Photo by T. Chapman.
Today in “nature is weirder than you ever thought possible” news: When male fruit flies are deprived of sex, they turn to alcohol. Really.
The researchers who studied the flies’ tiny blue balls gave them a choice between regular food and food mixed with 15 percent alcohol. Fruit flies that had been mating regularly didn’t show any preference for the alcoholic mixture. But when the male flies were denied access to females, they strongly preferred boozy food.
Lead researcher Troy Zars theorizes that this finding could lead to a better understanding of human addictive behavior. But we prefer to think of it as an excellent illustration of the principle that we are all interconnected with nature.
