Hello, fellow Satorites. Some of you may live close by, but many of you don’t. From what I’ve heard, there are people here from as far away as Florida. Wow! Thus, the local fauna here (most of which are insects) will be different from what you’re used to. Or maybe you just don’t care enough to pay attention to such things. If either of those describes you, then read on for a complete novice’s guide to the local anthropods.
Order Odonata
Dragonflies
Look up. Dragonflies zoom around above our heads, just out of reach. They are masters of the air, able to dart about with unsurpassed agility, accelerate almost instantly, and pluck their prey (like mosquitoes) out of the air using their legs like a net. They’re such effective hunters that they have been around since before the dinosaurs...or any other reptile for that matter. Back then, there was a greater percentage of oxygen in the air, permitting the terrestrial anthropods of the time (like scorpions, stoneflies and cockroaches) to grow much larger. Think dragonflies the size of eagles. Nowadays, none of those things get so huge, but modern dragonflies are still hard to miss.
Order Hemiptera
Water Boatmen
Most people will slap the term “bug” on anything with an exoskeleton. This is incorrect. A bug is an insect that goes through incomplete metamorphosis (so the young are miniature versions of the adults but wingless) and bears piercing and sucking (rather than biting and chewing) mouthparts. That includes stinkbugs, water striders, assassin bugs, leaf-hoppers, aphids, and cicadas. Got that?
Water boatmen are another example of of a true bug. They’re sort of like tiny whales, in that they live in water, despite breathing air, and filter-feed. Their exaggerated hind legs stick out to either side, and serve as oars. The front legs are shorter, and are used to sift through the muck for food. If the pond it lives in were to dry up, the have wings to find a new one. Good luck finding one around here; though I did see one in that pool near Tawanka...
Order Lepidoptera
Miscellaneous Butterflies
If you don’t know what these are, you are beyond my help.
Also, this is the first example of complete metamorphosis. This is where the larval form is wildly different from the adult (grub, maggot, caterpillar, etc.), and transition takes place as an immobile pupa (sometimes referred to as a chrysalis or cocoon).
Miscellaneous Moths
Moths are in the same order as butterflies. They’re generally drab and boring visually, and most are nocturnal. However, many moths are diurnal (active during the day) and brightly coloured. The only way to tell for sure is to look closely at their antennae: butterflies have small clubs on the ends of theirs, while moths’ are either straight or feather-like. Finally, many moths don’t eat once they become adults. For such moths, fluttering around a light is extremely dangerous. And why do they do that? Moths navigate using the moon, and they locate the moon by zeroing in on the brightest light source.
Part 2
By: A.B.
Welcome back. This is part 2 of my crash-course in entomology. You see, this article is so massive, that publishing it all at once would take up half of the Harold. We’ll resume at my special favorite insect order...
Order Coleoptera
Rove Beetles
Most animal species are anthropods, most anthropod species are insects, and most insect species are beetles. Heavily armoured and versatile, beetles exist in a mind-boggling array of shapes, occupying every possible niche, and on every continent, bar Antarctica. And with that out of my system, we can begin.
Rove beetles do not look like other beetles. Whereas most other beetles are at least somewhat compact, rove beetles are long and slender. But they nonetheless possess that one trait that makes a beetle a beetle: elytra. These hardened front wings (Fact: all insects possess either 4 wings, or zero) are kept on top of the abdomen as armor, protecting it as well as the hind wings, which are folded so they fit (or shrivelled beyond use. It varies between beetle families.) In rove beetles, the elytra are so short that they don’t even cover half of the abdomen. In North America, they rarely exceed 1 centimeter, which is even less spectacular when you realize that these are long and slender insects.
Lady-beetles
Most of you probably call these things ”ladybugs.” For those who do, refer to my definition of “bug” from yesterday. Also, you cannot determine their age by counting the spots. Once they become adults, the spots remain fixed. In fact, spot number usually doesn’t indicate much of anything, because spot patterns can vary widely even within a single species.
Now that we’ve cleared that nonsense up, we can discuss the facts. It’s true that lady-beetles are “friends of the gardener,” as they eat aphids, which are serious pests of flower gardens and large orchards alike. Lady-beetles may be small, but aphids are even smaller: bite size for a lady-beetle And when you’re aphid-sized, a lady-beetle is like a Siberian tiger, great white shark, Tyrannosaurus rex, grizzly bear, giant squid, and Velociraptor- all in one!
Order Hymenoptera
Social Wasps
Many people hear the word “wasp” and think of bright yellow insects that live in huge colonies like honeybees. News flash: nearly all wasp species are solitary. Also, 99% of wasps aren’t yellow. As you probably know, social wasps not only exist, but are quite common where they do.
Social wasps are master architects. They chew up wood, regurgitate it at the nest site, then shape it into the desired shape with their mandibles. In short, they construct their nests from paper, which they make themselves- all on instinct. And they’ve been doing that since well before we existed. And that’s not the only reason to respect them, they also sting. Unlike honeybees, wasps aren’t mortally wounded whenever they sting, so they can sting and sting and sting again. (Bright coloration warns predators of this.) Because wasps are predators, they use their stingers for killing prey as well as self-defence.
