Insect Archive

A new research found out that dragonflies may be one of the most effective hunters in the animal kingdom since it catches its prey more than 95 percent of the time, which has a significantly higher probability than the hunting skills of lions and great white sharks.

Although dragonflies are naturally one of the most well-liked insects, they are apparently ferocious too when they lock their eyes on their prey. Compared to a lion’s 25-percent accuracy, dragonflies defy nature to catch and eat their prey right away.

Aside from the fact that these are voracious aerial predators, dragonflies also have an insatiable appetite. This means their predation may happen several times a day because they happily grab as much food as they can. Stacey Combes, a Harvard student who studied the biomechanics of dragonfly flight, said she saw one laboratory dragonfly eat 30 flies in one flight.

A big brood of cicadas is forecast to emerge from the ground this spring along the East Coast, all the way from the Carolinas to New York State.

The tropics are home to an extraordinary diversity of insect species. How great is it, exactly?

A clip from the BBC Four programme, featuring researchers from Rothamsted Research

Preface (Extract): 

In issuing this first volumo of "Aid", I wish to call attention to the following sentence in my Prospectus, viz: - "There will be a Systematic Index, together with such remarks on the insects as may appear absolutely necessary, but the Editor is anxious to avoid adding to the already voluminous Entomological Literature ; the present work being intended to elucidate that which has been already written."

[Aide à l'identification des insectes en 2 vol. illustrés,1880-1882, 400 p. à télécharger | W.A.S./mahn-84]

After smashing, baking, and decaying the colorful outer layers that give some insects their sheen, scientists studying fossilized insects think they're closer to deciphering the original hues of today's dull and dark insect fossils.

It can take years of direct observation for a researcher to fully understand the diets of a community of herbivorous insects in a tropical rain forest.

BBC Four gets up close and personal with the insect kingdom in a series of documentaries.

We might as well end my spider campaign on a high note - the most beautiful spiders I have ever seen, PEACOCK SPIDERS! They're just 5mm long and are confined to eastern parts of Australia.
Check out this awesome video of them here: http://bit.ly/14QNkzC

Images by Jurgen C Otto.

A new species of leafcutter bee, Megachile chomskyi, is described from Texas, United States.

I think I will start with introducing one of my favorite insects, the wasp nest beetle or Metoecus paradoxus to give it the correct scientific name... This little beastie has been seen by my eyes o...

Insect goop made from the DNA of creepy crawlies could be used to quickly reveal the biodiversity of an area regardless of whether the species involved are known to science.

The technique involves DNA barcoding which identifies species using short genetic markers in the creature's DNA with something called next generation sequencing (NGS) technology which is part of metabarcoding.

For the study, 73 insects were collected and preserved while the genomics research team performed a visual identification. Once complete (as far as possible) DNA from the legs of each creature was analysed using DNA barcoding and compared with data from the Barcode of Life Data Systems. Finally, after a round of differential centrifugation (a way of separating cells into their component parts) mixed DNA samples were analysed with an ultra-deep sequencing strategy.

That last step allows research teams to assess biodiversity at the species level regardless of whether the species can be actually be identified. It also makes it possible to work out the total quantity of mitochondrial DNA present which related to the ratios and physical mass of each species present.

Speaking about the developments, genomics researcher Xin Zhou said, "In some sense, the contribution of NGS technology to biodiversity research is equivalent to what microscopes did to microbiology."

The study concludes that the metabarcoding approach shows "great potential in biodiversity-related surveillance, such as in biomonitoring programmes."

Tropical rainforests are known for their high biodiversity of countless species, many of them unknown and not named by scientists yet. A large proportion of this undiscovered life on earth is formed by insects, especially beetles.

Typical time course of an experiment (1 hour). The starting area is in the top right corner, the target area in the bottom left corner. Video published by Simon Garnier and al. - Publication in PLOS computational biology - march 2013.

Fire ants use their claws to grip diverse surfaces, including each other. As a result of their mutual adhesion and large numbers, ant colonies flow like inanimate fluids. This film shows how ants behave similarly to the spreading of drops, the capillary rise of menisci, and gravity-driven flow down a wall. By emulating the flow of fluids, ant colonies can remain united under stressful conditions.

Buglife. « The world's greatest museum of art and design gets a new roof for wildlife »

« The new roof will be monitored by wildlife experts this summer as part of wider research to identify which invertebrates are using the roof. Previous studies on Living Roofs in central London have recorded many species of beetles, flies and bees including the nationally rare Brown-banded carder bee (Bombus humilis). »

Two new studies have highlighted a negative impact on bees' ability to learn following exposure to a combination of pesticides commonly used in agriculture.