{"id":102,"date":"2014-08-09T11:57:36","date_gmt":"2014-08-09T14:57:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/aerendel.ca\/aarchives\/?p=102"},"modified":"2014-08-10T01:36:36","modified_gmt":"2014-08-10T04:36:36","slug":"earwigs-shudder","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/aerendel.ca\/aarchives\/earwigs-shudder\/","title":{"rendered":"Earwigs &#8211; (shudder)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Saturday, August 9, 2014.<\/p>\n<p>While flattening out once-crumpled packing paper in the basement, to empty and flatten boxes and make room to move stuff around down there- I moved a pile of clean kitchen towels and discovered two earwigs hiding beneath them. (&#8216;creepy&#8217;)<\/p>\n<p>So then I wondered what earwigs eat.<\/p>\n<p>And then tonight, I looked it up on wikipedia and this is what I found there:<\/p>\n<p>=====<\/p>\n<h1 id=\"firstHeading\" class=\"firstHeading\" lang=\"en\"><span dir=\"auto\">Earwig<\/span><\/h1>\n<div id=\"siteSub\">From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia<\/div>\n<div class=\"hatnote\">For other uses, see <a title=\"Earwig (disambiguation)\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Earwig_%28disambiguation%29\">Earwig (disambiguation)<\/a>.<\/div>\n<div>\n<table class=\"infobox biota\" style=\"text-align: left; width: 200px; font-size: 100%;\">\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<th style=\"text-align: center; background-color: #d3d3a4;\" colspan=\"2\">Earwigs<br \/>\n<small>Temporal range: <span style=\"display: inline-block;\">208\u20130<a class=\"mw-redirect\" title=\"Megaannum\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Megaannum\">Ma<\/a><\/span><\/small><\/p>\n<div id=\"Timeline-row\" style=\"margin: 4px auto 0; clear: both; width: 220px; padding: 0px; height: 18px; overflow: visible; border: 1px #666; border-style: solid none; position: relative; z-index: 0;\">\n<div style=\"position: absolute; height: 100%; left: 0px; width: 208.07692307692px; padding-left: 5px; text-align: left; background-color: #fed67b; background-image: linear-gradient(to right, rgba(255,255,255,1), rgba(254,217,106,1) 15%, rgba(254,217,106,1));\"><small><a title=\"Precambrian\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Precambrian\">Pre\u0404<\/a><\/small><\/div>\n<div style=\"position: absolute; height: 100%; text-align: center; background-color: #81aa72; left: 36.892307692308px; width: 18.818461538462px;\"><small><a title=\"Cambrian\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Cambrian\">\u0404<\/a><\/small><\/div>\n<div style=\"position: absolute; height: 100%; text-align: center; background-color: #00a98a; left: 55.710769230769px; width: 14.215384615385px;\"><small><a title=\"Ordovician\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Ordovician\">O<\/a><\/small><\/div>\n<div style=\"position: absolute; height: 100%; text-align: center; background-color: #a6dfc5; left: 69.926153846154px; width: 8.1907692307692px;\"><small><a title=\"Silurian\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Silurian\">S<\/a><\/small><\/div>\n<div style=\"position: absolute; height: 100%; text-align: center; background-color: #dd9651; left: 78.116923076923px; width: 20.409230769231px;\"><small><a title=\"Devonian\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Devonian\">D<\/a><\/small><\/div>\n<div style=\"position: absolute; height: 100%; text-align: center; background-color: #3faead; left: 98.526153846154px; width: 20.307692307692px;\"><small><a title=\"Carboniferous\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Carboniferous\">C<\/a><\/small><\/div>\n<div style=\"position: absolute; height: 100%; text-align: center; background-color: #f7583c; left: 118.83384615385px; width: 15.816307692308px;\"><small><a title=\"Permian\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Permian\">P<\/a><\/small><\/div>\n<div style=\"position: absolute; height: 100%; text-align: center; background-color: #994e96; left: 134.65015384615px; width: 17.217538461538px;\"><small><a title=\"Triassic\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Triassic\">T<\/a><\/small><\/div>\n<div style=\"position: absolute; height: 100%; text-align: center; background-color: #00bbe7; left: 151.86769230769px; width: 19.055384615385px;\"><small><a title=\"Jurassic\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Jurassic\">J<\/a><\/small><\/div>\n<div style=\"position: absolute; height: 100%; text-align: center; background-color: #6fc86b; left: 170.92307692308px; width: 26.738461538462px;\"><small><a title=\"Cretaceous\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Cretaceous\">K<\/a><\/small><\/div>\n<div style=\"position: absolute; height: 100%; text-align: center; background-color: #fea163; left: 197.66153846154px; width: 14.543692307692px;\"><small><a title=\"Paleogene\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Paleogene\"><small>Pg<\/small><\/a><\/small><\/div>\n<div style=\"position: absolute; height: 100%; text-align: center; background-color: #fedd2d; left: 212.20523076923px; width: 6.9215384615385px;\"><a title=\"Neogene\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Neogene\"><small>N<\/small><\/a><\/div>\n<div style=\"margin: 0 auto; line-height: 0; clear: both; width: 220px; padding: 0px; height: 8px; overflow: visible; background-color: transparent; position: relative; top: -4px; z-index: 100;\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><a title=\"Late Triassic\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Late_Triassic\">Late Triassic<\/a> to Recent<\/th>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td style=\"text-align: center;\" colspan=\"2\"><a class=\"image\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/File:Earwig_on_white_background.