Hello to all who are reading this! My name is Rachel Davis and I am a new intern here at the Frost Entomological Museum. I was born and raised in the Northwest suburbs of Chicago and a few weeks ago I graduated from the University of Minnesota with a Bachelor of Science in Ecology, Evolution, and Behavior. I am very happy now to be moving on to other exciting things! During college I was very fortunate to travel and pursue several scientific interests which have all lead me to where I am now. Although I was always the child who wanted to climb trees and catch squirrels, my professional interest in wildlife started when I studied abroad in Thailand to assist in tiger and avian conservation. From there I went on to travel to Australia and Belize for wildlife internships.

However, my love for entomology began just last summer in Northern Michigan where I studied the relationship between climate change and gregarine parasitism in the Caloptryx maculata  (Palisot, 1805) (Odonata: Calopterygidae). At the Frost, I am currently working on the digitization of the Beatty Collection. After digitizing, I will begin to georeference the localities of the collected specimens to create new species distribution maps for specific time periods. I love opening up a box of specimens and seeing that people were still catching damselflies during the Great Depression of the 30’s! I know that I will learn many valuable research skills while working in the Frost Museum and I greatly look forward to the next 10 weeks.