In the fairy tale books of childhood, butterflies and moths are treated differently: a fairy in a beautiful dress and dancing, and a bad witch who is gray and mischievous. When you grow up, when you see butterflies in the garden, you will feel picturesque and fragrant, and if you see moths, you are either afraid that their "poisonous powder" will get on your skin, or you will try to get rid of them quickly.
Butterflies and moths are all made of insects breaking their cocoons, is it just because of the level of appearance that there is such a different fate arrangement?
Figureworm creative
01
Although the impression is very different
But in fact, they are really close relatives
Unlike most insects that are labeled with pejorative labels such as "disgusting" and "dirty", butterflies are often accompanied by Liang Zhu's BGM, gracefully flying in the flowers, sometimes stopping at the heart of the flower, sometimes flying together. In people's minds, butterflies are a symbol of beauty, elegance and love, but there is also an insect related to butterflies - moths, although similar in shape, but its impression in people's minds is exactly the opposite of butterflies, making people afraid to avoid it! What is the reason for this?
Insects are the most diverse and numerous group of animals in the world, with more than 1 million species living, and the total number is uncountable. The most common and numerous insects in everyday life include Coleoptera, Hymenoptera, Diptera and Lepidoptera, colloquially known as beetles, bees and ants, mosquitoes and flies, and moths and butterflies.
Taxonomically , both moths and butterflies belong to the family Lepidoptera , a family that appeared relatively late in insect history and only appeared in the Mesozoic Era. Current research suggests that Lepidoptera and Pteroptera (stone moths) share a common ancestor and are relatively closely related taxa. There are currently more than 200,000 known species of Lepidoptera, of which 90% are moths and only 10,000 species of butterflies. Let's put it this way, butterflies can be considered a type of specialized moth. Among the moths, the closest relationship with butterflies is the ulnar moth, which is the common ulnar worm. In the Mesozoic Era, there was such a class of insects, looking like butterflies as twin brothers, with beautiful wings and long mouthparts, collecting honey among the flowers of the dinosaur era, and its name was Li Li. Unfortunately, in the mass extinction at the end of the Mesozoic Era, the lily spider became extinct like the dinosaurs, and now we can only glimpse the beauty of this insect from some insects.
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Not all moths are eclipsed
Butterflies also have representatives of flat postures
One way to distinguish butterflies from moths is that butterflies are beautiful in color and moths are dull in color because butterflies suck nectar and moths inhabit dirty places. It is said that there is a nose and an eye, and it sounds quite reasonable. However, if you know enough about butterflies and moths, you know that this method is completely unreliable.
Although many species of moths are small and inconspicuous, this is mainly to be able to integrate themselves with the surrounding environment well, a camouflage color, which is a natural selection caused by survival pressure. And there are many large moths, but also have a bright appearance that is not inferior to butterflies, such as the long-tailed silkworm moth and the large silkworm moth in the silkworm moth, not only the wings are large and colorful, but also have a long "tail"; the small bean long-beaked moth and the coffee transfiguration moth in the moth, they can quickly incite the wings to fly, flying in the flowers during the day with a long mouthpiece to absorb nectar, and are often mistaken for hummingbirds; and non-mainstream deer moths that are not only gorgeous in wings but also full of whistling, The swallow moth has a long tail protrusion similar to that of a butterfly, and the wings of the sun moth living in Madagascar are even more colorful than butterflies!
There are good-looking moths and of course ugly butterflies! For example, there is a class of butterflies called "butterflies", this group is not very conspicuous, and some of them look dirty, because butterflies belong to the relatively primitive taxa of butterflies, and the relationship with moths is closer; in addition, in butterflies, eye butterflies, gray butterflies and other butterflies, there are also some species that look dull in color, at first glance like a small moth.
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Powder on the wings of butterflies and moths
Is it really highly toxic?
If you have experience catching butterflies, or if you have accidentally provoked moths, you will know that it is easy to get a hand of "powder", which is a layer of fine scales on the surface of their wings, which is also the origin of the name lepidoptera. I believe that many people have been instilled by their elders when they were young, "This powder is poisonous, it will become blind in the eyes, it will become dumb after eating, and if it enters the ear, it will become deaf", I am one of them, scared to love bugs, I no longer dare to touch butterflies, and the big fluttering moth has even become a shadow of my childhood.
When I grew up and read the relevant books, I learned that the layer of scales on the surface of the wings of butterflies and moths is actually scales, and it is generally believed that these scales have the effect of confusing enemies, regulating body temperature, and when stuck by spider webs or other sticky objects, they can help themselves get out and protect themselves. Scientists have a hypothesis that it is the presence of these scales that gives butterflies and moths an advantage in the competition with lilies, thus eventually replacing limboys and completely occupying this ecological niche.
What is certain, though, is that the scales are not toxic. However, they do cause allergic reactions in people with certain constitutions, so don't easily try to get these scales into contact with the eyes or other mucosal tissue. It should be noted that there are some species of moths with toxic hair, when in the face of danger they will shake off these body hairs, fly around the body, if it comes into contact with human skin, it will be painful, itchy and red. These sincere suggestions from the heart can be accepted, don't ask me how I know.
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The larvae eat the plants adult pollen
The definition of beneficial insects or pests is inherently too biased
Moths and butterflies eat parts of plants in the larval stage, so are they both pests? In fact, for a creature, its purpose is only one, that is, to live instinctively, and any organism has its corresponding ecological niche in nature, and the so-called beneficial and harmful labels are artificially marked by us.
For example, the larvae of some Lepidoptera will eat the crops or cash crops we grow such as trismot borers, cotton bollworms, pine caterpillars, etc., but this is not their fault, these insects are just eating their own food. The main reason for the occurrence of "insect infestations" is that the biological species in our agricultural fields or economic forests are too single, and most of the natural enemies of these insects are eliminated by us or driven out in numbers not enough to control their growth. Lepidoptera themselves are in the lower layer of the food chain, occupying a large part of the lower ecological niche, feeding on plants to accumulate nutrients, and becoming an important food source for carnivorous insects, parasitic insects and small carnivorous animals at higher ecological niches.
Speaking of which, many species of adult butterflies and moths feed on nectar, which also helps plants pollinate while sucking nectar, which also promotes plant reproduction. If they all disappear, the entire ecosystem will be very badly affected. So we should look at the problem of "pests" scientifically.
Author | Li Weiyang's popular science writers' works have been published on Fruit Shell Network, State Forestry Administration, China National Geographic, Naturalist Magazine, Juvenile Science Magazine, etc
Audit | Huang Chengming, Researcher, Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences
This article is produced by the "Scientific Rumor Dispelling Platform" (ID: Science_Facts), please indicate the source when reprinting.