Invertebrates
edyong | May 1, 2008 Ultraviolet (UV) radiation lies beyond the violet end of the rainbow. Our eyes aren't equipped to see it and its presence only becomes visually apparent when enough of it hits our skin and causes a painful, red patch - a sunburn. But not all animals have eyes that are so ill-equipped. The females of the jumping spider Phintella vittata not only see UV light, they also find it sexy.
UV light may be invisible to us but many animals can see it and use it to communicate. Sometimes, this is deliberate, as in the case of blue tits using UV patches to seduce females. It can also be inadvertent…
edyong | April 23, 2008In the story of climate change, humans and the carbon dioxide we pump into the atmosphere are the villains of the piece. Now, it seems that we have an accomplice and a most unexpected one at that. It lives in the pine forests of North America and even though it measures just 5 millimetres in length, it is turning these woods from carbon sinks into carbon sources. It's the mountain pine beetle.
The beetle bores into pine trees and feeds from nutrient-carrying vessels called phloem. It also lays its eggs there. Once a beetle has colonised a pine, it pumps out pheromones that attract others,…
clock | April 13, 2008
Since everyone is posting about spiders this week, I though I'd republish a sweet old post of mine, which ran on April 19, 2006 under the title "Happy Bicycle Day!" I hope you like this little post as much as I enjoyed writing it:
This week's theme for the Tar Heel Tavern is bicycle. I was wondering what to write about. Perhaps about crazy bicycle rides I had as a kid. Or a fun riff on "fish needing a bicycle". Then, I was saved! Because, today is the Bicycle Day! That's just great, because I can go on a scientific tangent with a local flavor.
If you do not know what Bicycle Day is,…
edyong | March 27, 2008Imagine that you hand is made of jelly and you have to carve a roast using a knife that has no handle. The bare metal blade would rip through your hypothetical hand as easily as it would through the meat. It's clearly no easy task and yet, squid have to cope with a very similar challenge every time they eat a meal.
The bodies of squid, like those of their relatives the cuttlefish and octopus, are mainly soft and pliant, with one major exception. In the centre of their web of tentacles lies a hard, sharp and murderous beak that resembles that of a parrot. The beak is a tool for killing and…
edyong | March 24, 2008Bdelloid rotifers are one of the strangest of all animals. Uniquely, these small, freshwater invertebrates reproduce entirely asexually and have avoided sex for some 80 million years. At any point of their life cycle, they can be completely dried out and live happily in a dormant state before being rehydrated again.
This last ability has allowed them to colonise a number of treacherous habitats such as freshwater pools and the surfaces of mosses and lichens, where water is plentiful but can easily evaporate away. The bdelloids (pronounced with a silent 'b') have evolved a suite of…
edyong | March 21, 2008Eagles may be famous for their vision, but the most incredible eyes of any animal belong to the mantis shrimp. Neither mantises nor shrimps, these small, pugilistic invertebrates are already renowned for their amazingly complex vision.
Now, a group of scientists have found that they use a visual system that's never been seen before in another animal, and it allows them to exchange secret messages.
Mantis shrimps are no stranger to world records. They are famous for their powerful forearms, which can throw the fastest punch on the planet. The arm can accelerate through water at up to 10,000…
edyong | March 13, 2008
Many animals have cunning ways of hiding from predators. But the larva of the sand dollar takes that to an extreme - it avoids being spotted by splitting itself into two identical clones.
Sand dollars are members of a group of animals called echinoderms, that include sea urchins and starfish. An adult sand dollar (Dendraster excentricus) is a flat, round disc that lives a sedate life on the sea floor. Its larva, also known as a pluteus, is very different, a small, six-armed creature that floats freely among the ocean's plankton.
A pluteus can't swim quickly, so there is no escape for one…
edyong | March 4, 2008The transformation from caterpillar to butterfly or moth is one of the most beguiling in the animal world. Both larva and adult are just stages in the life of a single animal, but are nonetheless completely separated in appearance, habitat and behaviour. The imagery associated with such change is inescapably beautiful, and as entrancing to a poet as it is to a biologist.
According to popular belief, within the pupa, the caterpillar's body is completely overhauled, broken down into a form of soup and rebuilt into a winged adult. Richard Buckmister Fuller once said that "there is nothing in a…
edyong | February 27, 2008
Male insects have a tough time of it. Aside from the usual threats of predators, competitors and the odd hungry female, many are plagued by discriminatory parasites intent on killing them, while leaving their female peers unharmed. These "male-killers" are incredibly successful and infect a wide range of insects, who are themselves a very successful group. One of these killers, a bacteria known as Wolbachia, may well be the world's most successful parasite.
The male-killers are paragons of selfishness. Their success hinges on successfully infecting females, for whithin egg cells, they find…
grrlscientist | February 22, 2008tags: Charles Darwin, crabs, crustaceans, University of Oxford, Oxford Museum of Natural History, online database
Fiddler crabs are easily recognised by their distinctive asymmetric claws. This specimen was captured in May 1835 when the Beagle arrived in Mauritius.
