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sexy fruit flies
Tagged Under : insects
Fruit flies may all look the same to you. But not to other fruit flies! A new study in the journal PLoS Biology finds that males prefer bigger females. In fact, they harass the big girls so much, those females don’t lay as many eggs as they would if the darn males left them alone.
My story about sexy fruit flies appears today on ScienceNOW. I must warn you that it includes fruit fly porn.
Approximate conversation with editor yesterday afternoon: “I was thinking of taking out the second to last paragraph. I think it’ll flow better.” Me: “I don’t really care, as long as my ‘hitting on the hotties’ joke stays in.” Editor: “Well, at least you’ve got your priorities straight.” Ok, ok, I care how the story flows. I just trust the editor to make the right decisions – he can take out whatever he wants, if he thinks it improves the story. Although he also took out that joke. Ah, well. You win some, you lose some. Important writing lesson: It’s easier for an editor to remove excess personality than to add personality.
I am pleased that a story with the title “I’m Too Sexy For My Species” appeared on my birthday.
photo: Tristan Long
I’d say they’re just big-boned… but, you know, no bones. Happy Birthday!
Now that’s a fantastic way to celebrate a birthday. Yay science!
So who wrote the headline? I made a small deal this week on my blog about “dino media” journalists not being able to write their own headlines while bloggers can. It’s not fair.
My editor did. I hate writing headlines – I’m terrible at it. I’m very happy it’s the editor’s job, because if it were my job, the headline would be something like “Male Fruit Flies Harass Female Fruit Flies.”
(I mean, note the headline on this blog post. It’s pathetic how boring it is.)