Male crickets must choose between life and love

Calling or not calling, it's always a difficult question for male crickets. Because the cry can bring them love, but it can also be death.

Male crickets take up love songs to seduce crickets, but they can also bring death because it attracts even parasitic flies to reproduce on the body.

(Photo: Genomenewsnetwork) The parasitic fly is called Ormia ochracea. They dig on the host's body and after 1 week start gnawing on the parts, cutting the body and killing the animal as they proliferate.

Researchers have known this for a long time. They also knew that the "tragedy" was so heavy that the crickets in Hawaii could not keep traditional couple love songs. But new research has found that the dangers posed by parasites change drastically the males' way of calling and their reactions when parasites are lurking around.

"It is a very expensive price. If you are a male cricket and do not speak, you will not be able to get a mate but live longer. If you sing, you attract both lovers and enemies," micro animal Jane Brockmann at Florida University, USA, said.

In an experiment with wild crickets in Florida, Brockmann and colleagues caught male crickets and put them in a field, recording their sounds in the spring and autumn.

In northern Florida, parasitic flies only appear in the fall. Researchers found crickets cried on this schedule - 75% of males cried in the spring, compared with only 43% in the fall.

The results on the crickets are similar. During mating, females are very aggressive, almost dominate the male."In the spring, the girls were very excited. As soon as they heard the cry, they rushed to the place where the sound came from. But in the fall, they were much more cautious , " Brockmann said. "They hesitate and take longer to get closer to the sound source." This shows that it is easy to be afraid of being the target of parasitic flies.

However, the researchers also found that the males who did not call again wandered until they met a certain girl. In addition, although they do not sound in the fall, but the one who has complained is long. This will put them at greater risk of being attacked, but help them get closer to her. So the price paid is also worth it.

The results of the study shed light on the contradiction of natural selection pressure - the ability to survive, with sexual selection pressure - the ability to mate.

MT