Spring's Butterfly 1995

The purpose of my work
Background and history:
Animals indoors
Classification of the animal kingdom
The body and development of insects
Natural selection
The triumph of insects?
Gause's principle
Food:
The role of defence
Invisible protection
Reproduction in insects
The sounds of insects
Different life strategies:
Sociality and society
Solitary insects
Damp biotopes:
Earthworms and snails
Woodlice and springtails
Thriving in moisture
Beetles
Wasps, Centipedes
Ants almost everywhere
Ants attacking our homes
Flies in nature - Flies indoors
Small guests in the pantry
Butterflies in the pantry
Mites
Blood-sucking guests
Small creatures indoors that eat textiles
Wood-eating small creatures at 088
Omnivorous small creatures
Insects of beneficial significance
Insects for natural science
My investigations at home & their results
Summary
Bibliography

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The purpose of my work

I have been interested for nearly my entire life in what insects and other small creatures exist around us in our homes, often without our knowledge or awareness. Through my special project, I now hope to have the opportunity to find answers to my questions, which is my purpose:

+ What happens in the world of insects and other small creatures, what are their living conditions?

+ How are their bodies constructed?

+ In what ways can these animals adapt themselves generally to the environment?

+ Can they adapt to humans?

+ How do insects and other small creatures defend themselves?

+ How do these animals function in nature?

+ What attracts them into our homes?

+ Which animals can be found indoors?

+ What do insects or other small creatures live on when they are in people's homes?

+ Which creatures can be problematic at home?

+ Can insects or other small creatures be beneficial to humans?

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Lisa Ahrnberg, class N3e

Background and history

The entry of insects onto the earth was explosive. Within a relatively short time, a magnificent development occurred within the insect group. They conquered the world as no other group of organisms ever had. The last 200 million years have really only been fine-tuning and minor adjustments for insects.

Insects have existed for 350 million years, while humans have only existed for 2 million years. For 99% of human development, we lived as hunters and gatherers. Early on, people also learned to kill larger game. However, they had not mastered the art of storing food on any large scale. Actual pest species in, for example, storage areas were thus an unknown concept to our ancestors, but they surely had problems with fly larvae in their hunted prey and with pests that destroyed their hides and furs. Lice sat thickly in their hair, and bedbugs and fleas presumably swarmed in their caves. Mosquitoes surely disturbed the sleep of people of that time, and to this were added swarms of flies and other small creatures that they shared the cave with.

About ten thousand years ago, a decisive change took place. People began to cultivate crops, harvest grain, and keep livestock. With this way of life came many advantages, but animals that previously had lived scattered on wild grain crops now, when their food plants were cultivated in fields, had the opportunity to reproduce as never before. Houses offered new hunting grounds for animals like spiders and provided dwelling places and overwintering opportunities for many species. Over time, these opportunities created by humans increased.

Animals indoors

For an animal to thrive, it must, apart from suitable climate, also have access to the right kind of food and an appropriate environment with opportunities for shelter.

The climate indoors is more like a desert with its minimal air humidity than it resembles the summer climate outdoors. If we disregard those animals that happen to come in temporarily, there are not many of the species we find indoors that also live in our nature; the vast majority of house animals originally come from other parts of the world. Remarkably, only a few of them have been found in a wild state—animals with such specific requirements were never common in nature. Only in the human environment have they really been able to spread.

There is thus quite a range of insects that truly thrive indoors. One can essentially find insects in all environments around the world, and also in our own homes. Every house contains its own fauna of insects and other small creatures. They live and flourish in proximity to humans, even in homes of cleaning enthusiasts.

Classification of the animal kingdom

The animal kingdom has been divided into fourteen so-called classes, of which only four have been found indoors. Apart from insects (arthropods), these are worms, molluscs, and vertebrates.

Worms have only one representative among the animals that can appear indoors, and that is the earthworm.

Of the molluscs, which include snails and mussels among other things, it is primarily the cellar snail that can be considered one of our "house animals".