"Fuzzy Wuzzy" was not a bear. "Fuzzy Wuzzy" was--and is--a pink pipe cleaner caterpillar. And sometimes it comes in yellow, green, orange, blue, white or red.
Pipe cleaners are used to clean smoking pipes, ridding them of residue and moisture. But as chenille stems, they find themselves in a wide variety of arts and crafts projects, such as treasured pipe cleaner caterpillars!
Did you know that when the scientists at the Bohart Museum of Entomology at UC Davis host an open house (the events are free and family friendly), they also engage families in arts-and-crafts activities?
They do.
At the last open house, themed "Moth Night," the attendees created pipe cleaner 'cats, not to be confused with the 'cats of pipevine butterflies, Battus philenor.
Elisabeth Bond, a UC Santa Barbara graduate, Class of 2025 (applied mathematics and geography with a specialization in Geographic Information Systems) and her friend, Cameron Cummins, a master's student at UC Santa Barbara (computer engineering with a specialization in machine learning) staffed the arts-and-crafts table and invited everyone create a pipe cleaner 'cat.
Elisabeth's father, Professor Jason Bond, directs the Bohart Museum and is the Evett and Marion Endowed Chair of Insect Systematics, UC Davis Department of Entomology and Nematology, and executive associate dean, UC Davis College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences.
How did the 'cats turn out?
Purr-fect.
The Bohart Museum, located in Room 1124 of the Academic Surge Building, 455 Crocker Lane, UC Davis campus, houses a global collection of eight million insect specimens. It also includes a live petting zoo (think Madagascar hissing cockroaches, stick insects, tarantulas and more) and an insect themed gift shop, stocked with such items as T-shirts, hoodies, books, posters, jewelry, and insect-collecting equipment.
