It was a bright morning, I was 14 days old, and lived in an organic produce store that displayed succulent fruits with an astoundingly short shelf life, a life of luxury one might say. It was in a beautiful street out of the way from busy roads and far away from bustling markets all my siblings had flocked over to what they called ‘finding their destiny.’ I was never in sync with them, a late-bloomer hatching one day later than the rest, perfectly happy with this country life. All my siblings left soon after their eclosion the previous day, and today I had come of age too. As the first order of business, I take a good look at my beautiful wings and elongated abdomen marveling at the narrow dark bands visible. Slowly my hunger begins to bother me, reminding me of the scent of soft juiciness of rotting fruits, and I take off.
I first glanced upon him as I was busy engorging myself on some grapefruit at the section with freshly sliced fruit packets where you are bound to find a pack or two open enough to wriggle into. He had the darkest rear abdomen I had ever seen. I tried to turn my attention back to the fruit, but my compound eyes could not have enough of him. I had heard some stories about this feeling from my elder sisters, they used to say it can happen anytime after 8–10 hours after eclosion, but surely I am just imagining it. As luck would have it, he approached me and began tapping his forelegs, clearly interested in me. But I was not sure whether I was ready and had to kick him away to move onto another shelf. But he persisted, following me, aisle to aisle. And just when I thought I had lost him, he came right before me and started singing the courtship song of our species, stopping me right on my tracks with this enchanting piece.
We communicated for an hour by the end of which I felt like we have known each other for ten days! Just as we were passing by the refreshingly scented oranges, engrossed in our conversation, we were attacked. I remember getting sucked into a bottle together, but the carbon dioxide inside made it hard to stay conscious. Then I briefly remember being transferred to a vial, it was bright outside, but not by the sun, this light was crass and overbearing, the walls white, the air freshener a poor olfactory replication of lemons. This new enclosure was cold, and as they picked my partner away from me, I could do nothing, I could not move, and then it was all black, anything better than this light.
[The lab outside preps for genetic crossing procedures for fly AY347]
[Lab recording of fly AY347: The fly shows aversion towards citrus scents]
References:
- Busto, G. U., Cervantes-Sandoval, I., & Davis, R. L. (2010). Olfactory learning in Drosophila. Physiology, 25(6), 338–346.
- Pavlou, H. J., & Goodwin, S. F. (2013). Courtship behavior in Drosophila melanogaster: towards a ‘courtship connectome’. Current Opinion in Neurobiology, 23(1), 76–83.
- An introduction to Drosophila melanogaster written by The Berg Lab. Retrieved from https://depts.washington.edu/cberglab/wordpress/outreach/an-introduction-to-fruit-flies/
