{"id":297805,"date":"2025-06-16T21:38:28","date_gmt":"2025-06-16T21:38:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/peraltafinancing.com\/uncategorized\/most-bugs-cant-see-red-but-these-beetles-can\/"},"modified":"2025-06-16T21:38:28","modified_gmt":"2025-06-16T21:38:28","slug":"most-bugs-cant-see-red-but-these-beetles-can","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=297805","title":{"rendered":"Most bugs can’t see red\u2014but these beetles can"},"content":{"rendered":"


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Most insects<\/a> have evolved to see the blue, green, and even ultraviolet spectrums. But most insects have trouble parsing one hue in particular: red. Even bees and other pollinators<\/a> that visit traditionally vibrant poppies aren\u2019t attracted by the visible coloration, but by the UV light<\/a> reflected from their petals. Now, an international zoology team has discovered that some insect species can manage to see what their relatives cannot. According to a study published in the Journal of Experimental Biology<\/em><\/a>, at least two beetle species living in the eastern Mediterranean environments can actually see red.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo our knowledge, we are the first to have experimentally demonstrated that beetles can actually perceive the color red,\u201d said Johnnes Spaethe<\/a>, paper co-author and chair of zoology at Germany\u2019s University of W\u00fcrzburg.<\/p>\n

Both Pygopleurus chrysonotus<\/em> and Pygopleurus syriacus<\/em> are small, fuzzy beetles that belong to the Glaphyridae family, and mostly feed on pollen from red flowering plants like buttercups, anemones, and poppies. This led researchers to wonder how they developed their preferences.<\/p>\n

The team utilized a number of methods to determine the two beetles weren\u2019t traveling to the red flowers simply due to a UV sensory situation similar to bees. After using a combination of color trapping, behavioral experiments, and electrophysiology, Spaethe and colleagues clearly showed each species includes four types of photoreceptors in their retinas. Aside from UV light, the bugs are able to process blues, greens, and deep reds\u2014although field observations indicated the insects used true color vision to identify and visit red flowers.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe prevailing opinion in science is that flower colors have adapted to the visual systems of pollinators over the course of evolution,\u201d explained Spaethe.<\/p>\n

The team\u2019s latest findings may complicate this theory, however. In addition to Pygopleurus<\/em>, two other genera in the larger beetle family (Eulasia<\/em> and Glaphyrus<\/em>) display widely different color preferences including red, white, violet, and yellow. This suggests the ability to see red\u2014as well as nature\u2019s many other colors\u2014may be relatively more malleable than previously thought.<\/p>\n

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