First, I should mention that I am way backed up with ‘Ask and Entomologist’ questions from readers…so be patient with me as I get to them when I can. There are some good questions that have been asked so keep your eyes out.

Oran:

I was reading a blog the other day and the author mentioned trying to rescue a bee from a pool. He’d take it out, but it would keep on walking to the pool again and again. He wondered why he even bothered, seeing how bees are not sentient and what not. Well, that brought about a few questions. One: any ideas on why it kept going to the pool? Two: do you think insects like this can experience pain/suffering? Three: arthropods have ganglia instead of real brains, but I’m guessing they communicate with each other. Would you say the whole ganglial system is like one brain? and four: do arthropods have the same kinds of neurotransmitters (and used the same way) as humans do?

They’re probably difficult questions to answer (I remember people experimenting on lobsters to see if they felt pain, some concluding they do and others that they don’t), but a guess from an entomologist is better than my guess.

For those who may not know what sentient means, like I did at first, it refers to the ability to perceive or feel. To claim that insects do not have the ability to feel or perceive is a gross misjudgment, more about that in a sec though. I will answer the series of questions in order.

One: Why did the bee keep going in the pool? No idea. It could have something to do with the water surface reflectance looking like something else to the insect. A lot of insects look like bees, maybe it wasn’t a bee and an insect that was looking for a drink. A lot of times you see flies sucking up the rain water that collects on plants.

Two: Do insects experience pain? Yes. Well actually, this concept has been disputed, but I think recent evidence suggests that they do experience what is defined as pain. Vertebrates have nociceptors, which are specialized neurons that sense painful stimuli. Painful stimuli are described as noxious heat, mechanical or chemical stimuli that could potentially cause tissue damage. Tracey Jr. et al. (2003, sited above) found the following:

In models of nociception, noxious heat is often used as the stimulus to elicit a defensive motor output, as in the tail flick response of the rat. Since heat has also been shown to be an effective negatively reinforcing stimulus in adult Drosophila learning (Brembs and Heisenberg 2000 and Mariath 1985), we conjectured that heat might also be used to study nociception per se. A normal, undisturbed Drosophila larva moves through its environment with a rhythmic motion (Figure 1A). In response to light touch with a probe, a larva will pause (Figure 1B) or make one or more contractile waves, moving away from the stimulus (Kernan et al., 1994). In contrast, when touched with the same probe heated above a threshold temperature, larvae are seen to vigorously roll sideways in a corkscrew-like motion (Figure 1C). The threshold probe temperature for eliciting this behavior is 39°C–41°C (noxious heat), at which temperature several seconds of stimulation are required to induce rolling, but at 42°C or higher, the response occurs in as little as 0.4 s (Figure 1D). Importantly, the temperature threshold for firing of nociceptors in vertebrates, including primates, is similar, 39°C–41°C (Tillman et al., 1995). Since vertebrate nociceptors also respond to noxious mechanical stimuli (Beck et al. 1974; Bessou and Perl 1969 and Van Hees and Gybels 1981), we examined the response of Drosophila larvae to strong punctate stimuli or pinching of the cuticle with forceps, and these elicited the same rolling behavior as noxious heat.

But, like I said, there is some contention to the matter. Here is a nice little review on insect pain. If you don’t want to read the whole thing, below is an excerpt.

In the majority of examples of invertebrate nociception noted above, there seems to be little, if any, evidence that the animals’ responses persist in anything akin to the manner described for mammals. As Eisemann et al. (1984) have described in a review of the “biological evidence” concerning pain in insects, “No example is known to us of an insect showing protective behavior towards injured parts, such as by limping after leg injury or declining to feed or mate because of general abdominal injuries. On the contrary, our experience has been that insects will continue with normal activities even after severe injury or removal of body parts.”

Eisemann et al. (1984) use a variety of examples to support this contention, including:

* an insect walking with a crushed tarsus continues “applying it to the substrate with undiminished force”;
* a locust carries on feeding while being eaten by a mantis;
* a tsetse fly, although half-dissected, flies in to feed.

