Maria Hernandez Entomology Lab Reflection

        During the past few weeks as a class we have worked on the decomposition of a pig shoulder. This was an experiment we did to see how a body decomposes and how Forensic Entomology helps police and other crimes scene investigators locate a criminal if their is no type of evidence.

        During the course of the experiment I observed many changes in decomposition. At first the shoulder was obviously fresh with no odor or anything that seem un-normal, then as soon as it was unpacked and placed down on the designated area we had for it, flies started to appear.  My class and I let it sit there until we had class again and when we came back there were very little eggs, few larvae, and blow flies as well. The shoulder was redder, and a little dry. As the shoulder stayed there longer it began to decompose, it was now smelling, dried out, and  it had many maggots all over. Few more days passed by and it just began to turn black and it smelled worse, than all there was left was a bone.

        My development data is kind of off compare to the published data, because I had some temperatures that were off and some minor errors that can probably be fixed. Also my data is not consist with the publish one at any point.

        Forensic Entomology is a very important tool to the crime solving because it helped me and my classmates calculate the time we place the pig shoulder outside. This was based on all the samples of maggots and other bugs that we collected from the shoulder. Sometimes entomology can be hard if there is nothing but bugs and/or maggots because there is a lot to calculate and search. There is a lot to discover as an entomologist.