wtf_nature | Recent Entries

So, apparently there are snails that prey on other snails. Meet the rosy wolf snail:

The cover of Science magazine, featuring a fully extended snail with what looks to be an extra set of tentacles on its face, which are really its lips. Above the snail says 'Biological Invaders!'

You see those weird extra tentacles on the bottom of its face? Those are its lips. It has huge lips because it uses those lips to taste track the trails of other snails down, so it can consume them.

nanila

If you live in the UK, I do hope you've been watching the new David Attenborough series Frozen Planet. And if you have, did you notice the sequence on the life cycle of the Arctiid moth? It spends 14 years in caterpillar stage before it finally pupates. Can you imagine waiting 14 years before you were able to reprodu---oh. Anyway, better question: Can you imagine freezing solid every winter for 14 years before you were able to reproduce? CRYONICS FTW.

Wikipedia entry on Pyrrharctia isabella

foxfirefey

jadelennox

Introduce smell of rotting corpses to that full of lampreys. Lampreys, unsurprisingly, go batshit. Also unsurprisingly, lampreys going batshit are terrifying.

foxfirefey

pinkadot89

This gorgeous creature has been hiding from us for 87 years!

Read about it at the SOURCE

foxfirefey

YOUR BELLYBUTTON

foxfirefey

No, seriously. 'Singing penis' sets noise record for water insect.

pinkadot89

The research group behind the study showed that the photoreceptors seem to be located on the tip and base of the tube feet that are found all over the sea urchin's body and are used to move.

"We argue that the entire adult sea urchin can act as a huge compound eye, and that the shadow that is cast by the animal's opaque skeleton over the light-sensitive cells can give it directional vision," says Dupont.

Read more at the source...

foxfirefey

Its tiny little hoofsies...how...I don't even...

foxfirefey

So, if you take a single cell of a flatworm and put it into the dying body of another flatworm, it'll turn into a clone of the original flatworm. Trufax.

foxfirefey

jadelennox

How hummingbirds drink. (There's a video which you should totally watch if you can, but the article describes what's going on if you can't see the video.)

miss_haitch

The lyrebird of Australia is so called because the male's tail feathers look vaguely like a lyre, but most people don't take notice of how it looks once it opens its beak. It's most famous for its extremely good mimicry of other birds and anything else it hears. Also, according to Wikipedia a group of lyrebirds is called a "musket". Just another way in which this bird is frickin' awesome.

( Video under the cut )

jadelennox

Take a look at this ant. Then look again. Count the legs. Yes, those legs. The ones that look like antennae.

Current Mood: impressed

foxfirefey

So they're in a training program.

jadelennox

the magnificent mammal menage a trois

Imagine this. You’re on a research vessel out at sea in the Bay of Fundy, prime summer cruising area for feeding and nursing right whales. You’re not doing anything kinky, just attaching research tags to whales to determine position and feeding habits.

And then you see it. A Surface Active Group of two males and a female, rolling around and jostling at the surface. The female rolls over, presents her underside above the waves, and then…

( picture very not safe for work if you are a whale )

Current Mood: impressed

S	M	T	W	T	F	S
1	2	3	4	5	6	7
8	9	10	11	12	13	14
15	16	17	18	19	20	21
22	23	24	25	26	27	28
29	30	31

The strangeness of nature in all its forms

Carnivorous cannibal snails

Patience, thy name is Pyrrharctia isabella

How beary long

do you know what that sound is, highness? Those are the shrieking eels.

VAMPIRE FIIIIIIINCHES

Rediscovered Rainbow Toad

Guess what is a thriving, diverse ecosystem

The creature that is loudest for its size is using its penis to make the noise.

Sea Urchins see with whole body

Leocochloridium Paradoxum

Spongiforma squarepantsii

I present to you the "Mouse Deer"

I want a jumping cockroach!

And you though earthworms were good at regenerating when cut in half...

Ants! Close up!

hummingbirds with forked tongues

Allow me to present the lyrebird

insect fun. Kind of.

Pandas have troubles making love

I saw this in a porn movie, but it wasn't whales

Profile

January 2012

Syndicate

Page Summary

Style Credit

Expand Cut Tags