Researchers study cricket courtship to understand sexy behavior in other animals

 In many parts of the world, crickets' song is a part of the soundtrack of summer. British researchers have discovered that the way crickets rub their wings together to make that sound is kind of like a dating app for insects.

All the times when you hear insects singing in your garden or cicadas or grasshoppers or bush crickets, it's almost invariably the males that are singing. And they're almost invariably singing for one reason, which is to try to attract females.

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Tregenza says studying cricket courtship is a way of understanding sexy-time behavior in other animals.

The tail of the peacock is a classic example of a crazy male trait that doesn't seem to be much use for anything, but they've got it just to try to attract females. And we study crickets because their singing is kind of like an audio example of something like a peacock's tail.

Tregenza and his colleagues have been watching insects in one meadow in Spain for years.

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