Connected on 2013-07-24 10:00:00 from Albany, New York, United States
- 9:42am
- Bugscope Team we are ready to roll
- 9:47am
- 10:14am
- Bugscope Team good morning!
- Bugscope Team welcome to Bugcope!
- Student hi
- Bugscope Team this is the compound eye of one of the butterflies on the stub this morning
- Student cool
- Student hay
Bugscope Team Hi Minni!
- Student hello
Bugscope Team Hello Lelen!
- Bugscope Team hello!
- Student hii
- Student what's a compound eye
Bugscope Team it's an eye that insects have, some insects, with multiples lenses, or facets, called ommatidia
- 10:20am
- Student oh. cool
- Student Are we looking at a 'live' butterfly?
Bugscope Team the insects are inside a scanning electron microscope vacuum chamber, so they are not alive
- Bugscope Team this is a caterpillar
- Bugscope Team you can see its legs now
- Bugscope Team this is the ventral side -- the underside
- Bugscope Team all the insects we are looking at today are dead and dry- the best conditions for looking at through a SEM
- Student compound eyes are a bunch of different eyes grouped together i think
Bugscope Team that's right!
- Student what part of a catterpillar is that?
Bugscope Team the head is to the upper right area. It is a big fat head
- Student what type of caterpillar is this?
- Bugscope Team caterpillars often have silk glands near the mouth, so they can produce web
- Student what butterfly is this from
- Student what exactly is a SEM?
Bugscope Team scanning electron microscope -- it's a microscope that uses electrons to produce images of the samples, which must be in a vacuum
- Student the scales?
- Student Are these the wings
Bugscope Team these are scales found on the wings and all over the bod
Bugscope Team body*
- Student how do butterflys have scales and yet the wings feel soft?
Bugscope Team the scales are very tiny, and they are soft, themselves, not like snake scales
- Student What butterfly is this from?????
Bugscope Team I'm not sure what kind of butterfly it was from. Sorry
- Student its okay
- Student y do they over lap
Bugscope Team the scales do various things, and one is to protect the insect from flying into a spider web; they come off easily; overlapping ensures that the wing is covered
- Student Can you zoom into another part?
- Student i think it depends on the type of butterfly
- Student ok thxs
- Student what is a butterflys wingspan?'
Bugscope Team they vary, but some can be several inches and even larger
- Bugscope Team scales also give the wings color
- 10:25am
- Student what does lobed mean??
- Student how do caterpillars make chrystlist?
Bugscope Team they use the silk glands to weave the chrysalis
- Bugscope Team now we are looking up close at a lobed antenna
- Bugscope Team the antennae have sensory setae and sensory pits that help the butterfly smell the air
- Student is each little mountain thing the part of the butterfly that controlles the senses?
Bugscope Team yes that is correct!
- Student what does lobed mean??
Bugscope Team butterflies have a bulb at the end of their antennae, which is what lobed means
- Student Is that hairy? Or does it just look like it?
Bugscope Team they are hairy, but in insects and other similar arthropods we call the hairs setae, or we are supposed to
- Student Is that where they smell things?
Bugscope Team yes it is; insects are very sensitive to chemical scents in the air, and on surfaces
- Student where they suck in nectar from the flowers
- Student how big is it?
- Student is that their proboscis
Bugscope Team yes it is!
- Student is the black line in the middle the straw that takes up nectar.
- Student How often do you open up these sessions for 'bug veiwing'?
- Student isn't the proboscis very long, or does it vary from butterfly to butterfly?
- Student what is the top part?
- Student why are there two tracks going down the sides?
- Student how many senses does a butterfly have?\
Bugscope Team sight, smell/ taste, a version of hearing, touch, including the sensation of hot and cold; they may also have a form of electrical field sensing
- Student cool
- Student do they smell with their feet ??????????
Bugscope Team some of them do -- some of them have chemosensory setae on their feet
- Student is that like their hand?
- Student Where is the proboscis located?
Bugscope Team where you would expect the mouth to be
- Student is the black line in the middle the straw that takes up nectar.
- Student what does chemosensory mean sj????????????\
- Student How many claws do they have
- 10:30am
- Student do they have claws
- Student how long are their claws
- Student sort of freaky!
- Student are those their eyes?
Bugscope Team yes they are!
- Student and is the long thing the proboscis
Bugscope Team you cannot see the proboscis too well now --- it's right in the middle
- Student what is the fluzzz thing between its eyes
- Student and are those their wings, too?
Bugscope Team part of the wings are there. I cut off a portion of the wings so it wouldn't take up the whole sample stage
- Student What is above the eyes?
Bugscope Team those are palps, which help insects taste and manipulate their food
- Bugscope Team you can see on the left where Cate had to cut the wing away -- it was too large
- Student do butterflies have tiny hairs all over the body?
Bugscope Team yes many insects do as well -- insects do not have skin, instead they have an exoskeleton, kind of like armor, so the hairs stick through to help them sense the environments
- Bugscope Team environment..
- Student it looks like honeycomb!
- Student are butterflies mostly water like humans?
Bugscope Team yes they are, maybe less water than we are
- Student Are they in perfectly straight lines for a reason?
Bugscope Team it's the way they grow!
- Student how long is one scale (approximately)?
- 10:35am
- Student is this inside their wings?
Bugscope Team this is on the inner side, but you would not necessarily be able to tell
- Student what part of the caterpillar is this?
Bugscope Team this is one of the spiracles
- Student Zoom farther in on the bottom?
- Student whats a spiracle?
Bugscope Team spiracles are breathing pores in insects; there are usually two on the sides of each segment
- Student How many spiracles do they have?
Bugscope Team I think it depends on how many segments they have, not sure really
- Student what are those hairy looking things?
- Student what segment?
Bugscope Team kind of like an armadillo or a rolypoly, the segments
- Student Is this on the bottom of a caterpillar? (like where they stick on to things)
Bugscope Team yes this is near that area
- Student Are the hairs like filters for breathing?
Bugscope Team yes, that is exactly right
- Student what are the sticks/
Bugscope Team the one part to the left is a plant fiber
- Bugscope Team the fliters are to keep dust and stuff out of the tracheae, which are tubes on the inside of the body that lead to various organs
- Student what are those hairy looking things?
Bugscope Team not sure, Dude
- 10:41am
- Student what are the cracks?
Bugscope Team the cracks in the background are in the doublestick carbon tape
- Student Thanks!
- Student What organs do they have similar to humans?
Bugscope Team some insect have something like a brain, and the Malpighian tubules are like kidneys; they do not have lungs; they have a kind of lobed heart like thing but an open circulatory system
- Student is every part covered in hair?
Bugscope Team often it seems that way; some of the setae are quite small
- Student what are the stringey looking things inside some of the cells
- Student What is the stuff inside the pockets?
Bugscope Team it could be a light layer of chitin, which is what their exoskeleton is made of
- 10:46am
- Student Thank you for answering all our questions! it was alot of fun! BYE!!\
- Bugscope Team Thank you!
- Bugscope Team Bye!
- Bugscope Team bye thanks
