Something fun for a Friday afternoon! I have commented before on how I find Japanese culture both baffling and fascinating. The butt-biting bug was one example–here’s another one.
A game show contest that involves a high jump. But…also…
The contestants are dressed as giant insects.
And if you fail at the high jump, two girls dressed as spiders [...]
A really cool new paper about just how ants keep aphids as “cattle”:
Ant semiochemicals limit apterous aphid dispersal. Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences. Thomas H Oliver, et al.
Some background:
Aphid poop is actually a concentrated sugar solution–it’s called “honeydew“. Some species of ants tend aphids, and “milk” them for [...]
Yes, after a long hiatus, I posted something over at Skepchick!
Seems a lady discovered there was PORN (i.e, romance novels) in her public library! And they let her teenager check one out! And the world is ending!
Several other insects besides silkworms make silk, but not much has been known about the structure of those compounds. Bee and ant larvae produce silk and, although the silks in all these species are produced by the same glands, they use them quite differently. New research finds these silks are quite different than spider [...]
Totally NOT safe for work, but insect related. And you know you can count on The Bug to bring you all things Insectile!
A vibrating dragonfly for your penis:
“Like the edible costume jewelry we got at Halloween, the Waterproof Dragonfly Ring looks strange on us, and presents more problems than it solves. One fits himself [...]
Someone did an AWESOME job of putting together a video demonstrating that the “ghost” visible on this gas station camera was actually…an insect. He included footage of other famous ghost insects from the past as well. Enjoy! (and read the full story at Skepchick).
…and I’m trying to decide what to do about it. I got my page proofs last night for a journal article in an Entomological Society of America journal. Yay! But here’s what pissed me off so much–for the SECOND TIME, the email from the editorial office came addressed to “Dear Sir”.
Goddamn. It’s freakin’ 2007, and [...]
Mexico takes action to try to stop illegal logging:
“The 50 million peso (US$4.6 million, €3.1 million) plan will buy equipment and advertising for the Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve, a 124,000-acre (50,180-hectare) wooded park in Mexico’s Michoacan state, where clouds of orange- and black-winged butterflies nest each winter after flying south from Canada and the U.S.”
This [...]
I’m afraid I have been a very Bad Bug Blogger lately–I am sooooo swamped. My new job is kicking my butt (in a good way). Oh, and there’s the little matter of a paper I’m supposed to give in 2 weeks at the ESA conference…
Fortunately, many of my fellow bloggers are writing [...]
Interesting….combine Radiohead’s “All I Need” with clips from the (totally awesome!) movie Microcosmos, and you have a pretty cool music video:
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