Although some insect behavior, such as the writhing of insects poisoned by insecticides, or the struggling of restrained living insects, resembles that of “higher animals responding to painful stimuli,” Eisemann et al. conclude that the resemblance is superficial and that it “no more requires the presence of a pain sense than do reflexive withdrawal responses.” Similarly, although it has been shown that fruit flies can be trained to avoid certain odors and colored lights when these are associated with impending electric shock (Quinn et al., 1974), such learning is open to explanation in terms of neural mechanisms, without the need to postulate subjective experience on the part of flies.

The “relatively simple organization” of the insect central nervous system, Elsemann et al. argue, “raises the question of whether any experience akin to human pain could be generated” in these animals (and by implication in other invertebrates with a similar or less complex nervous organization). On the analysis of Gould and Gould (1982), the answer to such a question would be “no,” for these authors can find no evidence for conscious experience in insects. Certainly, on the limited amount of evidence presented here, it seems very difficult to imagine that insects and the other simpler invertebrates mentioned above can “suffer” pain in anything like the vertebrate sense. Nevertheless, the issue certainly is not closed, and further questions should be asked.

Perhaps such a view simply reflects a paucity of (human) imagination. Griffin (1984) surely would urge us to maintain an open mind on the issue, having provided behavioral evidence which, he argues, should challenge “the widespread belief’ that an insect, for example, “is too small and its central nervous system too differently organized from ours to be capable of conscious thinking and planning or subjective feelings.” Indeed, to take a more radical view, perhaps “it is presumptuous for us to assume that because our suffering involves self-awareness, this should also be true of other species” (McFarland, 1989).

Alternatively, perhaps, as Mather (1989) suggests, we should simply accept that these animals “are different from us, and wait for more data.”

Three: Would you say the whole ganglia system is like one brain? Well actually, they do have a ‘brain’. Their central nervous system is made up of a double-chain of ganglia joined by lateral and longitudinal connectives. The ‘brain’ is the anterior ganglia and it is actually the fusion of 3 separate lobes (the protocerebrum, the deutocerebrum, and the tritocerebrum), collectively called the supraesophageal ganglion.

The connectives run next to the subesophageal ganglion, which is near the foregut. Posterior to the subesophageal ganglion is the thoracic ganglia (also sometimes called the thoracico-abdominal ganglion). These three ganglia make up the CNS.

Four: Do insects have the same kinds of neurotransmitters as humans do? A neurotransmitter is a chemical messenger that is released when a nerve impulse reaches the synapse. Yes insects have them and even more they have some of the same neurotransmitters as vertebrates do, such as serotonin, dopamine, and acetylcholine. Do they act similarly in insects as they do in vertebrates? Thats a great question and one in which I am a coauthor on a series of papers that are going through the review process right now (concerning octopamine and serotonin) in attempt to answer. I’ll wait to tell you more about that once the papers are published. But in short, I can say yes and no

I think yesterday was national ‘bring-your-screaming-kid-on-the-airplane’ day. Seriously, every flight, without fail, had a screaming child on board. I am surprised the lungs were still functional on the child who was on the last flight of our journey home…she screamed the entire 40min duration of the flight. The poor man who had to be seated next to the mother holding the screaming carpet-crawler had everyone around rooting for him and offering up words of encouragement. The poor mother knew it too, she didn’t make eye contact with a single person…just stared out the window the whole time, not acknowledging any part of the situation. If it were up to me though, I would switch the focus of some of those bright, young scientists who are currently trying to cure cancer and have them put their energy into figuring out how to quiet screaming babies on airplanes.

Speaking of airplanes, I don’t think it is too much to ask of US Airways to see that our luggage makes it on the connecting flight from Philadelphia to Providence…especially since we had more than an hour to kill in Philly. That being said, we showed up in Providence and waited by the baggage claim as a whopping 10 bags came around the carousal despite the flight being full.

And this white girl still managed to return from Mexico without a tan.

