The mating system of the Austrialian field cricket, Teleogryllus commodus , features behavioral and biochemical mechanisms of assuring paternity. Nearly everybody knows that male crickets attract their potential mates by emitting a calling song. You may recall the case of an American president's wife asking the Secret Service to remove a singing male from her bedroom in the White House. Singing is an expensive business for male crickets. Males often maintain and defend a territory that, I suppose with luck, will later serve as a courtship and mating arena.
Male crickets produce their songs by stridulation of the their wings.
The singing itself is an energy-intensive process. Before they begin singing, males of some crickets create a small burrow. The burrow acts as a sort of amphitheater, extending the males' broadcast distance. I have often wondered what it is that females hear. We begin with the calling song because the temporal organization of male and female mating behaviors increases the chances of successful mate location for both sexes.