The Fernald Club conducts insect outreach events at UMass Amherst and elsewhere in the western Massachusetts community, including at schools, colleges, libraries, environmental centers, and more. We bring live insects and spiders from the UMass Live Insect Zoo, preserved specimens from the UMass entomology collection, and more!
Many of our events also involve representatives from the UMass Bee Campus USA Committee, our campus partner organization in insect conservation. Such events also involve native pollinator specimens, pollinator games, and lots of opportunities to learn more about bees and other native pollinators.
Contact us at fernaldclubumass@gmail.com if you want to host us for an insect outreach event at your western Massachusetts location!
The Fernald Club maintains an iNaturalist project of all insects and related arthropods observed on the UMass campus. So far we have documented nearly 1,200 species on the UMass campus, including some rare or unusual species!
You can help us document our campus insect populations by contributing to this project! Simply submit an insect photo taken on the UMass Amherst campus to iNaturalist via the app or website, and it will be automatically added to the project.
Bee Campus USA is an initiative organized by the Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation, to certify college campuses as bee-friendly and dedicated to promoting bee conservation. Thanks to the efforts of UMass's Bee Campus USA committee, UMass Amherst achieved Bee Campus certification in 2025!
The UMass Bee Campus Committee operates independently from the Fernald Club, but often collaborates with the club on pollinator outreach events, and shares the club's goals of promoting conservation and education about pollinators and other insects
Visit the UMass Bee Campus website to learn more, or see their iNaturalist project monitoring pollinators on the UMass Amherst campus! Any iNaturalist pollinator observations from campus will get automatically added to the UMasss Bee Campus project.