First of all, let me just say that I, hands down, heard the most annoying cell phone ring tone EVER while in Mexico. One of our drivers had a baby screaming, or crying, or maybe it was laughing (??) as his ring tone for his phone. Lets just say that man gets a lot of phone calls in a short period of time. One would hope that it is at least a recording of one of his own kids…

The ruins in Coba are set back in the jungle. The ruins date 600-900 AD and it is estimated to have had one of the largest populations of ancient Mayan cities (around 50,000 people). The grand pyramid (Nohoch Mul) at Coba is the only ruin that people are allowed to climb in the Yucatan and once at the top you get an amazing view over the jungle canopy. There are actually only a few ruins that have been excavated and uncovered at Coba, the rest (an estimated 6,000) are still buried under centuries of jungle overgrowth.

The tour guide mentioned Mel Gibson’s new movie, Acocalypto at one point. He claimed that the movie was actually fairly accurate to the Mayan Kingdom. He said that the only thing that was blatantly wrong was that at one point in the movie when the priest sacrifices one of the victims, the movie shows the priest being clean when in reality he would have been very bloody from the decapitation. Decapitation sacrifices were so central to the Mayan culture that there are skull carvings and sacrifice ritual carvings throughout the ruins.

I was actually surprised by the smell of the jungle. It wreaks. It smells like rotting…fruit, I guess. The amount of birds singing was overwhelming and equally frustrating because I could rarely spot them. I never realized how hard it would be to try to bird through thick jungle canopies. I probably only saw 10% of the different birds that I could hear singing in the canopy.

The picture below is of a weaver on his nest.

Equally disappointing was the lack of insect abundance that I could see. The only thing flying around was butterflies, which made the ruins seem somewhat magical. But other than that, I definitely missed the presence of flies (which are definitely abundant in North American forests during the day), beetles, parasitoids, and the like. I have a sneaking suspicion though that if I had returned to the jungle at night, it would be a completely different insect story being told. Most insects probably retreat during the day under the debris on the jungle floor avoiding the heat or are high up hiding in the canopy.

The lepidopteran below is mimicking a dead leaf as part of its natural defense against predation.

I’m not sure what species of caterpillars these are, but I have solicited the help of a friend who may know and will fill y’all in soon.

This last picture is of a termite nest up in the canopy.

Josh and I went horseback riding today…and the guides said it would be ‘though the jungles, mangroves, and out to the beach’. I don’t recall going through anything that jumped out as being a “jungle”, which made me come back to the hotel and look up the definition of a jungle. In my mind I picture thick vegetation and more rain forest-y type habitats. But according to Wikipedia, a jungle is “a dense forest in a hot climate”. Its also explained as such:

The word jungle originates from a Sanskrit word jangala, meaning “desert”. In many languages of the Indian subcontinent, including Indian English, it is generally used to refer to any wild, untended or uncultivated land, including forest, scrub, or desert landscapes.

A ‘desert’ is something I definitely felt on the ride. So that being the case, I definitely went through a hot climatic zone through some scrub forest. Once at the beach some people actually went swimming with their horses…not me though, gotta protect the camera.

Here are some selected photos from the day.

A tropical mockingbird

Some unidentified species of Ibis, the picture kind of sucks but give a girl some credit, I was trying to wrangle my horse with one hand while taking the photo with the other hand.

A close-up of a butterfly’s head.

I didn’t purposely put up a blurry photo of Japanese decor, there is a dragonfly in the right hand side of the photo.

Here is the same species of buprestid that I took a picture of the first day…this time in natural light.

A longhorn beetle

And finally, a leaf beetle (Chrysomelidae)…and as an added perk, it is demonstrating ‘reflex bleeding’ in its leg joints. The leaf beetle family uses this behavior as a defense mechanism.

Oh, and apparently the hotel staff do not have enough to do in a day because look at what they made us out of towels when they came to clean the room yesterday. Not gonna lie, it was kind of creepy.

Xcaret was an all day event but overall not too riveting. Josh and I may have been the only 2 people there who were not all that concerned with the staged sites and were more interested in seeing native insects and birds.

We saw several mariposas (which means butterflies in Spanish) and a longhorn beetle of some variety.

We also saw abejas nativas, which means native bees.

The bees are found in dried tree trunks throughout the jungles. These native bees cannot sting, which makes it a lot easier to collect honey than it is for us in the U.S. This bee was used by the Mayans as a basic ingredient in their meals and for indigenous medicine.

