Victoria Bug Zoo is crawling with interest

VICTORIA, B.C. -- When a Madagascar hissing cockroach gets angry, it's not a pretty sight. It rears up and makes a nasty, high-pitched squeal that only another roach could appreciate.

Skunklike when threatened, a giant Brazilian roach lets fly with a powerful odor strong enough to be smelled by humans if you get close enough.

And who would have guessed that some scorpions glow in the dark and that large, furry red-legged tarantulas make good pets?

Carol Maier likes bugs. So much so, in fact, that she earned a college degree in entomology from Ontario's University of Guelph, one of the oldest agricultural schools in Canada.

But the Victoria entrepreneur also likes business. So in 1996 she decided to try to match the two and explore ways to make your not-so-run-of-the-mill bugs interesting and accessible to humans.

She opened her first Victoria Bug Zoo on Wharf Street, close to the Inner Harbour waterfront. As her inventory grew and interest in her new business increased, she moved uptown to her current larger location on Courtney Street behind the Empress Hotel and next to the Magnolia Hotel.

Maier patented the Bug Zoo name in Canada. The concept has drawn attention. Bugs are an unusual business on the streets of downtown Victoria. After all, tourism is what makes Victoria tick -- High Tea at the Empress Hotel, the Inner Harbour, an eclectic mix of restaurants, pubs and nightlife are the attractions. A stop to look at bugs usually isn't in the mix when planning a Victoria visit.

I'd recommend you add the Victoria Bug Zoo to your list just for the fun of it. It's a true hands-on experience that everyone in the family can enjoy -- even the bug-squeamish ones.

After only six months as a Victoria Bug Zoo tour guide, Melissa Pietrasik seems to know every physical and social trait of each bug she handles. And, like Maier, her boss, she's pursuing a degree in entomology. She talks bugs non-stop for a full eight-hour shift without getting hoarse. Like all good students, Pietrasik told me the best questions that visitors ask usually are the ones she can't answer -- questions that seem to be few and far between. She really knows her bugs!

The bug-viewing arrangement at the zoo is a free-flow exercise that continues throughout the day, non-stop. There aren't scheduled showtimes. Instead, visitors can pick up the tour guide's presentation at any point and stay as long as they want, so it's easy to schedule a visit.

The exotic bugs live in temperature-controlled glass cases. The hands-on portion of the show was the most fun -- especially when Pietrasik dragged out the huge, green Malaysian jungle nymph, which was about the size of her hand, then later the 400-leg giant millipede. The glass case displays are well arranged for easy viewing, and they're child safe.

Pietrasik's people skills are about as well tuned as her bug skills. Sometimes a visitor's behavior can be more obnoxious than the fickle creatures she handles. Bugs -- especially the more evil-looking ones with bad reputations, such as tarantulas or scorpions -- sometimes elicit provocative comments. She also has developed a polite but forceful way to inform visitors how sensitive the bugs are to human proximity and noise issues.

JEFF LARSEN / P-I

Victoria Bug Zoo tour guide Melissa Pietrasik explains the wonderful world of bugs to visitors at the Victoria Bug Zoo.

One discerning young boy pointed at a giant cockroach in its glass enclosure and, in a very serious tone, asked Pietrasik if it was "too scary" for his mom. She just chuckled. But Pietrasik encourages those kinds of questions and encourages the children to hold the bugs to help them get over their fears and learn to appreciate the different characteristics of each one. No shrieking allowed.

Speaking of fears, I noticed more children than adults were willing to hold the harmless red-legged tarantula when Pietrasik offered. Personally, I've always disliked spiders. As a kid I always feared I would eventually die after being bitten by a black widow spider in my sleep. But after a little encouragement from other visitors, I decided it was about time I got over my spider phobia. Pietrasik gently set the furry creature (name Emma, by the way) in the palm of my hand after I assured her I wouldn't freak out. The spider was so soft it felt like an eight-legged ball of cotton. I even petted the lovely creature. I'll never squash another spider.

The amazing leaf-cutter ant colony display, conceived by Maier, consists of about 40 feet of clear plastic tubing running along the walls of the bug viewing area at about eye level. Thousands of the shiny red ants haul their cargoes of leaves from one end of the display to the other, so they can build nests and propagate. The colony revolves around the queen ant, which is almost impossible to spot among the thousands of others scurrying from one section of the display to another.

The bugs at the Victoria Bug Zoo aren't the kind you find scurrying around your garden or crawling up your basement wall. Most have been imported from exotic climates. This month, despite the amount of importation paperwork and permits required, Maier and her husband are headed to Panama to find more exotic bugs to join the likes of her Peruvian blue centipede and white-eyed assassin bugs.

JEFF LARSEN / P-I

A dragon-headed cricket wolfs down a cucumber slice at the Victoria Bug Zoo.

The zoo's gift shop features bug-related T-shirts, an insect collecting kit and edible, bug-infused lollipops.

For Maier, bugs aren't scary or creepy, just "misunderstood." She hopes her zoo will help visitors get over a common perception that the only good bug is a dead bug.

Upon my return from Victoria I went to the Pacific Science Center's Boeing Imax Theater to see the 3-D British film "Bugs!," which runs through Nov. 9. The film features a number of the same bugs on display at the Victoria Bug Zoo, including the giant dead-leaf mantis and the vicious looking dragon-headed cricket.

Ironically, the film was underwritten by Terminix, a company that specializes in killing bugs. I overheard some jokes and chortling about it from the audience when the sponsorship was flashed on the screen. In fact, Terminix's slogan is "No Bugs. No Hassles."

Despite the obvious contradiction, the film, which is set in a tropical rain forest in Southeast Asia, features spectacular close-ups of bugs eating other bugs and an amazing close-up look at a caterpillar-to-butterfly transformation.

Watching in real time a praying mantis creep up on an unsuspecting fly feeding on a flower and grab it with its long, front-barbed legs then bite off its head graphically illustrates the daily life-and-death struggles not usually visible to the human eye.

Some of the insects have been magnified to 250,000 times their normal size and the 3-D effect (with the handout goggles) gives viewers the sensation they can reach out and touch the bugs. A group of children in the row in front of me pawed at the air during the butterfly portion of the film.

JEFF LARSEN / P-I

The Victoria Bug Zoo is a real hands-on experience. Here is a prickly faced Malaysian jungle nymph.

Narrated by Oscar winner Dame Judi Dench, whose voice is as intoxicating as the scenery of the Borneo jungle where it was filmed, "Bugs!" has won a number of documentary awards for its sensitive portrayal of the life cycle of insects. Naming the caterpillar and mantis during their birth scenes adds a certain theatrical flare and personalizes the whole experience for the audience -- children especially.

Bugs usually are so small and inconsequential to our daily lives, it was nice to take a "short trip" into their world at the Victoria Bug Zoo and the Imax Theater to get a better understanding of just how significant the creatures are to our existence. I had no idea they could be so entertaining as well.

If you go

• Victoria Bug Zoo -- 631 Courtney St.; 250-384-2847; www.bugzoo.bc.ca Hours: Monday-Friday, 9:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m.; Sunday, 11 a.m.-5:30 p.m.

• Boeing Imax Theater -- Pacific Science Center, Seattle Center; 206-443-4629; www.pacsci.org/imax/ Showtimes: No shows Monday; Tuesday-Wednesday, 10:30 a.m. and 1 p.m.; Thursday-Sunday, 10:30 a.m., 1 p.m., 7:15 p.m.

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