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Ross Piper Profile picture
Ross Piper
@DrRossPiper
Zoologist, Entomologist, Author https://t.co/8hFRnmGNeR, Presenter, @RGS_IBG Fellow
May 10, 2021 • 7 tweets • 3 min read
The lengths some mothers go to.

Female beewolf squeezing symbiotic bacteria from special cavities in her antennae.

Why? Read the thread to find out.

⬇️

📷Ehard Strohm Image The symbiotic bacteria (Streptomyces philanthi) are unique to beewolves, cultured only in antennal cavities of the female.
Dec 3, 2019 • 9 tweets • 2 min read
Thread

If you've never heard of the telephone pole beetle (Micromalthus debilis), then you're missing out. It's life-cycle is about as extreme as it gets. No sex. Just weirdness.

Scroll down to find out what the very rare male does to its mum.

📷David R Maddison Most populations of this wood-munching beetle consist entirely of female larvae (diploid) that give birth to mobile triungulin larvae.
Nov 4, 2019 • 11 tweets • 3 min read
I was reading about reproduction in TINY egg parasitoids earlier (as you do) and it's broken my brain a bit because it's so bonkers. See THREAD⬇️. Remember that all of this action takes place in the microcosm of an insect egg (Copidosoma floridanum📷Scott Justis) Image The female wasp lays a SINGLE egg in the host (certain moths). The egg divides again and again to form an undifferentiated mass - the polymorula. This photo shows the sequence of development from egg to polymorula to larvae (Segoli et al 2009) Image
Aug 16, 2019 • 8 tweets • 3 min read
Today I've been unpacking some beewolves. Follow the thread for a whistle-stop tour of some of the internal anatomy of these wasps. Here's the abdomen with the ventral plates (sternites removed). Lots of important gubbins (technical term) in here. Most animals have a ventral nerve cord - very easy to see here.