Maggot Racing At The Spring Fling

One of my favourite science communication events was Spring Fling in Norfolk. It is an Easter event that contains agricultural activities for all the family, but also science activities.

That is where I found myself 3 years in a row between 2016-2019, situated in the John Innes Centre booth. In front of me… a box full of maggots. Now these were not just any ordinary maggots they were racing maggots.

You see, maggots normally head away from the light. In a process called phototaxis, in this case negative phototaxis as they moved away. Photo means light and taxis means move.

So, when you put the maggots on long strips of tubing (so they go in the right direction) and a light on the start position, they will naturally flee in one direction and that is towards the ‘finish’ line.

The maggot racing set-up.

On those days, I set up a little arena and decorated it in fun art and announced to the world that the maggot racing was open for business. See the above picture for the set up. Of course, there were many joyous little faces that stared up at me. Many squealed in horror as I produced this box of maggots. These maggots were fresh from the tackle shop and covered in corn starch, which gave them a Cheeto-like dusting.  

There were some brave souls that happily reached in and grabbed their winning maggot from the hundreds that lay in front of them. For the ones that weren’t as brave, I ended up doing it. The maggots were then placed in front of the lights and the cheer went up. Many different little voices screamed their favourite maggot on.

Now this game that I created, was mainly inspired by one of my GCSE experiments. When we had to set up a study that looked at the maggots and how they moved away from the light. That lesson really stuck with me and allowed me to drag this box full of goodies to the Spring Fling.