BEDBUGS are notoriously undiscerning about who they mount, and are wont to stab their penis straight into another male鈥檚 abdomen. Now it seems they have evolved a way of telling mistaken mounters to back off.
Female bedbugs have a structure beneath their carapace to guide the penis into a mass of infection-fighting immune cells, but males have no such protection. at found that they respond instead by emitting a pheromone normally used to warn off predators.
Males with blocked glands were mounted as often as other males, but for longer and suffered more wounds (Animal Behaviour, ). 鈥淭his is the first time I鈥檝e seen an alarm pheromone used as a sexual one,鈥� says Ryne. The chemical could be used to deal with bedbug infestation, she adds.
Advertisement
