How Do Insects End Up in Glacial Ice?
The Wind River Mountain Range of Wyoming is aptly named, because the wind plays an important role in all that occurs. The wind continually blows debris, like pollen and dust, onto the glaciers. The wind also blows a variety of insects, including grasshoppers, dragonflies, and moths onto the glacial surface. In time, snow buries the insects. Later, when the snow changes to ice, the insects become entombed in the glacier. Dozens of insects were found in the ice cores that were collected from the glacier. Most of the insects were wholly preserved when they were melted out of the shallower sections of the ice. An entomologist identified a grasshopper leg that was found 152 m below the surface of the glacier as from a species that is now extinct.