Social Bees
The first thing that comes to mind at the word “bee” is the honeybee: an yellow-orange and black social insect, domesticated by humans to produce honey. However, most bees are solitary. Even fewer have that familiar yellow-and-black colour pattern, But to the best of my knowledge, social bees are more common globally than social wasps.
The honeybees we all know originate in Europe, But you may also have heard of killer bees, properly known as Africanized bees. Their venom is no more potent than European honeybees, but the sheer amount of venom delivered by hundreds of homicidal bees is going to kill you, allergies or no. They originated in Brazil, where an enterprising beekeeper was trying to breed European honeybees with their African relatives. Why? African honeybees are better at making honey (since there are fewer flowers in Africa), but are much more aggressive (for the same reason). His plan was to produce a strain of bee that produced more honey, yet were docile. He got the opposite, and the failed experiments escaped, moving as far north as their tropical metabolisms would allow.
Finally, there are bumblebees. These are big, fat, hairy creatures that fly with furious wing-beats. That hair serves as insulation, guarding the bee from the cold, allowing bumblebees to remain active later into the year than other bees.
Ants
Unlike wasps and bees, the majority of ants are social creatures. In fact, I can’t name a single species of ant that leads a solitary life. Ants around here are somewhat common: tiny black insects that make their nests in between the bricks in the paths. These nests are marked by the hordes of ants crawling in and out. Below what we can see is a maze of tunnels filled with more ants, and chambers here and there. Most are nurseries, where the helpless larvae are raised. But one chamber houses the queen: the mother of all the other ants in the colony and the only one that can lay eggs.
And with that, I do believe I’ve covered every kind of insect I’ve seen here at Satori. Of course, this is far from a complete guide. (Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.) There are probably hundreds, if not thousands of insect species on the EWU campus alone.If anyone has any other questions, feel free to ask. I just might publish them here in the Satori Harold.
Odonata: tooth.
Hemiptera: half wing.
Lepidoptera: scale wing.
Coleoptera: sheath wing.
Hymenoptera: membrane wing.
Hello again, Satori. I’ve received numerous compliments on the various articles I’ve written this week, the insect articles in particular. Ever since people first got their hands on Tuesday’s Harold, I’ve been simply bombarded with praise for my articles. (And to think that at the beginning of the week I was nervous about screwing up!) It for this reason that I will now write an encore. That, and I have no other subject material. Enjoy!
Order Odonata
Damselflies
Damselflies are very similar to dragonflies, and many people don’t know the difference. One way to tell is by looking at their wings: damselflies generally keep their wings folded over their backs when at rest, while dragonflies keep them spread out. But this system is unreliable: It doesn’t work while the insect is flying, and there is a group of damselflies called “spreadwings” which keep their wings spread at all times. The only way to tell for sure is to remember that damselflies are slimmer than dragonflies relative to length.
Odonata undergoes incomplete metamorphosis, but the nymphs live in and breath water.
Order Dermaptera
Earwigs
The name “earwig” refers to the belief that these insects will crawl into people’s ears, burrow into their brains, and lay eggs. This is utter nonsense. Earwigs do prefer warm, humid crevices, and the human ear canal is a warm, humid crevice, but it’s also part of an organism several thousand times larger than an earwig. Wouldn’t you do every thing in your power to avoid something that much bigger than you? If you fall asleep on the ground, an earwig may crawl into your ear, but so could anything else small enough.
Alright, fact time. Earwigs do not lay eggs in people’s brains, but in soil or leaf litter. In fact, the female tends to her eggs with maternal care; a rarity amongst anything without a backbone. Even after the eggs hatch, they are still cared for by their mother; an even rarer behavior. The vast majority of earwig species are easily identified by the large pincers on the ends of their abdomens. In males these pincers are curved, while females have straight and narrow. Apparently, they can indeed pinch with them, but I’ve never seen them do that. Earwigs around here are brown.
Dermaptera undergoes incomplete metamorphosis.
Order Diptera
Hoverflies
I vaguely remember hearing about a story where a swarm of bees flew out of the carcass of a lion. Can you say “mistaken identity?” Those were most likely hoverflies, which lay their eggs in rotting flesh and boast a colouration that mimics that of bees. The reason is simple for the latter is simple: bees sting, predators avoid them, and most predators can’t call the hoverfly’s bluff. But these harmless mimics do pollennate flowers, and are easily told apart from the real deal if you know what to look for. Flight pattern is the most reliable tell for me.
On Wednesday, I said that all insects have either four wings or zero wings. So it may cause confusion when i say that “Diptera” translates to “two wing.” the reason for this etymology is that in the so-called two winged flies, the hind wings have evolved into tiny club-like organs called “halteres,” and are used for steering rather than propulsion.
Diptera undergoes complete metamorphosis (maggots).
