Diversity of insects in the central plains

Insect diversity has been a hot topic of discussion as some recent studies suggest that insect populations and diversity are shrinking worldwide. The purpose of this research was to look at populations of insects over time within the Central US and obtain estimates of diversity.  Since many insects are most abundant during the late summer and early fall, September to the end of October was the main time focus for collecting samples in order to identify population diversity of insects. To collect the data, an aerial net was used to sweep in three separate locations near Stillwater, OK. One location was mixed grasses next to a major highway, a second location was a plot of land containing mixed grasses in a rural area, and the last one was the Botanic Garden at Oklahoma State University. Thirty sweep samples were collected weekly and frozen until the insects could be identified. The results showed Site three had the highest diversity index according to site comparison and then September 18, 2019, had the highest diversity according to date comparison. This was made possible using a comparison of Shannon’s diversity index.