The Effects of Plants on Animals

Some plants make noxious gases when damaged to scare off herbivores like riot police do. Volatile organic compounds emitted by corn and cotton and tobacco plants are a way of signaling animals that you might not have heard of. When certain pests, like the corn earworm, start chomping on the corn plant, damage it. The plant releases volatile organic compounds that don't seem to repel the earworm. Instead, the smell attracts parasitic wasps that fly over to the corn plant and they lay their eggs in the pest's eggs.