Did you get laid that , before they romantically illuminate the Nox , firefly depart out as bowelless hunters that track down otherwise protect animals and drink down them with spitefulness ? get a line about the cutthroat lifetime of lightning bug larvae .
I know it ’s naive to assume that just because an animal is pretty , it ’s actually benignant — but somehow , I remember that firefly larvae were small , translucent aquatic creatures that survived on alga and the work of John Keats . And when they become adults , most fireflies eat pollen , but a few just stop eating and take their passing nature .
But now I know that they haunt the Earth like armored centipedes , hunting , killing , and devouring creates much crowing than themselves .
They can do this because they have anumbing agentthat they can inject into their prey . It immobilizes the animals — usually slugs and snail — so the larvae can rip them to pieces and happily devour them . One insect enthusiastfound a firefly larva and brought it back to his research laboratory , to observe how it ate . He watch as the larva sedately walked up to snail , squeeze its way into their shell through the little aperture on the front , and paralyzed and ate them from the inner out . This was always successful — and you could see for yourself , with the video above of the larva eating , surrounded by the shells of its past victim . The only beast that abide a opportunity against a firefly larva was a slug , and that ’s because the slug secreted so much slime that it took the larva over ten minutes to eat its way out .
Fireflies are such spoilt news that some of them shine before they even fly . The gleaming is a signal to predator — for certain , you may essay to tangle with me , but you ’ll be drear .
AnimalsScience
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