1. Insect Behavior

2. Rhythms Are simple responses to periodic changes in the environment
Many rhythms are response to changes in length of day and night are seasonal
Reproduction, mating, or migration

3. Locating food & initiating feeding
Food habits are classified by type of food eaten
Phytophagous = plant tissue
Carnivorous = animal tissue
Saprophagous = dead organic
Omnivorous = more than one type of food

4. Specialized in food source areas
Leaves
Sap
Roots
Pollen

5. Phytophagous = use sight & odors
Carnivorous = use sight (look for movements)
After they find the food source they will then use their mouth parts, tarsi, antennae to determine if the food source is what they can eat

6. Locating mates & copulation
Vision
Hearing
Smell (including pheromones)
Touch

7. Oviposition First a general discrimination as to an area
Second requires specific sensory conditions to initiate the behavior needed for egg deposition.
Chemoreceptors & tactile receptors on the tarsi and ovipositor, tasting the substrate by the mouthparts, and other senses are employed.

8. Oviposition Eggs may be laid either singly or in batches
Once laid most eggs are abandoned
Some beetles, sawflies & true bugs will provide parental care

9. Migration
Few insect species engage in migration. Those that do are classified as:
1- Undergoing this behavior soon after adulthood is reached
2- Females with developing ovaries being the consistent migrant sex
3- the migration often being a one-way movement, although some of the best known examples, such as certain populations of the Monarch butterfly do make at least partial return flights
4- Movement may not be straight-line in direction because of the directional winds and air masses.

10. Protective Behavior Bite Sting Flee Defensive Secretions
Chemicals in defense

11. Protective Behavior
Concealing coloration
Revealing coloration
Mimicry