Hank: An aphid mom could be carrying her daughters *and* granddaughters at the same time.

Their main survival strategy seems to be making a lot of babies, and they're especially good at it because the females are parthenogenetic, meaning that they can reproduce asexually. Instead of waiting to mate with a male in the spring and summer months, a mama aphid can cook up a whole bunch of clone daughters inside of her.

Now, parthenogenesis is pretty common among insects, but lady aphids have another reproductive shortcut: they give birth to live young, sometimes up to a dozen nymphs a day. This way, the aphids don't have to wait for the eggs to develop and hatch, and the next generation is quickly up and running.

And in some species, all of those daughter nymphs are actually already carrying more daughter embryos. In other words, some aphid babies are born pregnant. Babies having babies! Nymphs that are born pregnant still need to mature to the adult stage before they can give birth, but development can take as little as a week in good conditions, so tens of generations of aphids can spawn in just a couple of months.