American scientists found that ladybugs can "Snoop" chemical signals their enemies - ants. And they do this in order to be able to continue their family. The fact that these beetles lay their eggs around clusters of aphids or cognoscitivos, which protects vigilant ant guard, not allowing them outsiders.

Few people think about the fact that every second in the grass under our feet hundreds of fierce battles between ants and God cows. The two warring parties give each other no mercy, take no prisoners and do not limit ourselves to any formal rules of war. What has made these cute and useful insects in irreconcilable enemies? Ironically, this has made the most dangerous pests of plants gardens - aphid (Aphidoidea) and coccidae (Coccidae).

As is known, the data of the representatives of the order Hemiptera feed on the juices of plants, piercing their pelt thin, but sharp proboscis. In fact, their food is a concentrated solution of sugars, many of which these pests can't learn. Therefore, their faeces are not that other, as a thick sugar syrup. Well, ants, whose intake of carbohydrates is never enough, just love these "sugar wastes".

That is why the representatives of many species of ants take care of aphids and cognoscitivo as well as people on cattle - they carry these pests to new pastures, purify them from fungi, protect from a bad weather, and, of course, protect from predators. And among them the number one enemy are above ladybirds (Coccinellidae)that destroy aphids and cognoscitivos hundreds. That accounts for the ants to hold near their "pastures" large group of guards, and continue to patrol the adjacent territory to the enemy took them by surprise.

It should be noted that aphids and cognoscitivos destroy not only the adult beetles and their larvae, so ladybirds try to lay eggs closer to "pastures". However, the larvae have a particularly difficult, because if an insect at its detection ants can still fly, here's a young lady bug turns out to be absolutely defenceless before a crowd of furious six-legged "cowboys". And chances to win her there is absolutely no - ants for a few seconds just ripped the larva to pieces.

Therefore, in order to provide their children with food and to protect them from ants, females ladybugs go to the trick. In particular, they lay their eggs directly on the ventral side of coccidae, which has a very sedentary lifestyle, being attached to the plant. Eventually hatched larvae will be invisible to ants and will immediately begin to hunt on) - it will not be the same guard to kill the thief, cut your own "cow"! In addition, after some time the larva ladybirds covers himself waxy fibrous substance, which further protects it from scrutiny, as well as from a sharp jaws and poison vigilant ants.

However, this trick to make difficult because in order to lay eggs,) still have to come. And it is quite a large and noticeable bug is very difficult - it's about the same, if an elephant day tried to slip out of the crowded zoo. However, the scientists noticed that in most cases, God, the cows do manage to complete the project. And recently, biologists from the University of Michigan (USA) have discovered how exactly are these smart enough beetles.

Scientists observed "pastures" ants Azteca instabilis, which protect lornoxicam Coccus viridis that harm the coffee trees in Central and South America. They knew fearless and aggressive ants-Aztecs afraid of flies of mordellid (Phoridae). These small and nondescript create love to lay their eggs it is in the body of the ants, which are then eaten alive hatched from them larvae. And since the humpback see only moving prey, that is, standing ant attack of the flies is not exposed, the Aztecs developed their tactics of opposition to these attacks two-winged monsters - when approaching the mordellid they stand still for a long time.

Moreover, the researchers found that in the moment when the flies start to attack, sentinel ant emits a special pheromone which inform all workers are nearby, about the danger. This kind of alarm and introduces insects in the trance state. As a result, the activity of the whole colony is falling by almost half, and so the ants can carry more than two hours.

Then biologists have found one interesting thing there is, females ladybugs also able to catch this "alarm" pheromone. However, he has quite the opposite effect - they do not stand still, but, on the contrary, began to fuss. In order to understand what caused this strange reaction, scientists conducted a simple but ingenious experiment.

Entomologists gathered ants, cognoscitivos, humpback and ladybugs in the transparent cage, which also housed a branch of the coffee tree. In such conditions it was easy enough to follow the level of different odorants. On a branch, where some of the leaves were affected by insects, planted 40 ants, and several females ladybirds and a pair of humpback. A day later, the scientists looked up, laid whether ladybirds eggs and what smells when it hung in the test chamber.

The results showed that when the patrol ant, seeing of the mordellid beetle, was released pheromone anxiety, and all his brethren stood still, ladybirds, also catching the signal, do not lose time in vain. They all haste fled to lornoxicam, and put on them their eggs. All attempts were successful - ants did not move even when beetles ran right in front of their antennae. It turns out that fear of humpback was much stronger than the fear of losing "milk cows". It was also found that males ladybugs alarming ants pheromones no action provided that, in General, it is quite logical: they're not going to care about posterity.

The authors claim that the examples of when a chemical signal may be "overheard" different views, for which it is not intended, in nature, not so much, and this work has described the most interesting of these situations. However, it has a practical value. Because now, in order to protect coffee plantations from pests, you can use either of the mordellid beetle, or a dedicated pheromone alarm, not to process the trees costly and harmful insecticides...