Weird Animals

That is amazing.

All the instructions to make an animal’s body are in each one of its individual cells. But how does an embryo know that a scrotum should be built in the groin, and not on your forehead?

Rest of the article gets better from there: http://www.wired.com/2015/05/6-extra-pairs-genitals-just-much-good-thing/

For 13 days, D. darius destroys and reforms itself inside what looks like the head of a Gaboon pit viper (though the snakes aren’t native to Trinidad).

HOW THE HELL DID IT LEARN HOW TO LOOK LIKE A SNAKE ITS NEVER SEEN. D:

Srsly do these 'pillers have YouTube or something, what gives.

Saw it in Nat Geo, thought it looked cool

One thing you won’t find in the story of the Very Hungry Caterpillar is the part where after transforming into a butterfly, he mates with a female who has a Very Hungry Reproductive Tract waiting to devour his sperm. She has a special digestive organ just for this purpose. It’s so powerful that it could even compete with the gut that let the caterpillar, in his more innocent days, chew through those five oranges.

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/inkfish/2015/05/28/butterflies-have-an-extra-stomach-attached-to-their-vaginas/#.VWirw1I3C6E

http://phenomena.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/02/single-celled-creature-has-eye-made-of-domesticated-microbes/

Young female blanket octopuses literally rip the tentacles right off portuguese man-o-war jellies, and uses them like little octopus nunchuks

http://www.deepseanews.com/2015/05/six-reasons-the-blanket-octopus-is-my-new-favorite-cephalopod/

Woah.

The more I see stuff like those last 2 links, the more I think I know nothing (jon snow). The ocean is just this whole unexplored pile of crazy.

It's not just you -- science still has huge gaps concerning the oceans, especially the deep seas!

http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20150720-giant-animals-youve-never-seen

That's a lot of giant animals, dunno if I have that kind of time.

lol

Imagine a woodlouse that can grow longer than a cat, 76cm (2.5 ft) long – and weigh 1.7kg (3.75 lb). Well, it exists and it's called the giant isopod.

>:(

Yeah, I'm not a fan of those either.

it's the 12-inch-wide spider that's worrying me

http://cdn.bleedingcool.net/wp-content/uploads//2010/09/isopods-eating-doritos-570x329.jpg

But giant isopods, they're just like us!

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Just some chill dudes chompin on some chips.

Wait, how do you not like the isopod? They're so cute.

*waves*

http://twistedsifter.files.wordpress.com/2010/03/the-grossest-creature-insect-ever.jpg?w=634&h=476

no

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emil.y

isopod friend 4 u

http://img15.deviantart.net/c189/i/2011/245/2/d/ivan_the_giant_isopod_by_tarrpit-d48oczi.jpg

click at your own risk

in fact they are so cute that you can buy fluffy zip-mouthed isopods from Ikea* and while you slept we all voted to replace the Easter Bunny with one
https://c2.staticflickr.com/6/5084/5225877787_25a7042457.jpg

(except you can't, because they're discontinued, and they were probably meant to be woodlice anyway. RIP Klappar Skalbagge)

the main takeaway from forks' link is that the human virus (trenchant!) is wiping almost all of them out

Moving on from giant isopod grossness:

http://www.wired.com/2015/07/absurd-creature-of-the-week-tarantula-hawk/?mbid=social_fb

“There are some vivid descriptions of people getting stung by these things,” says invertebrate biologist Ben Hutchins of Texas Parks and Wildlife, “and their recommendation—and this was actually in a peer-reviewed journal—was to just lie down and start screaming [...]”

Surprisingly not native to Australia.

Weird plants! http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/inkfish/2015/07/21/plants-murder-bugs-to-pay-their-bodyguards/

Scientists have noticed that the corpse-covered plants can attract other, predatory insects that are looking for food. And while they’re in the neighborhood, these predators might eat some of the plant’s pests—critters that haven’t gotten caught in the flypaper but are happily munching on the their host’s leaves and flowers. One study of a sticky daisy found that these predators were helpful to the plant.

xp lol

It’s actually a kind of solitary wasp with a sting whose resulting pain only lasts three minutes, but it’s so fiercely electric that it could only be described as totally unacceptable.

or "unchill"

Did we not have a thread solely about giant isopods at one stage?

fuck washing an isopod

Weird Animals... What's on your isopod?

Wet clicking noises and hisses that eventually start to sound like whispered, inhuman voices calling you to the deep

and Tinashe

Not super-appropriate for this thread, in that the animals aren't especially weird, but I liked this story full of videos of (mostly) Australian wildlife attacking drones, and needed to share it: http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/aug/13/eagle-attacking-drone-mid-air-animals-averse-uavs?CMP=ema_632

Flannel moth caterpillar in action:

https://45.media.tumblr.com/e4445b55f4b43c723191b26908720f5c/tumblr_nz0s1hR8WR1s3yrubo1_r2_1280.gif

i went to the water bears exhibit at the museum of natural history and it was amazing

Reminds me of this http://www.classickidstv.co.uk/wiki/images/c/c5/Dangermouse_Greenback.jpg

https://41.media.tumblr.com/21463416033ed990920b047d59a25128/tumblr_nz603qp0zf1qm9k25o1_540.jpg

Pretty nudibranch.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e7ZnO893hTs

^^ Watched that while I had the Jessica Jones theme song playing in the background, totally works, maaaaan.

Did we have these fellas yet?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMs8Cu8PNKM

THEY FLY @ U FACE

http://i.imgur.com/gAdCndd.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/Q3vafgL.jpg

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_jacana

Purple socks? Grape-flavored churros?

http://www.mbari.org/deep-sea-worms-slither-around-the-bottom-of-the-animal-tree-of-life/

http://globalnews.ca/news/2239088/national-geographic-puts-spotlight-on-b-c-s-enigmatic-sea-wolves/

Hah wow I totally thought that was going to be about some kind of predatory eel.

Like this wolf fish thing

http://www.sott.net/image/s13/267867/full/vllkyt5dr423icgh4_38b1be8f.jpg

Yeah! /faints