Bug Art

I went for a bush walk the other day and came across an absolute delight! An entire Scribbly Gum forrest! I adore Scribbly Gums, I think probably since reading May Gibbs' 'Snugglepot and Cuddlepie'. According to the story they are bush creatures' messages left on the trees.

Standing in the middle of a whole forrest of them, I imagine a mass of little conversations around me. In such a quiet place it seemed very noisy!

After a little trip into childhood memory I went looking for May Gibbs on the net - and discovered you can visit her house Nutcote. I'd post some pictures but am too worried about copyright.. so sad! Here's a link tho.

But back to the bugs! Apparently the squiggles are caused by a particular type of moth larvae that inhabit the scribbly gums Eucalyptus rossii and E. racemosa. The CSIRO has a great page on interpreting the scribbles. There has been a lot of recent research as to which bug it is, but the scribbles become thicker as the grub grows.

This moth photo is from the CSIRO site here.

Hmm... imagine if all our newspapers were actually written by a bunch of never-seen grubs that evolve and then fly off leaving us with their scribbles to read. A new take on the legion of monkeys theory.

The marks they make are very beautiful in their quasi-random way and do inspire me - each one is different - I spent hours in that forest!

--Mel