“Part stand-up, part scientist, part pirate (no, really), Bridget Nicholls is not your average naturalist. She is, however, one of that enviable breed, who pulls together the disparate strands of their passions to find their true purpose in life. For Bridget, a writer, comedian, entomology enthusiast, and descendant of the ‘pirate’ Captain Kidd, that purpose is Pestival, a biannual bug festival, which she founded as a passion project back in 2006. “Insects are our canaries,” says Bridget, who spent much of her childhood on her hands and knees studying the way bugs moved, crawled and flew. “They may be fragile, but they are also abundant, and if they are dying out, when there’s up to 10 quintillian of them, then you’ve got to ask yourself, what’s happening on our planet?…