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/upload.wikimedia.org\/wikipedia\/commons\/thumb\/3\/34\/Earwig_on_white_background.jpg\/240px-Earwig_on_white_background.jpg\" alt=\"Earwig on white background.jpg\" width=\"240\" height=\"103\" data-file-width=\"2000\" data-file-height=\"861\" \/><\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td style=\"text-align: center; font-size: 88%;\" colspan=\"2\">Female common earwig, <i><a title=\"Forficula auricularia\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Forficula_auricularia\">Forficula auricularia<\/a><\/i><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<th style=\"text-align: center; background-color: #d3d3a4;\" colspan=\"2\"><a title=\"Biological classification\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Biological_classification\">Scientific classification<\/a><\/th>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Kingdom:<\/td>\n<td><span class=\"kingdom\" style=\"white-space: nowrap;\"><a title=\"Animal\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Animal\">Animalia<\/a><\/span><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Phylum:<\/td>\n<td><span class=\"phylum\" style=\"white-space: nowrap;\"><a title=\"Arthropod\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Arthropod\">Arthropoda<\/a><\/span><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Subphylum:<\/td>\n<td><span class=\"subphylum\" style=\"white-space: nowrap;\"><a title=\"Hexapoda\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Hexapoda\">Hexapoda<\/a><\/span><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Class:<\/td>\n<td><span class=\"class\" style=\"white-space: nowrap;\"><a title=\"Insect\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Insect\">Insecta<\/a><\/span><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td>Order:<\/td>\n<td><span class=\"order\" style=\"white-space: nowrap;\"><b>Dermaptera<\/b><\/span><br \/>\n<small><a title=\"Charles De Geer\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Charles_De_Geer\">De Geer<\/a>, 1773<\/small><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<th style=\"text-align: center; background-color: #d3d3a4;\" colspan=\"2\">Suborders<\/th>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td style=\"text-align: left;\" colspan=\"2\">\n<ul>\n<li><a title=\"Extinction\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Extinction\">\u2020<\/a><a title=\"Archidermaptera\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Archidermaptera\">Archidermaptera<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a title=\"Extinction\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Extinction\">\u2020<\/a><a class=\"new\" title=\"Eodermaptera (page does not exist)\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/w\/index.php?title=Eodermaptera&amp;action=edit&amp;redlink=1\">Eodermaptera<\/a><\/li>\n<li><a class=\"new\" title=\"Neodermaptera (page does not exist)\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/w\/index.php?title=Neodermaptera&amp;action=edit&amp;redlink=1\">Neodermaptera<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<th style=\"text-align: center; background-color: #d3d3a4;\" colspan=\"2\"><a title=\"Synonym (taxonomy)\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Synonym_%28taxonomy%29\">Synonyms<\/a><\/th>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td style=\"text-align: left;\" colspan=\"2\">\n<ul>\n<li>Euplecoptera<\/li>\n<li>Euplexoptera<\/li>\n<li>Forficulida<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n<p><b>Earwigs<\/b> make up the <a title=\"Insect\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Insect\">insect<\/a> <a title=\"Order (biology)\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Order_%28biology%29\">order<\/a> <b>Dermaptera<\/b> and are found throughout the <a title=\"Americas\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Americas\">Americas<\/a>, <a title=\"Africa\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Africa\">Africa<\/a>, <a title=\"Eurasia\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Eurasia\">Eurasia<\/a>, <a title=\"Australia\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Australia\">Australia<\/a> and <a title=\"New Zealand\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/New_Zealand\">New Zealand<\/a>. With about 2,000 <a title=\"Species\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Species\">species<\/a><sup id=\"cite_ref-1\" class=\"reference\"><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Earwig#cite_note-1\">[1]<\/a><\/sup> in 12 <a title=\"Family (biology)\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Family_%28biology%29\">families<\/a>, they are one of the smaller insect orders. Earwigs have characteristic <a title=\"Cercus\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Cercus\">cerci<\/a>, a pair of <a title=\"Forceps\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Forceps\">forceps<\/a> <a title=\"Pincer (biology)\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Pincer_%28biology%29\">pincers<\/a> on their abdomen, and membranous <a title=\"Insect wing\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Insect_wing\">wings<\/a> folded underneath short <a class=\"extiw\" title=\"wikt:fore wing\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wiktionary.org\/wiki\/fore_wing\">forewings<\/a>, hence the scientific order name, &#8220;skin wings.&#8221; Some groups are tiny parasites on mammals and lack the typical pincers. Earwigs rarely use their flying ability.