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Tent Caterpillar
Tent caterpillars are moderately sized caterpillars, or moth larvae, belonging to the genus ''Malacosoma'' in the family Lasiocampidae. Twenty-six species have been described, six of which occur in North America and the rest in Eurasia. Some species are considered to have subspecies as well. They are often considered pests for their habit of defoliating trees. They are among the most social of all caterpillars and exhibit many noteworthy behaviors. Tent caterpillars are readily recognized because they are social, colorful, diurnal and build conspicuous silk tents in the branches of host trees. Some species, such as the eastern tent caterpillar, ''Malacosoma americanum'', and caterpillars of the small eggar moth, ''Eriogaster lanestris'', build a single large tent which is typically occupied through the whole of the larval stage, while others build a series of small tents that are sequentially abandoned. Whereas tent caterpillars make their tents in the nodes and branches of a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Eastern Tent Caterpillar
The eastern tent caterpillar (''Malacosoma americanum'') is a species of moth in the family Lasiocampidae, the tent caterpillars or lappet moths. It is univoltine, producing one generation per year. It is a tent caterpillar, a social species that forms communal nests in the branches of trees. It is sometimes confused with the spongy moth and the fall webworm, and may be erroneously referred to as a bagworm, which is the common name applied to unrelated caterpillars in the family Psychidae. The moths oviposit almost exclusively on trees in the plant family Rosaceae, particularly cherry (''Prunus'') and apple (''Malus''). The caterpillars are hairy with areas of blue, white, black and orange. The blue and white colors are structural colors created by the selective filtering of light by microtubules that arise on the cuticle. Social behavior Tent caterpillars are among the most social of larvae. The adult moth lays her eggs in a single batch in late spring or early summer. An ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Social Caterpillars
The collective behaviors of social caterpillars falls into five general categories: collective and cooperative foraging, group defense against predators and parasitoids, shelter building, thermoregulation and substrate silking to enhance steadfastness. The most behaviorally sophisticated of the insect societies are found among the ants, termites, bees, and wasps. While these insects are technically classified as eusocial insects they are commonly referred to simply as the social insects. In this scheme of classification, other non-eusocial, gregarious species of insects are referred to as presocial, subsocial, quasisocial, or in some other manner that has the unfortunate consequence of suggesting that are not quite social. Yet a significant number of insect species that do not possess the defining criteria of eusociality are by any other standard of classification clearly social and it is in this sense of the term, that employed by zoologists in general, that larval aggregates of m ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sugar Maple
''Acer saccharum'', the sugar maple, is a species of flowering plant in the soapberry and lychee family Sapindaceae. It is native to the hardwood forests of eastern Canada and eastern United States. Sugar maple is best known for being the primary source of maple syrup and for its brightly colored fall foliage. It may also be known as "rock maple", "sugar tree", "birds-eye maple", "sweet maple", "curly maple", or "hard maple", particularly when referring to the wood. Description ''Acer saccharum'' is a deciduous tree normally reaching heights of , and exceptionally up to . A 10-year-old tree is typically about tall. As with most trees, forest-grown sugar maples form a much taller trunk and narrower canopy than open-growth ones. The leaf, leaves are deciduous, up to long and wide, palmate, with five lobes and borne in opposite pairs. The basal lobes are relatively small, while the upper lobes are larger and deeply notched. In contrast with the angular notching of the silver ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pharate
A pupa ( la, pupa, "doll"; plural: ''pupae'') is the life stage of some insects undergoing transformation between immature and mature stages. Insects that go through a pupal stage are holometabolous: they go through four distinct stages in their life cycle, the stages thereof being egg, larva, pupa, and imago. The processes of entering and completing the pupal stage are controlled by the insect's hormones, especially juvenile hormone, prothoracicotropic hormone, and ecdysone. The act of becoming a pupa is called pupation, and the act of emerging from the pupal case is called eclosion or emergence. The pupae of different groups of insects have different names such as ''chrysalis'' for the pupae of butterflies and ''tumbler'' for those of the mosquito family. Pupae may further be enclosed in other structures such as cocoons, nests, or shells. Position in life cycle The pupal stage follows the larval stage and precedes adulthood (''imago'') in insects with complete metamorphosis ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Embryogenesis
An embryo is an initial stage of development of a multicellular organism. In organisms that reproduce sexually, embryonic development is the part of the life cycle that begins just after fertilization of the female egg cell by the male sperm cell. The resulting fusion of these two cells produces a single-celled zygote that undergoes many cell divisions that produce cells known as blastomeres. The blastomeres are arranged as a solid ball that when reaching a certain size, called a morula, takes in fluid to create a cavity called a blastocoel. The structure is then termed a blastula, or a blastocyst in mammals. The mammalian blastocyst hatches before implantating into the endometrial lining of the womb. Once implanted the embryo will continue its development through the next stages of gastrulation, neurulation, and organogenesis. Gastrulation is the formation of the three germ layers that will form all of the different parts of the body. Neurulation forms the nervous sys ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pheromone
