If an expectant mother knew that dangerous creatures lurked around her, and knew also that she wouldn’t be around to take care of her young, she might be stressed.

Image Credit... Chris Gash

And if she had a way to warn her young before they were born, surely she would.

Human mothers cannot do this, to the best of our knowledge. But pregnant crickets, it appears, do have the ability to forewarn. This is especially useful since crickets abandon their young after birth.

Researchers from the University of South Carolina Upstate and Indiana State University placed pregnant crickets in an enclosure where they were stalked, but not eaten, by a wolf spider, whose fangs had been coated with wax to protect the crickets.