![]() ![]() ![]() Honeydew is also secreted by certain fungi, particularly ergot. It also contaminates vehicles parked beneath trees, and can then be difficult to remove from glass and bodywork. Honeydew can cause sooty mold-a bane of gardeners-on many ornamental plants. The plant-hopper then raises its abdomen and excretes a drop of honeydew almost right onto the snout of the gecko. In Madagascar, some gecko species in the genera Phelsuma and Lygodactylus are known to approach flatid plant-hoppers on tree-trunks from below and induce them to excrete honeydew by head nodding behaviour. Animals and plants in a mutually symbiotic arrangement with ants are called Myrmecophiles. Ants may collect, or "milk", honeydew directly from aphids and other honeydew producers, which benefit from their presence due to their driving away predators such as lady beetles or parasitic wasps-see Crematogaster peringueyi. The sap continues to bleed after the insects have moved on, leaving a white sugar crust called manna. Honeydew-producing insects, like cicadas, pierce phloem ducts to access the sugar rich sap. Some caterpillars of Lycaenidae butterflies and some moths also produce honeydew. Honeydew is particularly common as a secretion in hemipteran insects and is often the basis for trophobiosis. When their mouthpart penetrates the phloem, the sugary, high-pressure liquid is forced out of the anus of the aphid. ![]() Honeydew is a sugar-rich sticky liquid, secreted by aphids and some scale insects as they feed on plant sap. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |