Here are some fun, interesting and amazing facts about Madagascar hissing Cockroach...
These hissing cockroaches are native only to the island of Madagascar, and if you see them anywhere else on earth … someone brought them there.
The males are territorial, and they fight intruders. Some may say that a Madagascar hissing cockroach is as stubborn as a goat because they fight ‘butting heads’ similar to a goat’s behavior.
Baby Madagascar hissing cockroaches are called ‘nymphs’.
Female Madagascar hissing cockroaches only breed once in a lifetime, but can have as many as three litters annually.
Madagascar hissing roaches grow to reach 3-4 inches in length.
Like dogs and cats have fleas, Madagascar hissing cockroaches carry mites but they cannot hurt or live on humans. A good way to remove them from a Madagascar hissing cockroach is to place the little creature in a plastic bag with a teaspoon of flour, and gently shake.
The Madagascar hissing cockroach lives as an important scavenger in their native habitat by keeping the jungle floor clean, but in captivity a good meal is a serving of dog or cat food and a piece of fresh fruit.
Baby Madagascar hissing cockroaches (nymphs) are about the length of a small watermelon seed and they are flat.
Momma Madagascar hissing cockroaches carry their babies for exactly sixty days.
The Madagascar hissing cockroach produces the famous hissing sound by forcing air out of tiny places on the sides of their bodies called ’spiracles’. They use the hissing sound for communication with other Madagascar hissing cockroaches, during mating, while fighting or when they feel threatened.
A Madagascar hissing cockroach’s feet are sticky.
A Madagascar hissing cockroach has lots of enemies. Some insects, mammals, birds, and reptiles would love to eat them.
The Madagascar hissing cockroach is nocturnal, meaning that they are more active at night. They are actually afraid of light.
The Madagascar hissing cockroach may be a member of the roach family but unlike others roaches, they have no wings.
Nymphs go through seven stages of growth before reaching adulthood, molting six times.
The average life span of a Madagascar hissing cockroach is anywhere from two to three years.
A nymph can mature faster in warmer climates.
When a Madagascar hissing cockroach sheds its exoskeleton, they eat it because it’s filled with nutrients.
Scientists tell the males and females apart by their horns, actually they are called pronatal humps, but they appear hornlike. These pronatal humps are more pronounced in the male species.
Out of all of the species in the cockroach family researchers believe that the Madagascar hissing cockroach is most like the prehistoric cockroaches that roamed the earth long before the dinosaurs. They are also called ‘living fossils’ for this reason.
Source: avivadirectory , factsnfacts
Showing posts with label insects. Show all posts
Showing posts with label insects. Show all posts
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Saturday, June 13, 2009
Facts about Dragonfly
Here are some really interesting facts about dragonfly...
Dragonfly eyes contain up to 30,000 individual lenses. Human eyes only have one.
They have two sets of wings. They don’t have to beat their wings in unison like other insects do. Their front wings can be going up while their backs ones are going down.
They only flap their wings at about 30 beats per second (bps) compared to a bee’s 300 bps.
Excellent and strong fliers, they can loop-the-loop, hover, and fly backwards.
An Australian variety has been clocked at 36 miles per hour.
Dragonfly nymphs (the first stage after hatching) live in the water for about a year.
While underwater they eat mosquito nymphs, tiny fish, and pollywogs. When they have matured to airborne insects, they catch mosquitoes and gnats in mid-air before devouring them.
After leaving the water and becoming flying insects, they only live for about a month.
Their natural predators are birds.
Among the many names for dragonflies around the world are Old Glassy from China, Water Dipper from England and Big Needle of Wings from the ancient Celts.
Source: chevroncars.com , Interesting Facts
Dragonfly eyes contain up to 30,000 individual lenses. Human eyes only have one.
They have two sets of wings. They don’t have to beat their wings in unison like other insects do. Their front wings can be going up while their backs ones are going down.
They only flap their wings at about 30 beats per second (bps) compared to a bee’s 300 bps.
Excellent and strong fliers, they can loop-the-loop, hover, and fly backwards.
An Australian variety has been clocked at 36 miles per hour.
Dragonfly nymphs (the first stage after hatching) live in the water for about a year.
While underwater they eat mosquito nymphs, tiny fish, and pollywogs. When they have matured to airborne insects, they catch mosquitoes and gnats in mid-air before devouring them.
After leaving the water and becoming flying insects, they only live for about a month.
Their natural predators are birds.
Among the many names for dragonflies around the world are Old Glassy from China, Water Dipper from England and Big Needle of Wings from the ancient Celts.
Source: chevroncars.com , Interesting Facts
Friday, June 12, 2009
Facts about Butterflies
Here are some really interesting facts about butterflies...
