He’s Buggy Over Insects

Andy Miller’s world is full of bugs. . . .

But he doesn’t mind. That’s his business--part of it, anyway--supplying bugs, insects, arachnids and assorted creepy-crawlies to television and motion picture crews.

He’s a free-lance special effects expert, and the nasties that enlivened the cave scene in “Raiders of the Lost Ark” came from his private insectarium.

“It’s a business,” he said. “But it’s a hobby, too. Or an obsession. I’ve been crazy about bugs since I was 10 years old.”

Miller, 35, began working at film studios as a welder, edged into special effects rigging stunt vehicles (he now runs an independent steel fabrication shop that specializes in that kind of work) and began supplying insects to studios as a sideline.

“But the truth is, I was always more interested in the bugs than in anything else,” he admitted. “And my family feels the same way about it.”

His wife, Nancy, was a bit hesitant at first.

“The usual reaction when I showed her my bugs,” Miller recalled.

“She wanted to know if I was crazy.”

But she finally made friends with them and now their children, Donnie, 8, and Mindy, 5, play with roaches and tarantulas the way other youngsters play with dogs and cats.

But Miller has outside interests, of course.

“On the side,” he said, “I’m doing field research, now, or a paper on the distribution of scorpions in Southern California.”

So don’t bug him, OK?