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Deadly Mating | National Geographic


welcome to any farm USA this voracious
creature is the Diamondback caterpillar
it’s so voracious it can consume an
entire crop the whole field in a matter
of weeks worse yet the Diamondback is
becoming resistant to pesticides so
farmers have begun to deploy an
insidious weapon they’re using the
Diamondbacks own reproductive urge to
destroy it when the Diamondback becomes
a moth the first thing it does is well
what else look for a mate this
futuristic looking micro Dreamhouse is
actually a trap emitting a scent that
the laws are powerless to resist we’re
not privy to the moth mental process but
well here’s the moss staring at the trap
it’s got to be the strangest looking
plant it’s ever seen that scent that
scent powerless to resist powerless to
resist
here’s a visual simulation of what a
diamondback moth sees as it’s coming in
for a landing
remember the moth is also praised by the
simulated sense of willing female now
the moth goes in search of its beloved
but instead of conjugal bliss what does
the moth get to help I’ll tell you what
it gets a cold shower
worse than that a cold shower of fungal
spores sprayed out from the trap
the moths hang around getting good and
soaked there’s no mistaking that scent
it’s a flashing neon sign willing
females here and yet no willing females
ha what a ripoff
this has got to be disillusioning
finally the moth gives up and goes in
search of a real mate
but now the moth is carrying the means
of its own destruction those spores it
absorbed germinate and finger-like
tendrils dissolve their way into its
body the fungus eats them off slowly
digesting its flesh but it doesn’t harm
any crops at all filaments anchor the
moth to the leaf becoming a kind of
death shroud but the killing isn’t over
yet new spores burst from the dead model
with the help of a light breeze they
shower down on the diamondback
caterpillars nearby the caterpillars
suffer the same fate as the maas eaten
from within using its own life urge
against it
diabolical and effective
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