Butterflies range in size from a tiny 1/8 inch to a huge almost 12 inches.
Butterflies can see red, green, and yellow.
Some people say that when the black bands on the Woolybear caterpillar are wide, a cold winter is coming.
The top butterfly flight speed is 12 miles per hour. Some moths can fly 25 miles per hour!
Monarch butterflies journey from the Great Lakes to the Gulf of Mexico, a distance of about 2,000 miles, and return to the north again in the spring.
Butterflies cannot fly if their body temperature is less than 86 degrees.
Representations of butterflies are seen in Egyptian frescoes at Thebes, which are 3,500 years old.
Antarctica is the only continent on which no Lepidoptera have been found.
There are about 24,000 species of butterflies. The moths are even more numerous: about 140,000 species of them were counted all over the world.
The Brimstone butterfly (Gonepterix rhamni) has the longest lifetime of the adult butterflies: 9-10 months.
Some Case Moth caterpillars (Psychidae) build a case around themselves that they always carry with them. It is made of silk and pieces of plants or soil.
The caterpillars of some Snout Moths (Pyralididae) live in or on water-plants.
The females of some moth species lack wings, all they can do to move is crawl.
The Morgan's Sphinx Moth from Madagascar has a proboscis (tube mouth) that is 12 to 14 inches long to get the nectar from the bottom of a 12 inch deep orchid discovered by Charles Darwin.
Some moths never eat anything as adults because they don't have mouths. They must live on the energy they stored as caterpillars.
Many butterflies can taste with their feet to find out whether the leaf they sit on is good to lay eggs on to be their caterpillars' food or not.
There are more types of insects in one tropical rain forest tree than there are in the entire state of Vermont.
In 1958 Entomologist W.G. Bruce published a list of Arthropod references in the Bible. The most frequently named bugs from the Bible are: Locust: 24, Moth: 11, Grasshopper: 10, Scorpion: 10, Caterpillar: 9, and Bee: 4.
People eat insects – called "Entomophagy"(people eating bugs) – it has been practiced for centuries throughout Africa, Australia, Asia, the Middle East, and North, Central and South America. Why? Because many bugs are both protein-rich and good sources of vitamins, minerals and fats.
Many insects can carry 50 times their own body weight. This would be like an adult person lifting two heavy cars full of people.
There are over a million described species of insects. Some people estimate there are actually between 15 and 30 million species.
Most insects are beneficial to people because they eat other insects, pollinate crops, are food for other animals, make products we use (like honey and silk) or have medical uses.
Butterflies and insects have their skeletons on the outside of their bodies, called the exoskeleton. This protects the insect and keeps water inside their bodies so they don’t dry out.
Source: thebutterflysite.com , factsnfacts.com
Butterflies range in size from a tiny 1/8 inch to a huge almost 12 inches.
Butterflies can see red, green, and yellow.
Some people say that when the black bands on the Woolybear caterpillar are wide, a cold winter is coming.
The top butterfly flight speed is 12 miles per hour. Some moths can fly 25 miles per hour!
Monarch butterflies journey from the Great Lakes to the Gulf of Mexico, a distance of about 2,000 miles, and return to the north again in the spring.
Butterflies cannot fly if their body temperature is less than 86 degrees.
Representations of butterflies are seen in Egyptian frescoes at Thebes, which are 3,500 years old.
Antarctica is the only continent on which no Lepidoptera have been found.
There are about 24,000 species of butterflies. The moths are even more numerous: about 140,000 species of them were counted all over the world.
The Brimstone butterfly (Gonepterix rhamni) has the longest lifetime of the adult butterflies: 9-10 months.
Some Case Moth caterpillars (Psychidae) build a case around themselves that they always carry with them. It is made of silk and pieces of plants or soil.
The caterpillars of some Snout Moths (Pyralididae) live in or on water-plants.
The females of some moth species lack wings, all they can do to move is crawl.
The Morgan's Sphinx Moth from Madagascar has a proboscis (tube mouth) that is 12 to 14 inches long to get the nectar from the bottom of a 12 inch deep orchid discovered by Charles Darwin.
Some moths never eat anything as adults because they don't have mouths. They must live on the energy they stored as caterpillars.
Many butterflies can taste with their feet to find out whether the leaf they sit on is good to lay eggs on to be their caterpillars' food or not.
There are more types of insects in one tropical rain forest tree than there are in the entire state of Vermont.
In 1958 Entomologist W.G. Bruce published a list of Arthropod references in the Bible. The most frequently named bugs from the Bible are: Locust: 24, Moth: 11, Grasshopper: 10, Scorpion: 10, Caterpillar: 9, and Bee: 4.
