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Just as babies do not appear to remember anything until reaching a certain stage of brain development, the moths only recalled what they learned if the experience occurred before they were three weeks old. Insects that had been conditioned before that age did not avoid the chemical, while those conditioned after that point appeared to retain the memory. "We now know that the [insect's] brain is extensively rewired, although not built from scratch by any means," said Blackiston, who explained that many memory-storing neurons may remain intact during the transformation and make new connections as the insect ages. In the future, the findings could improve pest control techniques, since the research may help explain why insects often lay eggs on plants they apparently remember eating when they were larvae. The research could also help to determine how brains cope with large-scale changes, and how memory survives even after a nervous system is largely rewired, Blackiston said. Fred Gagnon, curator of butterflies at the Magic Wings butterfly conservatory in South Deerfield, Mass., doubts caterpillars could form many memories beyond odor-based ones, since they have very poor vision and "just eat all of the time without moving much." The conditioning aspect of the study didn't surprise him, though, since butterflies -- like dogs and cats -- can be socialized and trained."If you raise them in captivity, they are much less afraid of human contact than those taken from the wild," Gagnon said. "You can even train them to land on your finger."
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