...and most wonderful have been, and are being evolved." - On the Origin of Species, Charles Darwin 1859
As I wander the fields I work in, my eyes drawn to the motion of the pollinators, I am always amazed at the life surrounding me, even in such a simple place as a watermelon field. Although some may not see the beauty or wonder in an insect, I have the lucky fortune as a biologist to see it. That a creature so small can find its way home miles away and communicate to its nest mates about the food source nearby and how to get there....that inspires wonder in me. The glistening metallic green color of a bee's body or the soft fuzzy yellow and black hair....that is beauty to me.
Below are a just a few examples of the bees and creatures I encounter as I wander the watermelon fields (first few on yellow flowers are bees on watermelon flowers):
Common eastern bumblebee/Bombus impatiens
American bumblebee/Bombus pensylvanicus
Southern Plains bumblebee/Bombus fraternus
Sweat bee/Halictus poeyi
Sweat bee/ Lasioglossum sp.
Leafcutter bee/Megachile sp.
Sweat bee/Augochorella sp.
Southern carpenter bee/Xylocopa micans
Gulf fritillary/Agraulis vanillae
Eastern tiger swallowtail/Papilio glaucus
Eastern bluebird/Sialia sialis
Palamedes swallowtail/Papilio palamedes
thread-waisted wasp/Sphex habenus
Zebra longwing/Heliconius charithonia
Great egret/Ardea alba
The beginning of this quote by Darwin is:
"It is interesting to contemplate a tangled bank, clothed with many plants of many kinds, with birds singing on the bushes, with various insects flitting about, and with worms crawling through the damp earth, and to reflect that these elaborately constructed forms, so different from each other, and dependent upon each other in so complex a manner, have all been produced by laws acting around us.... whilst this planet has gone circling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being evolved."
Not to compare myself to the genius of Charles Darwin (although we are both biologists and curiosity-seekers), but he put so eloquently what goes through a biologist's mind when they step out of the lab and away from the computer and become engulfed in the wonder of nature. I would say most people, at least as children, feel this way as well, as we are awe-inspired by the beauty of a waterfall or a great view from a mountain top and are curious about what lives in a stream or beneath the sand at a beach. "From so simple a beginning"....that all of life evolved from the microorganisms that first appeared on Earth billions of years ago....if that isn't awe-inspiring, I don't know what is.