People eat insects – called "Entomophagy"(people eating bugs) – it has been practiced for centuries throughout Africa, Australia, Asia, the Middle East, and North, Central and South America. Why? Because many bugs are both protein-rich and good sources of vitamins, minerals and fats.
Many insects can carry 50 times their own body weight. This would be like an adult person lifting two heavy cars full of people.
There are over a million described species of insects. Some people estimate there are actually between 15 and 30 million species.
Most insects are beneficial to people because they eat other insects, pollinate crops, are food for other animals, make products we use (like honey and silk) or have medical uses.
Butterflies and insects have their skeletons on the outside of their bodies, called the exoskeleton. This protects the insect and keeps water inside their bodies so they don’t dry out.
Source: thebutterflysite.com , factsnfacts.com
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Interesting Facts about ants
Here are some interesting and astonishing facts about ants. Read them and see what this little creature has got...
If a man could run as fast for his size as an ant can, he could run as fast as a racehorse.
Ants can lift 20 times their own body weight.
With their combined weight greater than the combined weight of all humans, ants are the most numerous type of animal.
The abdomen of the ant contains two stomachs. One stomach holds the food for itself and second stomach is for food to be shared with other ants.
An ant brain has about 250 000 brain cells. A human brain has 10,000 million so a colony of 40,000 ants has collectively the same size brain as a human. Ant brains are largest amongst insects. An ant's brain may have the same processing power as a Macintosh II computer. Thousands of years ago, King Solomon wrote: "Go to the ant, consider its ways and be wise".
The average life expectancy of an ant is 45-60 days.
Adult ants cannot chew and swallow solid food. They rely on juice which they squeeze from pieces of food.
There are over 10000 known species of ants.
Some worker ants are given the job of taking the rubbish from the nest and putting it outside in a special rubbish dump.
Some birds put ants in their feathers because the ants squirt formic acid which gets rid of the parasites. The Slave-Maker Ant (Polyergus Rufescens) raids the nests of other ants and steals their pupae. When these new ants hatch,they work as slaves within the colony.
If a worker ant has found a good source for food, it leaves a trail of scent so that the other ants in the colony can find the food.
Army Ants are nomadic and they are always moving. They carry their larvae and their eggs with them in a long column.
The Army Ant (Ecitron Burchelli) of South America, can have as many as 700,000 members in its colony. The Leaf Cutter Ants cut out pieces of leaves which they take back to their nests.
Wood ant workers live seven to ten years.
The queen ant lives up to ten or twenty years.
The wood ant can threaten the enemy with open jaws.
There are thirty-five thousand kinds of ants in the world.
Some ants sleep seven hours a day.
Ants are normally from 2 to 7 mm long, although carpenter ants can stretch to 2 cm, or almost an inch.
Some ants care for and "farm" other insects.
Source: thaibugs
If a man could run as fast for his size as an ant can, he could run as fast as a racehorse.
Ants can lift 20 times their own body weight.
With their combined weight greater than the combined weight of all humans, ants are the most numerous type of animal.
The abdomen of the ant contains two stomachs. One stomach holds the food for itself and second stomach is for food to be shared with other ants.
An ant brain has about 250 000 brain cells. A human brain has 10,000 million so a colony of 40,000 ants has collectively the same size brain as a human. Ant brains are largest amongst insects. An ant's brain may have the same processing power as a Macintosh II computer. Thousands of years ago, King Solomon wrote: "Go to the ant, consider its ways and be wise".
The average life expectancy of an ant is 45-60 days.
Adult ants cannot chew and swallow solid food. They rely on juice which they squeeze from pieces of food.
There are over 10000 known species of ants.
Some worker ants are given the job of taking the rubbish from the nest and putting it outside in a special rubbish dump.
Some birds put ants in their feathers because the ants squirt formic acid which gets rid of the parasites. The Slave-Maker Ant (Polyergus Rufescens) raids the nests of other ants and steals their pupae. When these new ants hatch,they work as slaves within the colony.
If a worker ant has found a good source for food, it leaves a trail of scent so that the other ants in the colony can find the food.
Army Ants are nomadic and they are always moving. They carry their larvae and their eggs with them in a long column.
The Army Ant (Ecitron Burchelli) of South America, can have as many as 700,000 members in its colony. The Leaf Cutter Ants cut out pieces of leaves which they take back to their nests.
Wood ant workers live seven to ten years.
The queen ant lives up to ten or twenty years.
The wood ant can threaten the enemy with open jaws.
There are thirty-five thousand kinds of ants in the world.
Some ants sleep seven hours a day.
Ants are normally from 2 to 7 mm long, although carpenter ants can stretch to 2 cm, or almost an inch.
Some ants care for and "farm" other insects.
Source: thaibugs
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