A pheromone () is a secreted or excreted chemical factor that triggers a social response in members of the same species. Pheromones are chemicals capable of acting like hormones outside the body of the secreting individual, to affect the behavior of the receiving individuals. There are ''alarm signal, alarm pheromones'', ''food trail pheromones'', ''sex pheromones'', and many others that affect behavior or physiology. Pheromones are used by many organisms, from basic unicellular prokaryotes to complex multicellular eukaryotes. Their use among insects has been particularly well documented. In addition, some vertebrates, plants and ciliates communicate by using pheromones. The ecological functions and evolution of pheromones are a major topic of research in the field of chemical ecology. Background The portmanteau word "pheromone" was coined by Peter Karlson and Martin Lüscher in 1959, based on the Greek φερω ''pheroo'' ('I carry') and ὁρμων ''hormon'' ('stimulating'). P ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Instar
An instar (, from the Latin '' īnstar'', "form", "likeness") is a developmental stage of arthropods, such as insects, between each moult (''ecdysis''), until sexual maturity is reached. Arthropods must shed the exoskeleton in order to grow or assume a new form. Differences between instars can often be seen in altered body proportions, colors, patterns, changes in the number of body segments or head width. After shedding their exoskeleton (moulting), the juvenile arthropods continue in their life cycle until they either pupate or moult again. The instar period of growth is fixed; however, in some insects, like the salvinia stem-borer moth, the number of instars depends on early larval nutrition. Some arthropods can continue to moult after sexual maturity, but the stages between these subsequent moults are generally not called instars. For most insect species, an ''instar'' is the developmental stage of the larval forms of holometabolous (complete metamorphism) or nymphal forms o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Frass
Frass refers loosely to the more or less solid excreta of insects, and to certain other related matter. Definition and etymology ''Frass'' is an informal term and accordingly it is variously used and variously defined. It is derived from the German word ''Fraß'', which means the food takeup of an animal.M. Clark and O. Thyen. The Oxford-Duden German Dictionary. Publisher: Oxford University Press 1999. The English usage applies to excreted residues of anything that insects had eaten, and similarly, to other chewed or mined refuse that insects leave behind. It does not generally refer to fluids such as honeydew, but the point does not generally arise, and is largely ignored in this article. Such usage in English originated in the mid-nineteenth century at the latest. Modern technical English sources differ on the precise definition, though there is little actual direct contradiction on the practical realities. One glossary from the early twentieth century speaks of "...excrem ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Biological Life Cycle
In biology, a biological life cycle (or just life cycle or lifecycle when the biological context is clear) is a series of changes in form that an organism undergoes, returning to the starting state. "The concept is closely related to those of the life history, development and ontogeny, but differs from them in stressing renewal." Transitions of form may involve growth, asexual reproduction, or sexual reproduction. In some organisms, different "generations" of the species succeed each other during the life cycle. For plants and many algae, there are two multicellular stages, and the life cycle is referred to as alternation of generations. The term life history is often used, particularly for organisms such as the red algae which have three multicellular stages (or more), rather than two.Dixon, P.S. 1973. ''Biology of the Rhodophyta.'' Oliver & Boyd. Life cycles that include sexual reproduction involve alternating haploid (''n'') and diploid (2''n'') stages, i.e., a change of pl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fall Webworm
The fall webworm (''Hyphantria cunea'') is a moth in the family Erebidae known principally for its larval stage, which creates the characteristic webbed nests on the tree limbs of a wide variety of hardwoods in the late summer and fall. It is considered a pest but, does not harm otherwise healthy trees. It is well known to commercial tree services and arboriculturists. Description The adult fall webworm has a wingspan of approximately 30 mm and is generally white-colored, although some individuals may have dark-colored marks. Distribution The moth is native to North America, ranging from Canada to Mexico and has been introduced into other continents. Introduced to what was formerly Yugoslavia in the 1940s (firstly recorded in 1949), it now has occupied probably its entire range in Europe from France to the Caspian Sea in the east as well as penetrated into Central Asia: Turkmenistan (from 1990 to 1993), Uzbekistan (Fergana valley from 1996 to 1997), Kyrgyzstan, and sou ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Eriogaster Lanestris
''Eriogaster lanestris'', commonly known as the small eggar, is a moth of the family Lasiocampidae that is found across the Palearctic. Unlike many other members of the Lasiocampidae, the small eggar is a social insect. Historically, only eusocial insects like ants, bees, and termites were thought to exhibit complex social organization and communication systems. However, research since the late 20th century has found that ''E. lanestris'', among a number of other phylogenetically related moth and butterfly species, demonstrates social behaviors as well. Larvae spend nearly their entire development in colonies of about 200 individuals, and this grouped social structure offers a number of benefits, from thermoregulation to increased foraging success. The small eggar population has been in decline since the 1970s. Landscaping practices like hedgerow cutting and intensive mowing destroy habitats and damage cocoons during pupation, leading to scattered populations and increased rarity. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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