Insect communication - an amazing natural feat!
Surprise! Itâs another post about insects. If youâve read any of my other blog posts youâll notice this emerging theme. To me, the most amazing thing has to be insect communication. Iâm super biased, but still they are able to effectively communicate in so many unique ways! Â
Imagine you're a small little insect living in the Arboretum on campus here in Guelph. You're tiny, you do not have bones and only an exoskeleton. You have no lungs to scream, no vocal cords to talk, and you're not nearly capable of thinking at the level of humans are. How would you communicate with members of your own species? Turns out you could do it in so many unique ways! I want to highlight 3 modalities of insect communication; sound, chemical, and visual.
While they donât have vocal cords like us or scream because they donât have vocal cords or respiratory systems like most mammals, insects still manage to produce sound. They do this mainly through a process known as stridulation. Stridulation is when you produce sound by rubbing 2 body parts together (The Amateur Entomologistsâ Society, n.d.). When you hear crickets making their distinct sound, theyâre actually doing stridulation! There are a number of body parts insects can rub together to perform stridulation but commonly crickets will rub their wings together, grasshoppers with rub legs together, or a leg and wing (Department of Entomology, n.d.). A good analogy would be sort of like a washboard; you rub your hands against the ridges to produce noise. Â
One really unique way insects communicate is through pheromones. Ants are a really great examples of insects that use this. Pheromones, which are a type of chemical signal, are used by aunts to coordinate a number of tasks, including foraging, nest defence and brood care (Chalissery et al., 2019). They can use these pheromones to give other colony mates an idea where to go for food, what the ants are feeling, and let them know whatâs going on in their environment. Because thereâs so much information ants can share through pheromone communication, there are many types of pheromones that they can produce (ScienceDirect, n.d.). I find that I often hear a lot of scientists compare the complexity of communication through pheromones to that of the complexity of a spoken language! Wow wow wow!
The last communication method I want to mention is visual communication, specifically through light communication. Lampyridae, or the fireflies are a type of beetle that use bioluminescence to communicate with others of that species. They can produce this light on demand by combining chemicals in their abdomens, producing efficient and almost completely heat free light (Marshall, 2017). That is an extremely impressive feat! They mainly use this communication for reproductive purpose, with the flash rate, duration, and number of flashes signalling the identity of these fireflies to females of the same species (Marshall, 2017). Â
It's one thing for me to write about all of this, but I think these ideas are a lot more easy to interpret them when you can see and hear them ( with pheromones you canât really do either but trust me, theyâre still really cool). Hereâs a link to a Nat Geo video showing fireflies glowing; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0BOjTMkyfIA . Also check out this video of a bush cricket stridulating; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iar_zPTsAuw ( It also provides a pretty good visual of the process).Â
To me, it's amazing to think that these tiny little insects are capable of so much communication. I think a lot of times, we as a society tend to disregard insects and all their amazing feats based on perceptions of them as gross or uncomplex. In reality, these tiny creatures have evolved to have complex methods of communication that have allowed them to survive. To me, that is truly amazing.
 Chalissery, J. M., Renyard, A., Gries, R., Hoefele, D., Alamsetti, S. K., & Gries, G. (2019). Ants sense, and follow, trail pheromones of ant community members. Insects, 10(11), 383. https://doi.org/10.3390/insects10110383
Department of Entomology. (n.d.). Crickets and temperature. CRICKETS AND TEMPERATURE | Department of Entomology. https://entomology.unl.edu/k12/crickets/temperature.htm Â
Marshall, S. A. (2017). Insects Their Natural History and Diversity (2nd ed.). Firefly Books. Â
National Geographic. (2016, September 4). Watch: Fireflies glowing in sync to attract mates | national geographic. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0BOjTMkyfIA Â Â Â
ScienceDirect. (n.d.). Trail Pheromone. Trail Pheromone - an overview | ScienceDirect Topics. https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/agricultural-and-biological-sciences/trail-pheromone#:~:text=Ants%20use%20trail%20pheromones%20to,predator%20is%20on%20the%20prowl
The Amateur Entomologistsâ Society. (n.d.). Stridulation. Stridulation - Entomologistsâ glossary - Amateur Entomologistsâ Society (AES). https://www.amentsoc.org/insects/glossary/terms/stridulation/
unit_one. (2017, September 11). Bush cricket stridulation. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iar_zPTsAuw