There's a Bed Bug in My Christmas Stocking!

'Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house 
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.
The stockings were hung by the chimney with care,
In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there.--Clement Clarke Moore (1779-1863), 'The Night Before Christmas' 

What will be in your Christmas stocking?

Stocking stuffers are usually tiny, fun, or meaningful gifts or something that makes you feel special. For a child, the "stuffings" are often a toy,  book, stickers, crayons, pencils, coins, fruit and candy. Adults may receive that coveted piece of jewelry, lottery tickets, a book or cash. Or gag gifts guaranteeing a smile or a laugh. 

How about a bed bug, fruit fly, tick or louse in your Christmas stocking? 

Santa's helpers who visit the Bohart Museum of Entomology gift shop will have a field day selecting plush toy animals for bug enthusiasts.

The Bohart gift shop is stocked with scores of colorful plush toy animals that can warm a Christmas stocking or dance on a key chain. Think pink bed bugs, yellow bookworms, orange fruit flies, a black ant, and even one labeled "poo" (in insect world, it's "frass").

UC Davis distinguished professor Lynn Kimsey, director of the Bohart Museum, especially likes the yellow bookworm, (Anobium punctatum).

Ticks (Ixodes scapularis), bed bugs (Cimex lectularius), louse (Pediculus capitis), black ants (Lasius niger), fruit flies (Drosophila melanogaster) are popular. The crab louse (Pthirus pubis)? Maybe not so much.

These critters are crafted by Giant Microbes, headquartered in Stamford, Conn.

The Bohart gift shop is also shelved with insect-themed books, posters, note cards, jewelry, T-shirts and hoodies, collecting equipment, edible insect snacks, and pens crafted by entomologist Jeff Smith, curator of the Lepidoptera collection.

Proceeds benefit the Bohart mission "of documenting and supporting research in biodiversity, educating and inspiring others about insects, and providing state-of-the-art information to the community," Kimsey says.

Home of a global collection of nearly eight million insect specimens, the Bohart Museum houses the seventh largest insect collection in North America, and the California Insect Survey, a storehouse of the insect biodiversity of the state's deserts, mountains, coast, and the Great Central Valley. It maintains one of the world's largest collections of tardigrades. It also houses a live "petting zoo" that includes Madagascar hissing cockroaches, stick insects and tarantulas.

The Bohart is located in Room 1124 of the Academic Surge Building, 455 Crocker Lane, UC Davis campus. It is open to the public Monday through Thursday, from 8 a.m. to noon and from 1 to 5 p.m. (holiday hours remain the same this week).