<\/p>\n<p>Earwigs are mostly <a title=\"Nocturnality\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Nocturnality\">nocturnal<\/a> and often hide in small, moist crevices during the day, and are active at night, feeding on a wide variety of insects and plants. Damage to foliage, flowers, and various crops is commonly blamed on earwigs, especially the common earwig <i><a title=\"Forficula auricularia\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Forficula_auricularia\">Forficula auricularia<\/a>.<\/i><\/p>\n<p>Earwigs have five <a title=\"Ecdysis\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Ecdysis\">molts<\/a> in the year before they become adults. Many earwig species display maternal care, which is uncommon among insects. Female earwigs may care for their eggs, and even after they have hatched as <a title=\"Nymph (biology)\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Nymph_%28biology%29\">nymphs<\/a> will continue to watch over offspring until their second molt. As the nymphs molt, <a title=\"Sexual dimorphism\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Sexual_dimorphism\">sexual dimorphism<\/a> such as differences in pincer shapes begins to show.<\/p>\n<p>Some earwig specimen fossils are in the extinct suborders <a title=\"Archidermaptera\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Archidermaptera\">Archidermaptera<\/a> or <a class=\"new\" title=\"Eodermaptera (page does not exist)\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/w\/index.php?title=Eodermaptera&amp;action=edit&amp;redlink=1\">Eodermaptera<\/a>, the former dating to the <a title=\"Late Triassic\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Late_Triassic\">Late Triassic<\/a> and the latter to the Middle Jurassic. Many orders of insect have been theorized to be closely related to earwigs, though the icebugs of <a class=\"mw-redirect\" title=\"Grylloblattaria\" href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Grylloblattaria\">Grylloblattaria<\/a> are most likely.<\/p>\n<div class=\"sharedaddy sd-sharing-enabled\"><div class=\"robots-nocontent sd-block sd-social sd-social-icon-text sd-sharing\"><h3 class=\"sd-title\">Share this:<\/h3><div class=\"sd-content\"><ul><li class=\"share-facebook\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"sharing-facebook-102\" class=\"share-facebook sd-button share-icon\" href=\"http:\/\/aerendel.ca\/aarchives\/earwigs-shudder\/?share=facebook\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Facebook\"><span>Facebook<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-twitter\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"sharing-twitter-102\" class=\"share-twitter sd-button share-icon\" href=\"http:\/\/aerendel.ca\/aarchives\/earwigs-shudder\/?share=twitter\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Twitter\"><span>Twitter<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-end\"><\/li><\/ul><\/div><\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Saturday, August 9, 2014. While flattening out once-crumpled packing paper in the basement, to empty and flatten boxes and make room to move stuff around down there- I moved a pile of clean kitchen towels and discovered two earwigs hiding beneath them. (&#8216;creepy&#8217;) So then I wondered what earwigs eat. \u2026 <a class=\"continue-reading-link\" href=\"http:\/\/aerendel.ca\/aarchives\/earwigs-shudder\/\"> Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr; <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n<div class=\"sharedaddy sd-sharing-enabled\"><div class=\"robots-nocontent sd-block sd-social sd-social-icon-text sd-sharing\"><h3 class=\"sd-title\">Share this:<\/h3><div class=\"sd-content\"><ul><li class=\"share-facebook\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"sharing-facebook-102\" class=\"share-facebook sd-button share-icon\" href=\"http:\/\/aerendel.ca\/aarchives\/earwigs-shudder\/?share=facebook\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Facebook\"><span>Facebook<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-twitter\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"sharing-twitter-102\" class=\"share-twitter sd-button share-icon\" href=\"http:\/\/aerendel.ca\/aarchives\/earwigs-shudder\/?share=twitter\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Twitter\"><span>Twitter<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-end\"><\/li><\/ul><\/div><\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true},"categories":[11,10,28,13,1,9],"tags":[29,30,32,174,31],"class_list":["post-102","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-life-should-be-more-fun","category-life-should-be-more-relaxed","category-marginalia","category-personal-nonsense","category-uncategorized","category-wildlife","tag-bugs","tag-earwigs","tag-eek","tag-marginalia","tag-wikipedia"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p559rH-1E","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/aerendel.ca\/aarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/aerendel.ca\/aarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/aerendel.ca\/aarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/aerendel.ca\/aarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/aerendel.ca\/aarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=102"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/aerendel.ca\/aarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":105,"href":"http:\/\/aerendel.ca\/aarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102\/revisions\/105"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/aerendel.ca\/aarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=102"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/aerendel.ca\/aarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=102"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/aerendel.ca\/aarchives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=102"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}