Biology Stack Exchange
Biology Stack Exchange

Questions tagged [entomology]

The scientific study of Insects. If the question is about some other group of arthropod use 'arthropod' tag.

Questions about the biology and identification of members of Insecta.

Insecta is a group of arthropods with the following basic characteristics:

  • body divided into head, thorax and abdomen
  • three pairs of thoracic legs.

This group includes arthropods such as Butterflies/Moths (), Flies (), Beetles (Coleopterans), Bees/ (Hymenopterans), and true bugs (Hemipterans).

  • Insects do not include Chelicerates, myriapods, or crustaceans. If any of these (or arthropods in general) are the focus of your question, please use the tag.

    • If the question is about arachnids (spiders, ticks, or mites) use tag .

Questions about pest insects can include the tag or the tag if appropriate.

  • If you are curious about or think you may have found bed bugs, please see this post

See also and use other tags to narrow the field of your question.

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Why do cockroaches flip over when they die?

This question has always mystified me since young. For beetles, I can reason that they flip over because they have a higher centre of gravity causing them to be in unstable equilibrium when they tuck in their legs when they are about to die. For…
Question Overflow
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Are mosquitoes repelled by high frequency sound?

I am totally confused whether ask this question to physics or biology stackexchange. I downloaded a mobile application which claims to repel mosquitoes. This application basically produces sound from 16kHz to 22kHz (I doubt that it even produces…
Santosh Kumar
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If I squash an insect and it produces red "juice", does it always mean it is a blood-sucking type?

If I squash an insect and it produces red "juice", does it always mean it is a blood-sucking type of insect? Or do some insects have red "juice" themselves, so the color is red on its own and not caused by sucking higher animal's blood? I squashed a…
Honza Zidek
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How to protect my mounted insect specimens from ... insects?

I have a modest collection of insect specimens that I caught, prepared, mounted, and dried myself. I'm entirely an amateur collector, so my procedure may be causing me this trouble now, but here's how I preserved them. Killed in the freezer Placed…
user3970
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How long does a mosquito take to land on a host, bite, and fly off?

How long does a mosquito take to land on a host, start its bite, end its bite and then fly off? And what about different species? I am most interested in human hosts. References to web sites or books would be appreciated. I cannot find this even…
finch
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Can butterflies still fly after their wings are touched?

When I was a kid, I was told not to ever touch a butterflies wing, as it would lose its ability to fly. This was because of some dust which was supposed to be in place on the wings and when disturbed it had the described consequences. I doubt at…
Karolas
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How do insects survive the winter?

I had an interesting discussion today in which the question arose how insects survive in the winter. Since they need a high enough external temperature to be active, this seems a bit difficult in the winter. With frost they should completely freeze…
Chris
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Why do cockroaches burst from soapy water?

(careful, disturbing!) I was experimenting with some stray cockroaches that ended up falling in my bath tub overnight (there is currently an infestation undergoing in my apartment building) and I found out that they are very easily killed by simply…
user1306322
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Are there any solitary species of ant or termite?

The social insects consist of the ants, the bees, and the termites, which live in colonies rather than living solitary. But I've heard that there are some species of bee which are solitary and don't live in colonies. Are there also any species…
hippietrail
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How far can a mosquito fly over the sea?

My question is: how far can a mosquito fly over the sea? I am interested to know, because from this, I could possibly deduce on which islands there either might not be mosquitoes or on which it would be achievable to eradicate all mosquitoes until…
O0123
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Why are bugs attracted to light bulbs but not flames?

Just now, a housefly was bugging me a lot and I wanted to get rid of it. My mother suggested me to turn off the lightbulb and off it went. However a small flame was burning in my room. Why didn't the housefly get attracted to the flame (although it…
Berry Holmes
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Constantly wiggling moth pupa - will it emerge soon?

Today I found a moth pupa in the soil in my garden in western Sweden. It's about 15 mm long. I have found similar ones before, but this one is wiggling a lot more, even after I put it down and put a bit of dirt over it. It's been moving for more…
picapica
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Is it true that bees and wasps don't sting if struck by hand while they are in flight?

Is it true that wasps don't sting if struck by hand while flying? I know of one person who claims to have done this at least 20 times and has never been stung. And out of curiosity (not that I'd want to kill them), what about bees?
Andreas Zollmann
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Is there something that makes flies slower at high altitudes?

At first glance, higher altitudes equal lower temperatures, which would likely slow down cellular metabolism. However, while backpacking in New Mexico in ~90 degree weather, I experienced the same thing -- the flies were slow enough I was able to…
USER_8675309
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Why are mosquitoes repelled by smoke?

A well known way to have a rest of mosquitoes during camping is to stand in the fire's smoke. Moreover, I learned recently that shepherds in certain regions of Africa use the same tactic for cattle. They make smoky fires and cattle gathers in smoke…
Yrogirg
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