted hundreds of them himself.]  It turned out these Luna moth caterpillars liked black walnut leaves better than birch leaves, so that is what I fed them.

They got pretty big, about as big as my mom’s thumb. Their bright green color turned brown before they turned into pupae by wrapping up in leaves. 

MES: When I met you two years ago, you had the pupae and you and your grandmother were trying to decide what to do with them. What happened?

We gave some to the [Maine Coastal] Botanical Gardens, some to a preschool and we kept 27. We put them in a big screened cage outside on our porch.  Then last summer I found a Luna moth in the screened cage. Little by little the new moths shook themselves out of the leaves and began to pump fluid into their moth wings.  I knew moths like to fly at night, so we released the moths at night.  It took a bunch of days for them all to turn into moths.

One morning we found many blue jays in our yard, eating the Luna moths. I know they don’t live long, they don’t even eat, but I hope they had a chance to lay eggs before the blue jays ate them.

Oliver with his luna moths.

MES: What would you like to do next that relates to insects?

I want to raise a spider. I know they aren’t insects because they have 8 legs instead of 6 and only 2 body parts. But I’d still like to raise one.

MES: Have you created any more books besides the coloring book of insects?

Yes, I have drawn more coloring books. They are All Kindz of Birds; Butterflies; Winter Animals; Bugs; Hallowell Animals and I am working on a book about army airplanes and boats. 

MES: Oliver do you have a message to our readers?

Yes I do. Do Not Kill Insects! Try to raise any kind of insect yourselves because it is a fun process to watch!