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Category Archives: Physiology
Why Do Insects Lay Their Eggs In Patterns?
Written by Joe Ballenger We get a lot of identification requests on our Facebook page, and we do what we can to identify them. Sometimes, these turn into interesting conversations…which in turn lead to good questions like this: The moth … Continue reading
Posted in Behavior, Ecology, Physiology
Tagged egg patterms, eggs, Insects, March Mantid Madness
4 Comments
Through the Compound Eye
Written by Nancy Miorelli Eyes are remarkable structures that have evolved independently at least three times. The most obvious advantage of eyes is that they help us understand the world around us by absorbing what is essentially data, which our brains then … Continue reading
Posted in Ecology, Physiology
Tagged Compound Eye, Diptera, Eyes, Fly, Insect, Ommatidia
15 Comments
Does UV light kill insects? What about other types of light?
Written by Joe Ballenger Ultraviolet light is pretty nasty stuff. It’s known to cause skin cancer in humans. UV light is a standard material for inducing mutations in lab experiments. It’s also used to sterilize biological safety hoods. It has … Continue reading
Why do insect bites transmit disease?
Written by Joe Ballenger @Stylopidae As a layman I know nothing about regular mosquitoes & how they bite etc. Be good to establish that. — Jude Adamson (@smalljude) January 31, 2015 While writing my post about GMO mosquitoes, Jude Adamson … Continue reading
Cough it Up – Fly Vomit
Written by Nancy Miorelli You’ve probably noticed an intrepid fly boldly navigating your pizza, lapping up oils and pizza sauce. Shortly after enjoying some of your meal, the fly, assuming it’s the kind with the lapping mouth parts, will have … Continue reading
Posted in Behavior, Physiology
Tagged Blood Splatter, Extra Oral Digestion, Flies, Fly, Forensic Entomology, Vomit
5 Comments
What do Butterflies and Poop Have in Common? They’re Green!
Written by Nancy Miorelli First, if you’ve never had green poop, congratulations, you’re one of the few people who haven’t had the issue … apparently. Anyway, I’m getting ahead of myself. We got this question from Facebook, and it specifically … Continue reading
Posted in Physiology
Tagged bile, bile pigment, bile salt, Butterflies, Chlorophyll, Colors, Green, Lepidoptera, Lutein, Malachite Butterfly, nano-structure
2 Comments
How do insects breathe? Part 2: Parasites
Written by Joe Ballenger In the first part of our post, Wait, Insects Breathe? But How?, we talked about how insects breathe. Although they use oxygen, like humans, they don’t use lungs. Instead, they use a system of hollow tubes … Continue reading
Wait, Insects Breathe!? But How? Part I
Post by Nancy Miorelli and Joe Ballenger One day, while puttering around on Twitter we noticed that there was a #BugQuestions already…and there are some really neat questions here. The question of how insects breathe is one which is commonly … Continue reading
What Happens Inside a Cocoon or Chrysalis?
Written by Nancy Miorelli This is a great series of questions because I was going to tackle a butterfly coloration question this week, but would have had to talk about development. Now I can talk about development and we can … Continue reading
Posted in Physiology
Tagged brain, Butterfly, Caterpillar, Chrysalis, Cocoon, Development, imaginal discs, larva, learning, Pupa
9 Comments
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