When harassed, the large, plump caterpillars of the great peacock moth make a run of sounds somewhat like the rasping of a fingernail over a comb, says Jayne E. Yack of Carleton University in Ottawa, Canada... Saturnia pyri chirp before or while they ooze foul-smelling droplets from their bristles. So the chirps might be a warning to attackers...
Unlike a lot of caterpillar communication, the chirps the team recorded in the lab travel by air and their frequencies overlap with bird, bat and human hearing ranges. Caterpillars give broadband chirps, with frequencies ranging from 3.7 kilohertz to the ultrasonic at 55.1 kilohertz, the researchers say. The team determined that caterpillars make the noises by scraping one of their mandibles against the inside of the other...
Via Neatorama's Upcoming Queue. Photo credit.
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