Female moths can detect distress signals from plants and adjust their behaviour, according to new research from Tel Aviv University. This is the first clear evidence of plant-animal acoustic interaction, showing that moths actively respond to ultrasonic calls from stressed plants before deciding where to lay their eggs.
Plants under stress—such as dehydration or heat—emit ultrasonic signals in the 20 to 100 kilohertz range. Humans cannot hear these sounds, but moths can, using them to avoid laying eggs on plants that would provide poor conditions for their offspring.
ThoGot@feddit.org 5 months ago
I’m sorry what
supersquirrel@sopuli.xyz 5 months ago
Are you asking about the logic or the idea of deafening the moths?
The logic is that if the moths show a preference when they can hear they preferentially select and when they can’t hear they do not preferentially select suggesting they no longer have a source of information to go of off, that being the sound of the plants.
ThoGot@feddit.org 5 months ago
About the methodology of how to deafen a moth temporarily (though I haven’t found the paper in my five seconds of research)