Grasshopper

There's lot to discover and wonder about nature. Every little thing in nature teaches us something if we carefully look into. So, what's grosshopper's specialty...

Have you ever been amazed and astounded at how well a grasshopper can jump?
Have you ever wondered how they do it?

Well, someone did wondered and carried research about it. The grasshoppers use a CATAPULT to jump. [..following are excerpts of the wonderful webpage maintained by a Prof. W. J. Heitler, University of St. Andrews, UK..]

When a grasshopper jumps, it first crouches down, there is then a short delay, and then off it goes! A grasshopper jumps by extending its back legs from a folded position, so that they thrust against the ground. A good jump means that the legs must push against the ground with high force, and high speed.

We humans have a limitation of muscle power. If you make a muscle contract so as to get maximum force out of it, then it only contracts very slowly. On the other hand, if you make it contract as quickly as possible, then you don't get much force.

For example..snapping your finger. The more force you put, the less quickly you can snap the finger.

A human throwing something is exactly same as grasshopper throwing itself (after all, that's what jumping is - throwing oneself using ones legs). A good throw needs a rapid and forceful arm movement, but as we have just said, muscles can produce high force or high speed, but not both.

Humans have solved this problem by using tools, such as the catapult, or bow-and-arrow. But, the grasshopper has this mechanism built in. It does it routinely without much thought.

Where does the grasshopper keep its catapult?

Enugh of me...Check out the following links for detailed description and cool videos of the grasshoppers motion..

http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/~wjh/jumping/
http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/~wjh/jumping/weird_stuff
http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/~wjh/jumping/lifestyle.htm
http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/~wjh/jumping/info.htm