Image: Oxford University Museum of Natural History [larger view].
The University of Oxford Museum of Natural History has electronically catalogued Charles Darwin's crabs that had been collected by the famous naturalist while he was making his voyage around the world on the HMS Beagle from 1831 to 1836.
These crustaceans were…
grrlscientist | February 15, 2008tags: researchblogging.org, climate change, global warming, oceanic dead zones, west coast, North America, Oregon state, Washington state
Millions of dead crabs are washing up onto Oregon and Washington state beaches from the offshore "dead zone".
Ever since it was first noticed by crab fishermen who hauled up hundreds of dead and dying crabs in 2002, the "dead zone" that popped up in the waters along the northwestern coastal shelf just off the coast of Oregon has claimed unknown millions of lives. This oxygen-depleted region has transformed formerly rich seafloor communities teeming with…
grrlscientist | February 13, 2008tags: luminescent marine animals, Deep Sea, Deep Blue, streaming video
Scenes and music are from the movie "Deep Blue", rearranged to make this little video, which shows mostly luminescent creatures that are living in the deep sea. These animals are bioluminescent, but to see that, you'd have to turn the lights out, and then they'd glow a bluish-white. However, these animals glow with rainbow colors due to diffraction by their bodies of the light that is being shown onto them for the purposes of photography. Imagine: we know more about the moon than we know about the deep sea! [1:15]
grrlscientist | February 11, 2008tags: beetle, insect, photography, subway art, AMNH, NYC, NYCLife
The tiger beetle, Cicindela formosa,
as portrayed in tiles on the walls of the NYC uptown subway stop (A-B-C)
at 81st and Central Park West. (ISO, no zoom, no flash).
Image: GrrlScientist 2008. [wallpaper size].
Read more about the AMNH tile artworks and see the AMNH tile artworks photographic archives -- with all the animals identified.
grrlscientist | February 7, 2008tags: katydid, insects, invertebrates, photography, subway art, AMNH, NYC, NYCLife
I think this is a species of Katydid,
as portrayed in tiles on the walls of the NYC uptown subway stop (A-B-C)
at 81st and Central Park West. (ISO, no zoom, no flash).
Image: GrrlScientist 2008. [wallpaper size].
Read more about the AMNH tile artworks and see the AMNH tile artworks photographic archives -- with all the animals identified.
grrlscientist | February 2, 2008tags: blog carnivals, teaching
The 29th edition of the Circus of the Spineless is now available for you to read and enjoy. This is another "too small" blog carnival, but it includes pieces from my favorite invertebrate zoologists, so go there and enjoy!
grrlscientist | January 11, 2008tags: behavior, environmental enrichment, giant Pacific octopus, Octopus dofleini, cephalopod, animal intelligence
Louis, the giant pacific octopus, Octopus dofleini, cuddles his Mr Potato Head.
The 1.8meter-wide (6 foot) animal is so attached to Mr Potato Head that he
becomes aggressive when aquarium staff try to remove it from his tank.
Image: Apex.
Who would have thought that Mr Potato Head would turn out to be such a charmer? Certainly not I, but this morning, I unexpectedly ran across a news story about a giant Pacific octopus, Octopus dofleini, that lives in an aquarium in the UK.…
clock | January 7, 2008
I had no time to read this in detail and write a really decent overview here, perhaps I will do it later, but for now, here are the links and key excerpts from a pair of exciting new papers in PLoS Biology and PLoS ONE, which describe the patterns of expression of a second type of cryptochrome gene in Monarch butterflies.
This cryptochrome (Cry) is more similar to the vertebrate Cry than the insect Cry, also present in this butterfly. The temporal and spatial patterns of expression of the two types of Cry suggest that they may be involved in the transfer of time-information from the…
grrlscientist | November 1, 2007tags: circus of the spineless, blog carnival
I know that at least some of you assume that that the Circus of the Spineless blog carnival is all about politicians, but (sorry to disappoint you), this blog carnival instead focuses on linking to essays about invertebrates. The 26th edition of this blog carnival has a lot of wonderful links and stories about insects and other invertebrates for you to enjoy. And, best of all, they included a submission from me!
grrlscientist | October 23, 2007tags: microcosmos, sexy boy, snail sex, streaming video
This video shows some amazing footage of a variety of invertebrates as they go about their lives, including a snail sex scene. Footage: Microcosmos. "Sexy Boy" by Air sets the mood. (Safe for work) [4:58]
grrlscientist | October 4, 2007tags: blog carnivals, Carnival of the Spineless, invertebrates
It has come to my attention that the latest edition of the Carnival of the Spineless is now available for you to enjoy. Remember that the majority of life on earth consists of living creatures that lack a spine, so there is a great deal of information out there for you to read and learn from.