SHOO FLY: Biting midges (here) swarm the noses of túngara frogs (Engystomops pustulosus) during the breeding season, keying in on the mating calls that males emit to attract females (below).XIMENA BERNALCommunication coded for a particular kind of recipient is usually considered privileged information. But sometimes signals from a sender can also have multiple unintended receivers.
Take the túngara frog (Engystomops pustulosus). During the breeding season, males gather in ponds and puddles throughout Central and South America and call to attract females of their own species. Also listening: predators and parasites.
Research beginning in the 1980s has demonstrated how frog-eating bats use the calls of male túngara frogs to home in on the animals. The bloodsucking flies that feed on frogs, however, were just a scientific footnote until Purdue University biologist Ximena Bernal set her sights on them. According to Bernal, shifting her focus to the flies that prey on túngara frogs was a happy accident.
In 2002, Bernal was working on how male and female túngaras perceive mating calls for her PhD in Michael Ryan’s laboratory at the University of ...
