section_path: Ecology/Defense
section_name: Defense
paragraph_text: Defense
  
  Insects are mostly small, soft bodied, and fragile compared to larger lifeforms. The immature stages are small, move slowly or are immobile, and so all stages are exposed to predation and parasitism. Insects accordingly employ multiple defensive strategies, including camouflage, mimicry, toxicity and active defense. Many insects rely on camouflage to avoid being noticed by their predators or prey. It is common among leaf beetles and weevils that feed on wood or vegetation. Stick insects mimic the forms of sticks and leaves. Many insects use mimicry to deceive predators into avoiding them. In Batesian mimicry, edible species, such as of hoverflies (the mimics), gain a survival advantage by resembling inedible species (the models). In Müllerian mimicry, inedible species, such as of wasps and bees, resemble each other so as to reduce the sampling rate by predators who need to learn that those insects are inedible. Heliconius butterflies, many of which are toxic, form Müllerian complexes, advertising their inedibility. Chemical defense is common among Coleoptera and Lepidoptera, usually being advertised by bright warning colors (aposematism), as in the monarch butterfly. As larvae, they obtain their toxicity by sequestering chemicals from the plants they eat into their own tissues. Some manufacture their own toxins. Predators that eat poisonous butterflies and moths may vomit violently, learning not to eat insects with similar markings; this is the basis of Müllerian mimicry. Some ground beetles of the family Carabidae actively defend themselves, spraying chemicals from their abdomen with great accuracy, to repel predators.