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Buzz, Sting, Bite: Why We Need Insects

Book by Anne Sverdrup-Thygeson · 1 quotes · Biology, Insects, Nature

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Buzz, Sting, Bite: Why We Need Insects Quotes

“Just listen to this: take two fruit flies and leave them in ideal living conditions for a year - equivalent to 25 generations for fruit flies. Every fruit fly mother lays 100 eggs. Let's say that they all grow to adulthood, and that half of them are females who mate and lay another 100 eggs. Once the year is over, you will be left with the 25th generation and that alone will amount to almost a tredecillion sweet little redeyed fruit flies. A tredecillion is the figure 1 followed by 42 zeros. To make this figure more meaningful, imagine packing these flies together densely, as densely as possible, into one enormous fruit fly ball. You'd end up with a sphere whose diameter exceeded the distance between the Earth to the Sun! It's a good thing these insects have so many enemies, because otherwise there wouldn't be any room left on Earth for us humans.”

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Book:Buzz, Sting, Bite: Why We Need Insects
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