Howdy y’all. We wanted to try something a little different. For next week’s post, I have a couple of topics in mind – but I’m only going to write about one. Which topic would you like to read about next Tuesday (10/27/20)?
Answer in the comments by Friday, 6:00pm CT!
~Joanie
This question came in to me through my Twitter and I thought it was so interesting! Yes insects can and do taste. Yes it’s different than smelling for them. But do they actually have taste buds?
A student of mine is researching scorpions and he has a question about emperor scorpions that we have been unable to answer through our own research. He has learned that baby emperor scorpions are born white, but he cannot find the answer to the question “WHY they are born white.” We would appreciate it very much if you knew and shared the answer.
Bret, via Email
When scorpions are born, they’re ghostly pale. They actually stand out against their mom, looking almost more like maggots than actual arachnids.
But adult emporer scorpions, like mom up there, are dark. That darkness is an indicator of a hard exoskeleton, which scorpions need on their claws and stingers to crush and eat prey.
So why are they pale?
Continue readingMy undergraduate student that I’m mentoring this semester asked me a question about when an insect is dead. He pondered this because we read a paper were researchers infected carpenter ants with a fungus were considered dead after no movement was detected. This got us thinking, if a brain is completely damaged or missing, is an insect alive? My thoughts immediately went to questions we’ve received here at Ask an Entomologist – specifically, the questions that asked, “why does a cockroach stay alive after its head is removed?” OR “why does a cockroach’s legs still move after its head is removed?”
Continue readingThis question popped up in my learning community The SciHive and I thought to myself … what a wonderful question. So here we go.
We run #SpiderSunday where we post pictures of spiders and generally just learn about their biology when one of my members posted this cool shot of a zipper spider. Well … I’ve always called them Zipper Spiders. Apparently they’re also called “Writing spiders, black and yellow garden spiders, golden garden spiders, zigzag spiders ….” you get the idea.
A rant about common names another day…
To which Jared asked … “why do they make those little zippers?”
Well … the short of it is “we don’t know” and the long of it is “we don’t know but we have some good guesses.”
I wanted to take the approach today of looking at some of the various hypothesises that have been put forward and look at them with a critical eye. Is this likely? What evidence do we have to support these? What evidence do we have not to? I think – especially – in the age of Covid people think that scientists come up with an answer and then it’s fact. Forever. The end.
When in reality we propose a bunch of different ideas, test them, retest them, use new evidence, use more logic, and settle upon an idea. Usually after a decent amount of back and forth. Sometimes the idea that’s settled upon finally isn’t the initial hypothesis. And that’s okay. Science is all about fact checking and then re-fact checking.
So here we go.
Continue reading@BugQuestions Can you help identify this bug and what insects are on it? pic.twitter.com/3Ht56RJ6IS
— Groumpio (@jameslaird1976) October 7, 2015
https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
Sometimes, when writing for this blog, I learn new things about bugs as well. This is one of those times when I have to admit that I didn’t know the answer, and got curious enough to read up on the topic.
Back in June we received an email that stuck with me. A person had a question about CO2 attraction in fireflies. Their question pertained to an insect trap that emits CO2 to attract and capture insects. They were concerned about the trap attracting fireflies. The trap claims that it’s safe for honeybees and butterflies because they aren’t attracted to it. At Ask an Entomologist we cannot give pest control advice because we aren’t licensed pest control operators; however, we are entomologists that have a broad knowledge base on insect science. CO2 attraction in insects is complex. What I mean by this is that insects use many stimuli to find their nest, a potential mate, or food. What signals insects use to find food or whatever highly depends on their biology.
So, let’s answer question, “[…] are Fireflies attracted to CO2?”
Continue readingWritten by Nancy Miorelli
You know – I was supposed to write an introduction after we got back from our hiatus in May. But then there were “murder hornets“, and the BLM movement, and then people putting up fake wasp decoys, and well … it was a lot to cover. So Now we’re in August and …
So here I am!
Hai – my name is Nancy. I’m an entomologist with my Master’s from the University of Georgia, living in Ecuador.
I normally conduct ecological tours in Ecuador focused on insects, ecology, conservation, and also Ecuadorian local culture. through my business SciBugs.
My Ecuador, Entomology, EcoTours are 100% personalized! You tell me where you wanna go – and I get you there. And do all the translation. And connect you to cool locals. And toss you bug facts from the back of canoe.
But, Ecotourism is kind of not a thing that is happening in 2020, so I’ve started working on my YouTube channel again and have started working on gamified entomololgy workshops.
Question from Sam asking what bug this is and why it has a fluffy butt. May 2020.
@Earth2Meekus asked about these on Twitter. May 2020.
Spring and summer time bring out all the interesting bugs! Over the years (and recently) we’ve had a few people ask what these insects are and why they have “fuzzy butts.” These insects are broadly called planthoppers. Why do they have these fluffy projections out of their abdomen? Let’s look closer at their group.
Got a question? Ask us!
