Many of these have bright colors, such as black-and-yellow stripes, to warn enemies away. The mandibles are the jaws. Their eggs or young survive in sheltered places and emerge in spring. The body of an insect has three parts. Larvae usually look nothing like the adult insect. Nearly all caterpillars are phytophagous, but one unusual moth caterpillar (Ceratophaga vicinella) scavenges on the tough keratin shells of dead gopher tortoises. Check out our fun insect facts for kids. hޤ��n�6����R���Hi7A�v�n@�(�A�K�ee�\7����[��$+���
۴��;��x(^��#�U�_((D�G@�S,ÌB�W?7^����&����! The air then diffuses down the blind-ended tracheae. By using ThoughtCo, you accept our, Insects May Be Small, but They Use It to Their Advantage. Each animal begins with a different letter, and has its own content page with relevant pictures, quick information, fun facts, and short poems. Silkworms and bees have been used extensively by humans for the production of silk and honey, respectively. They can be found living in the oceans. Insects have adapted to living in the darkness of caverns and at altitudes only a Sherpa can appreciate. The third kind of eye is barely an eye at all. Learn about different insect parts, which insects can walk on water, how ants communicate and much more. Some insects get enough water from their food, be it moist plants or goo-filled prey, but others do need to drink water! And these insects weren't tiny, either. There are several ways conducted by the adult bugs to move. Their relationship is so sophisticated they've developed their own vocabulary and communicate with each other by squeaking. Interesting facts about bottlenose dolphins, Interesting facts about breakfast cereals, Interesting facts about Olympic Mountains, Interesting facts about the Atacama Desert, Interesting facts about molten chocolate cake, Interesting facts about golden lion tamarins, Interesting facts about the Canadian Rockies. There are numerous examples of flowering plants that require a specific insect pollinator to set seed. Beetles have chewing mouthparts, as do grasshoppers, termites, and stick insects. They All Have the Same Basic Mouthparts, but Use Them Differently. 3) Dragonflies have been on earth for 300 million years! How these structures are modified reveals a lot about how and what an insect eats. Hercules beetles can lift 850 times their own weight. They First Appeared on Earth at Least 400 Million Years Ago. Insects are the planet's most efficient decomposers, breaking down everything from carcasses to dung to fallen logs. There Are Three Different Kinds of Insect "Eyes". Some Form Relationships, and Even Care for Their Young. Springtails are no longer classified as insects. Three arthropod orders that were once neatly listed under the Class Insecta were cast aside. Insects have many different ways of communicating. Locusts can eat their own weight in food in a day. endobj An insect can withstand falls because its minimal weight means it lands with significantly less force. They live on glaciers, in tropical jungles, in scorching deserts, and even on the surface of the oceans. Insects outnumber all other terrestrial animals. Insects are mostly solitary, but some, such as certain bees, ants and termites, are social and live in large, well-organized colonies. <>stream Life On White/Getty Images. The three orders – Protura, Collembola, and Diplura – now stand separately as entognathous hexapods instead of insects. All Canada Photos/Jared Hobbs/Getty Images. The fossil record of insects takes us back an astounding 400 million years. Many of the adult insects we observe have large eyes called compound eyes for detecting light and images. With an average life of one to 24 hours, mayflies are the insect with the shortest life span. �4�kB����LVb>��X����\�ʿ��S�|�y�99kOM�F����P�?�t�xJ, http://www.littleworksheets.com/grade2reading.html. Air enters the tubes through a row of holes along an insect’s abdomen. Insect mouthparts are modified to suit their diet. Here are other interesting facts about bugs to note: Facts about Bugs 1: where to find insects? All insects have sense organs that allow them to see, smell, taste, hear, and touch their environment. <> They farm fungus and disperse seeds. The first part is the insect’s head. Insects that feed on blood, like mosquitoes, also have piercing, sucking mouthparts. They can be seen swimming, flying and walking. Certain colors and patterns, called aposematic coloration, warn potential predators that they're about to make a bad choice if they try to eat the insect in question. Insects can even be found in icy habitats. Acrobat Distiller 9.5.1 (Windows); modified using iTextSharp 4.1.6 by 1T3XT An insect's relatively large surface area creates a lot of drag as it moves through the air, so it slows down as it reaches the end of its travels. All insects have six legs. They control weeds, kill crop pests, and pollinate crops and other flowering plants. The larvae enter a pupa, chrysalis or cocoon. It’s fastest recorded speed has been up to 145 kilometers (90 miles) per hour. An insect’s mouth is specially designed for the kind of food it eats. Others are resplendent and sparkly, in patterns of fiery orange, royal blue, or emerald green. That’s equivalent to a human lifting 10 elephants. Perhaps the most remarkable example of insect relationships is that of the bess beetles. Insects are everywhere. We encounter them every day. In some cultures, insects, especially deep-fried cicadas, are considered to be delicacies, whereas in other places they form part of the normal diet. If we count every kind of land animal known thus far, from rodents to humans and everything in between, that total is still only about a third of the known insect species. The dragonfly eye is perhaps the most sophisticated of all, with more than 10,000 ommatidia in each compound eye. Most insects live on land, in fact about 97% do. The red disa orchid, Disa uniflora, relies on a single species of butterfly (the mountain pride butterfly, Aeropetes tulbaghia) for its pollination. Insects are small animals with a three-part body (head, thorax and abdomen), three pairs of jointed legs, compound eyes and one pair of antennae. Some insects survive the cold by hibernating. As a group, insects dominate the planet. 2 0 obj We've only begun to identify and describe the insects on earth, and the list is already over one million species and climbing. Debbie Hadley is a science educator with 25 years of experience who has written on science topics for over a decade. An adult insect emerges from the pupa. Who knew there are Mr. Moms among the arthropods? While the greatest abundance and diversity of insects occur in the tropics, you can find a remarkable number of insect species in your own backyard. The oldest definitive insect fossil, Rhyniognatha hirsti, is estimated to be 407 to 396 million years old. These 10 fascinating facts about insects may surprise you. Insects like water striders can literally walk on water, by distributing their low body mass in a way that maximizes the water's surface tension. Butterflies and moths drink fluids and have mouthparts formed into a proboscis or straw for doing so efficiently. Most insects take little or no care of their young, but social insects are an exception. These arthropods do have six legs, but other morphological traits distinguish them from their insect cousins. Beetles, of the insect order Coleoptera, are the most biodiverse group of creatures known, with more than 380,000 species described to date, making up 40 percent of all insect species on the books. The hypopharynx is a tongue-like structure that projects forward. Some scientists estimate the actual number of distinct insect species may be as high as 30 million. Portions of this work have been adapted or used directly from sources in the Creative Commons. Some immature insects have compound eyes, too. A fierce hunter, it can reach speeds of 9 kilometers (5.6 miles) per hour when chasing prey. About Insectsapplication/pdfReading Comprehension Grade 2http://www.littleworksheets.com/grade2reading.htmlReading Comprehension Grade 2 Dung beetles can navigate only when the Milky Way or clusters of bright stars are visible and are the only insect known to orient itself by use of the galaxy. endobj 2) Fruit flies were the first living creatures to be sent into space. Bess beetles form family units, with both parents working together to rear their young. Some Insects Fill Specific Ecological Roles. This is the case with some lace bug and stink bug mothers; they guard their eggs until they hatch, and even stay with the young nymphs, fending off predators. Keep reading to find out 10 weird and fun facts about insects. They don’t need much, however: a simple raindrop will do. While fossil evidence of insects from before the Devonian period is unlikely to exist, we do have fossil plant evidence from that time. The total weight of all the insects is about 70 times as much as all the people.