Another thing I noticed while out here is that the resort paints all their trees with this white sealant. I finally asked a staff member what that was all about and all they could tell me was that it was to protect the trees from a ‘bug’.

On to the birds…I think this first one is a golden-fronted woodpecker.

The next couple images are of a motmot.

An Orange Oriole.

A Great Kiskadee.

Xcaret has a sea turtle rearing facility…lots of babies and huge adults.

We also visited a Saint Francis of Assisi Chapel.

Xcaret also had a mushroon growing farm. I think the concept is a little bizzare…especially since I think mushrooms are gross. The mushrooms in the picture below are oyster mushrooms and are edible.

Lastly, here is a pretty waterfall we saw.

As it turns out, it is really hot and humid in Mexico. This being said, my hair is going to be in permanent frizz mode. My camera has been wigging out having to go from the air conditioned room to the hot/humid weather…it takes about 20min for the lenses to stop collecting condensation. And I just may be the only person you know that can go to Mexico white as a ghost and return from Mexico all the same.

Today the kind hotel staff booked several meetings with different people for us all day long in order to coordinate the activities for the rest of the week, so we haven’t been able to really leave the resort area. But we did manage to scope out the beach in front of our room.

But just within the resort area I did manage to find some friends.
Magnificent Frigatebird

Great-tailed Grackle

Osprey

Its definitely a little unique seeing Iguanas at the beach. And lastly, as we were walking back to our room after one of our meetings I found this buprestid beetle walking along the pathway.

Tomorrow we hit up Xcaret. I have a feeling it may be a little more touristy for my liking but I’ll let you know how it goes.

I’m writing you looking out at this gorgeous view of the Caribbean sea from the balcony of our hotel room in Mexico. This past week was one big wedding celebration for us, a whole gaggle of friends and family came in from 13 different states (and even Canada ). The week started off a little mellow with Wii battles and barbeque’s with smores.

And grew into arm wrestling contests and poker games…

The day before the wedding we had a group of 20+ go out for a whale watch out of provincetown at the tip of the cape.

The whale watch started a little slow…but quickly picked up after a hand full of our friends got a nice salt spray from the ocean.

We saw several sea birds that included Northern Gannets, Wilson’s storm petrels, and sooty shearwaters. To see more pictures of the birds click here. Make sure to double click on the thumbnail to see the larger photos.

And of course, there were minke and humpback whales. You can actually see the little fish jumping out of the whale’s mouth…and see that the gull has taken the opportunity to grab an easy lunch.

To see more pictures of the whales, click here. Same deal here, make sure you click on the thumbnails to see the larger photos when scrolling through.

I’ll be posting pictures from the wedding and reception soon for those of you who couldn’t be there, as well as pictures of the flora and fauna of the Riviera Maya as soon as Josh and I start exploring.

Arafa:

Can you list the names of insects that can produce light?

Picture Credit: Glowworm Tours in New Zealand

Bioluminescence has been described for several groups of plants, microbes, and animals. Insects that produce light include some springtails (Collembola), the fulgorid lantern bug (Hemiptera), some fungus gnats (Dipterans), and several families (Lampyridae, Elateridae, Drilidae, and Phengodidae) of beetles (Coleoptera).

Bioluminescence has been more heavily studied and described in the beetles. Members of the Lampyrids, or fireflies, have light-producing organs in their abdomens. Depending on the species, both males and females can produce light, as well as the larval stages. Luminescent larvae (of both beetles and flies) are often called glowworms. The light flash patterns, including duration and frequency, are species specific and are involved in mate attraction. Generally it is the males that are flashing in order to attract mates, but there are of course some crafty carnivorous females who light up to trick prey. Light is produced by a luciferase enzyme reaction where the pigment luciferin is oxidized.

Fungus gnat larvae found in caves in New Zealand have light producing organs that are modified parts of their malpighian tubules (waste removal system of the insect). The adult fly lays her egg on a mucus string from the ceiling and this is where the developing larvae hang from. Small insects flying through the caves are attracted to the bioluminescence and consequently get caught in the sticky threads where the developing larvae then feed on them.