Interesting Facts about Insects
Some types of crickets and grasshoppers have their ears on their front legs. Mounds of African termites can get up to 40 ft high. They use an intricate system of ventilation shafts which helps control the inner temperature. Female Parnassian Butterflies mate only once in their life. This mating is a long one which lasts for about three hours. While mating, the male butterfly secretes a fluid that hardens up into a shell and this shell permanently seals up the female 's genital opening. The couple can get stuck together forever if things go wrong. Mosquitoes have killed more human beings than the combined death toll of all the wars in history. While mating, a male Katydid will produce a tasty meal(in addition to sperms), which the female will eat while she waits for her eggs to get fully fertilized. Humans have named this meal spermatophyllax. A cockroach can live for 9 days without its head before it dies of starvation. Male ants often have only one role and that is mating with the queen. After they have performed this function, they may die. Houseflies have taste buds on their feet and thus can taste with their feet. By the end of its three-to-six-week life, a ladybug (ladybird) may eat some 5,000 aphids. Larvae of one type of midge can survive in -321 degree fahrenheit liquid nitrogen for about three days. Daddy longlegs(name of a spider-like insects) copulate at least a dozen times while mating. After the male has fertilized the female, he would tower over her and keep her imprisoned until she lay eggs. The Black ants and Wood ants can spray formic acid. For this reason some birds put them on and into their feathers because this acid helps them to get rid of parasites. Some wasps would sleep and even hibernate for many winter months while hanging with their teeth. Termite queens normally lay up to 30,000 eggs in a day. The Slave-maker ants raid the nests of other ants to steal their pupae. When these pupae hatch, the new-born ants are made slaves and work as slaves throughout their lives. Stick insects can live up to 3 years in the wild, on the average. Both eyes of ants are made of many small eyes and are known as compound eyes. To produce a pound of silk, about 2000 silkworm cocoons are needed. Australia once imported dung beetles to cope with the droppings of millions of cattle on their land. It now regularly imports them. There are about 5000 different species of ladybugs. The army ant of South America can have 700,000 ants in their colonies. A small colony of Madagascar hissing cockroaches can eat a large carrot in one day. Ants are able to lift and carry more than 3 times their own weight. About 10 million trips of honeybees would collect enough nectar to produce a pound of honey. Only female mosquitoes bite humans. The oldest known fossil of an insect is 400 million years old. This fossil is of an insect named springtail. |
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