insects

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bug_girl March 23, 2013
22 7

Planet of the Arthropods

I’m on the radio! Skeptically Speaking asked me to talk a little bit about insect conservation, in order to round out an interview with the author of Rat Island. (I haven’t read the book yet, but it looks pretty fascinating.) I mostly discussed the 2012 report “Spineless”, published by IUCN (The International Union for Conservation of Nature). You might recognize…
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Science

bug_girl February 19, 2013
3 77

How to make a giant aluminum ant nest

The internets have been abuzz with this photo today (Click for the full size version). It’s a photo of an aluminum cast of an ant nest made by Walter Tschinkel, a Florida entomologist–but there haven’t been a lot of additional details. The nest you are looking at is one of a Florida harvester ant, and appeared with many other photos…
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Science

bug_girl July 2, 2012
16 14

Can Stick Insects really mate for 1400 hours?

I saw this tweet a while back, and it made me awfully curious: Is that true? Because that seems like not a very smart thing to do, if you are a large and tasty insect. Or, in this case, two large leaf-eating insects belonging to a group that specializes in being invisible to predators by looking like a stick. Two…
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Science

bug_girl April 21, 2012
6 2

Art made of Aedeagus

Well, sort of. An artist down under has created an exhibit of insect penises. (Or, to use the proper name for insect intromittent organs, aedeagi.)
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Science

bug_girl March 30, 2012
217 21

Waiter, There’s a Bug in my Frappuccino

This headline…may be a bit of an overstatement: "Soy Strawberry Frappuccinos are the latest threat to the vegan community." Vegans are feeling threatened(?) by the revelation that Starbucks Soy Frappuccinos contain insect juice. Specifically, cochineal insect extract used as a reddish food coloring. Is there really "bug juice" in your Strawberry Frappuccino? Yes!
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Science

bug_girl May 20, 2011
9 3

Debugging Grace Hopper

Do you know who Grace Hopper is? And that she has an entomological connection? I should give her the proper title–Rear Admiral Hopper. (A biography described her as “Admiral of the Cybersea.”)
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Science

bug_girl May 12, 2011
30 0

Bees, CCD, and Cellphones: Still no Link

Once again, the media is going bonkers over a bee paper, and making claims way out of proportion to any actual results. OMG RADIATIONS IN MAI BEEZ!!!
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bug_girl February 14, 2011
16 6

Shellac: it’s a bug AND a feature!

Happy Valentines Day! This holiday is traditionally celebrated with a gift of plant genitalia and candy to one’s beloved. The flowers exist to attract pollinating insects, and the candy has an insect connection you might not know about. A common theme at my Bug Blog is that you eat insects on a regular basis. And, frankly, that you need to…
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