Researchers: “We’ve thought for a long time that flowering plants must have contributed to the extraordinary number of moth and butterfly species we see today, but we haven’t been able to test that. This study helps us see if prior hypotheses line up, and what we find is that the plant hypothesis does, but the bat hypothesis does not.”
Tag: moths
Deaf moth has “completely new” noise-making defence against predators
Just how the moth developed such a defense is unclear. It doesn’t know about the world of sound and can’t be striving for anything one way or the other. A vast cascade of lucky accidents?
Moths use “acoustic camouflage” to evade bats
Their fuzz works like an acoustic panel to cut down the noise volume from their movements. From ScienceDaily: While some moths have evolved ears that detect the ultrasonic calls of bats, many types of moths remain deaf. In those moths, Neil has found that the insects developed types of “stealth coating” that serve as acoustic […]