Madeline Hollander: Flatwing

Note: For a sound description of Cricket Thermometer (2021), scroll to the end of this transcript.

MH: I'm interested in the satellite strategy, or whatever it’s called, and for me increased movement is kind of meaningless unless I see what that looks like. As like–in terms of where it’s happening in the body and the relationship to the chirping cricket and the female, and even like what the move is from the male who is the flatwing, who is kind of hovering around, waiting for the female. So for me it’s like all of those parts are the substance that I would be interested in that I can't find. 

MZ: And you wouldn't because it’s mostly like stuff that happens...   

MH: In a lab. 

MZ: Well no, in nature it's like stuff that happens in the grass in the dark 

MH: Right, right, right, right.

MZ: Without us really seeing it, and so in the lab all it is is an insect walking which is not really all that informative. 

MH: It might be informative though! 

MH: I'm definitely more focused on the evolution of behavior and how that translates to physical movement. And so that’s why I was trying to figure out if this very crucial period where they're going from the satellite behavior to either going extinct or figuring out another method of calling could potentially lead to something more physical. You know—running in circles so that the male would have more chances of bumping into a female, you know just like things…

MZ: Well, see, that's what you would do. They don't have that much of a repertoire.

MH: Right. So they don't really learn from their behavioral mistakes. It's more of an evolutionary path? 

MZ: Right. Exactly.

MH: If one of them is, you know, rubbing against a leaf and it makes a sound that draws a cricket or that mimics the sound of a cricket, and it draws a female, they’re not going to be like, “Oh that worked!” 

MZ: Right, exactly. 

MH: Okay, that clarifies a lot for me. 

MZ: Insects certainly can learn, and I think increasingly people are realizing that their behavior is somewhat more flexible than we think, but their cognitive processes are just not the same as people.

MH: Mhm. Yeah. 

MZ: It’s important, you know, to appreciate how different other organisms are from us. If you were that size and were down there you would try and see, you would try and do all of the—they are not like people. 

MH: Right. As a choreographer and someone who is videotaping every single one of my rehearsals and every gesture and movement all the time, I'm also interested in what it would look like for a flat wing cricket to be stridulating, you know, imitating or still pretending to be creating the sound. But not creating the sound would also have a different movement quality than one that has, that is stridulating, that is making a sound. So all of those levels of detail are the part that for me is just completely fascinating. 

MZ: It just looks like their wings are raised and you can see the wings tremble very slightly. That’s all it looks like. 

MH: Right. Except for the flatwing crickets, when they are doing that, it’s not going to be trembling. They’re just going to be raising them and lowering them. 

MZ: All they are doing when they are trembling is that they are opening and closing their wings really quickly. 

MH: Right, but there’s ridges, and I assume that the ridges [are] what was causing– 

MZ: Right, but that doesn't affect how it appears, because that's a very, very fine scale. 

MH: Ah! So like a violin—

MZ: So to your eyes they would look exactly the same—

MH: I see. 

MH: Is there any assumption of what's going to happen when the satellite behavior is no longer available? In terms of the crickets evolving some sort of replacement to that call in the form of a dance. 

MZ: So, I mean, never say never, but what I think could happen is that if the normal wings all disappear, and the populations are small—so that’s possible—then I think the whole thing is... the whole shebang is going to go extinct, and the populations will stop existing. 

MH: Is there any indication that there are going to be more physical strategies because they are seemingly more locomotive and more agile? 

MZ: I suppose it's possible they could end up increasing the likelihood that they are going to run into a female. Sure, they are not going to suddenly, I don't know, evolve another pair of legs or something—

MH: Right, right. 

MZ: There’s limits to what’s kind of possible. 

MH: Right. Um, but it just seems like the satellite behavior is already a type of choreography that’s kind of a, you know, a sneaky one. I’m just curious whether or not the crickets are just going to step up and have some sort of performative act that...

MZ: But see they can’t do that unless they have the structures and the organs that would allow them to. That’s the thing. 

MH: Because physical movement would be enough. 

MZ: And they don’t. Like there’s only so many ways you can sense your environment. 

MH: Right. 

MZ: You can smell it, you can see it, you can hear it. And they are crappy at seeing, and anyway, it is dark. 

MH: Yeah. The seeing portion is very crucial here. 

MZ: They can hear really, really well. They are really good at hearing. They don't see very well, and it's dark.

MH: Um, I assumed that they are really good nightseers because they–

MZ: NOPE. 

MH: Okay. Then that’s a huge problem. 

MH: How much longer do you think there’s going to be the chirping crickets so that there’s still satellite behavior? 

MZ: I do not know. This is the thing that keeps me doing this project. 

MH: Yeah.

MZ: And you know, like every time I go I think, “Oh well are they still going to be there?” This is why we do science. You just see what—what happens out there. 

MH: Yeah. No, you’re just watching. 

MH: I'm dying for a more specific visual of exactly how that works. 

MZ: Yeah, and there kind of isn't. We don't do videos much. So, like I said, I mean, I'm taking data, but I don't do it with videos because I kind of know what it looks like and I’m there and I can just record, “walked this far,” or, you know, whatever it is that I'm recording. But it's not in the form of the video. 

MH: What is the likelihood that I could capture anything if I was to go into the field? 

MZ: Well in the field, almost nothing. In the lab, you could certainly do something. 

MH: Of course, yeah.   

MZ: You couldn't film it in the field because they are under the grass. 

MH: They're under the grass, well, yeah. No, I'm definitely at the edge of trying to figure out if there is a way to film it in the grass. 

MZ: Well not really—because again dark–and, B, you’d have to be super lucky because you’d have to catch–

MH: —the satellite behavior. 

MZ: I mean...basically, not really. 

MH: And that would be a whole 'nother—

MZ: But yeah, I mean I—wouldn't bother doing it. There is no reason to do it in the field. 

MH: Okay. There is no reason to do it in the field. Except for the natural landscape. You know, it would be an infrared so it would be like a night—it‘d be something that—

MZ: Right, but then it's just a patch of grass, it’s a lawn. 

MH: It's a lawn, yeah. It’s a close-up of a lawn waiting for hours for crickets to show up. 

MH: Ah! That’s—is that a—? I don’t think that’s a cricket…it’s a katydid, not a cricket. Let’s get this. Shit. Found ‘em. I think I’m just going to catch him in my hands. What is that? Is, is that a cricket? Oh my god it’s so loud. Where’d you go? Oh no. Come on. Focus, focus…. Come on big cricket. Where is it? Not a cricket. And I just lost him again...oh, no he’s there. Where? Come to me. 

Sound Description: Madeline Hollander, Cricket Thermometer, 2021
Running Time: Continuous

Sounds include: A mid-level tone pulses. High-pitched cricket chirps repeating at various intervals, sometimes in quick succession and sometimes with longer pause between.