About a week ago we noticed a stink bug depositing eggs onto
the glass outdoor surface of our back door.
It was a really cool sight to see.
After laying an egg the bug (yes indeed a true bug) would move itself slightly over and then after a few moments lay
another one. This went on for some time until
a few dozen eggs were adhered to the glass.
In her final moments on the door the bug checked over the arrangement of
eggs, almost appearing to count them, then flew off.
Yesterday the eggs were opened and there is now a clutch of
tiny stink bug nymphs clumped on and around their empty eggs. Though they are still
small, the nymphs are significantly larger that the eggs and when my youngest
son saw this he asked, “How did the stink bugs get so big?” When he asked I
simply told him, “Cell division and differentiation.”
I know what some of you may be thinking, “What a dumb answer
to give and 8 year old.” I must say I totally agree and after I said it I immediately
realized that a much better answer would have been; “Cell division and
differentiation driven by molecular processes, specifically the reading of genetic
information stored in DNA, which isn’t really “read” in a literary sense but
decoded by molecular mechanisms driven by the physical and chemical
environments of the cell.”
Yes that would have been a much better explanation.
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