Sue Warner, age 8, of Greeley, Colo., for her question:
DO INSECTS HAVE SENSES
Insects, like most other animals, can see, hear, touch, taste and smell. And as a matter of fact, many kinds have senses that are far keener than those of most other animals.
Most insects have two large compound eyes that include tiny six sided lenses that fit together like the cells of a honeycomb. The number of lenses varies in insects from about six in some worker ants to more than 30,000 in some types of dragonflies.
Insects cannot move or focus their eyes. But many have very sharp vision for short distances.
A wide range of hearing is found in insects. Some can hear ultrasonic sounds of more than two octaves higher than man can hear. Others respond to sounds so low that the human ear cannot hear them.
Most insects do not have ears but hear by means of delicate hairs that respond to sound waves.
Insects are highly sensitive to touch. Touch organs consist of hairs and spines that cover all parts of an insect's body, sometimes even the eyes: Any kind of pressure moves the hairs, setting up a nerve reaction that goes to the brain.
Many insects are highly sensitive to the same four taste sensations that people are: sweet, sour, salt and bitter. The taste organs of most insects are on their mouth parts.
Some insects have an amazingly sharp sense of taste. A monarch butterfly, for example, can easily detect sugar in water. The amount of sugar would have to be increased 2,000 times before a human could taste it.
The sense of smell is located mainly in the antennae of insects. Most species have a sharp sense of smell since many must use this ability as a way to locate food, as a way to find their way about and as the way they must locate places to lay their eggs.
A male moth depends chiefly on his sense of smell to find a mate.
A male moth can be attracted by the odor of a female moth more than one mile away.
Although insects can hear, they do not have voices. Many of them make sounds by stridulating or rubbing one part of the body against the other part.
Grasshoppers, crickets and cicadas are probably the noisiest insects. Usually only the adult males stridulate. They sing to atract the females, most of which can make no sound.
Many beetles make sounds by scraping parts of their bodies together. In addition, some make whirring and buzzing sounds with their wings.
The "ears" of a cricket are located on its legs. Each front leg has a drumlike membrane that vibrates when sound waves strike it.
No matter how carefully you move your hand toward a fly, the insect will almost always dart away. The insect hairs give a warning as air is being moved.