NARBC Spring 2014!

Confession time: The reason I've not been updating as much is simply because I've been using my other Gmail account more. Having both switchable at the ready is nice. Never fear; more entries are coming, and they'll be juicier and meatier than ever before!

This entry focuses on North American Reptile Breeders' Convention (NARBC) Spring 2014 (Mar 15-6). I love these - there's so much cool stuff to take photos of! These went on my Twitter (@kurokarasu), so some people got a live feed of this entry as it was being made. ;) Most things are way out of my price range, but there are also some really great bargains that remind one how expensive pet stores can be. You'll also see a lot of species that one would not ordinarily see, like...

...yes, that's a hognose (H. nasicus). They're really cool, little rear-fanged snakes that are only mildly venomous. Nobody has ever died from a hognose bite; the worst that's happened is an allergic reaction. I've complained about how hard they are to get in IL before, but all one really needs is a permit.

So, how can these people even touch poison dart frogs? Captive-bred poison dart frogs aren't poisonous. The poison needs a few things before it can activate: bacteria on the frog, UV light, and a certain species of insect. We can take that last one away, at least, meaning that these frogs are OK to handle. Still, wash your hands after handling. These are mostly display frogs, anyways.

Someone on my Twitter commented that these ball pythons (P. regius) were on the pricey side. Um...no, not for ball python morphs, they are not. Here are a few non-slashed (or very slightly discounted) ball python morphs for your gawking pleasure:

Yes, I deliberately took photos of acid trips for you. Bear in mind that your regular ball pythons (usually "loser males") can be purchased for 30-50 bucks from a reptile specialty store.

A leucistic rainbow boa! A shame it looks almost like every other white snake on the market. If there was any of the species' namesake iridescence in these guys, the light was not showing it well.

This is a legless lizard. It was hard to get a good look at its eyes, but several other features made me believe it anyways. I'd like to think someone at a reptile convention would correct the owner if he was BS'ing us.

Hypo Burms! One of them was sold as I was walking around. People acted like they were having trouble getting rid of them. Given the abundance of laws surrounding giant snakes, I understand why.

I absolutely love dwarf reticulated pythons! This picture also happens to be for science; I'm working on a paper concerning what makes for a good domesticated animal, and dwarf retics are actually a really good candidate for a domesticated snake. I asked if they retained their legendary intelligence (by snake standards) even when dwarfs; the seller said yes. Regardless, it was amazing to hold one of these beauties.

Finally, my own acquisition: A GFP axolotl! This little guy (or girl, we don't know) glows green under black light, just like a GloFish. His/her working name is "Fran," short for both "Frankenstein" and "Francesca/Francisco"- we aren't sure, yet. Once the little salamander grows a bit, the males get bulges near the base of the tail. We shall see! 

Creature Feature: Thread Snakes.

This picture is MINE...but was done with Field Museum equipment, and is for their use.  

Now for something I actually did: This is the head of a silver snake (Leptotyphlops albifrons), a type of thread snake from Argentina. It took forever to get a picture this good! The (dead) specimen had curled such that the head was hard to spread flat, but great side shots like this were still possible. It even shows the cute white spot at the front of the snake - handy, since the tail and head look very much alike on thread snakes. Just one of the many interesting things one can do by volunteering at the Field Museum!

Thread snakes in general are pretty neat, too. There are a few different families of thread snake, but they have enough in common to comfortably be called the same thing and share an entry page. Collectively, are found almost everywhere except Europe and some of the colder parts of northern Asia. Seeing them at all is a problem; these are secretive, quiet creatures that live in the soil and under rocks. Prepare to get your hands dirty. 

Thread snakes are also called "worm snakes" or "blind snakes," and with good reason. These snakes look like worms, if not burnt noodles. They are not slimy like worms; that should be your first clue if you happen to pick one up. As seen beneath a microscope, however, these snakes have scales, eyes, nostrils, and a spinal cord, just like every other snake in existence. All of them eat eusocial insects, particularly ants and termites, at all stages of life. Some may also be parthenogenic - capable of reproducing entirely without a male. More on that particular thread snake in another entry, though.

From National Geographic. Probably the only pic out there. 

Thread snakes are the tiniest snakes in the world. The smallest snake currently on record is the Barbados thread snake (L.carlae). As the name implies, this species is only native to Barbados, an island in the Caribbean. It is so small that it feeds on termites and their larvae. The adult is small enough to, well, fit comfortably on a quarter. The snake may be on the verge of extinction due to habitat threat, but not very much is known about it at all. It was just discovered and identified in 2008, so give it a bit longer.

Oddly enough, these snakes have the proportionately largest eggs of any snake type. The mother lays only one egg...which hatches into a baby almost half her size. Scientists think that, if the babies were any smaller, they would not be able to eat. The opposite case is true with giant pythons, who can lay clutches of hundreds! Size matters - just ask the people who take home Burmese pythons without realizing how monstrously huge they get.

Source. 

I love volunteering at the Field. I get inspired for so many entries, but only a few of them make the cut. Now, if only I could actually get paid to do things like that photo up top. 

"What Does The Fox Say?"

First off, let me just say that the song I am referencing in the title is very silly. "Stupid" would imply that I hate it, which is not 100% true; I appreciate a catchy hook for what it is. The video is also okay. It is, however, still a very silly song in that it is about a guy wondering what foxes say, and why there is no convenient onomatopoeia for it like "moo," "woof," or "meow."

What? You don't know what "onomatopoeia" is? Let's fix that!

"Onomatopoeia" is the fancy, English major word for "sound effects" in word form. Words that represent sounds like "bang," "wham," or "zoom" are onomatopoeia. They have no meaning aside from the sound they are representing. There, you've learned something.

Foxes actually have a great variety of calls. For all you dog and cat owners out there, no doubt you have noticed different noises for when your pet wants to play, is hungry, or is not in the mood for much of anything. Foxes have an extremely versatile vocal range. Your dog is a singing bum on the street compared to the vocal rock stars foxes are.

Take a lookie here:



That's a lot of very distinct sounds for one animal, no? No wonder nobody really knows what the fox said; they probably didn't even know it was a fox. 

Here's the "Vixen's Scream" they mentioned, complete with facial expressions:



Oh, and for all you Pokemon fans, here's what your Fennekin sounds like when it is happy:



Or, "AHMG YOU GAVE ME A POKEPUFF, YAAAAAYYYY!"

So, you tell me: What does the fox say? Write your own onomatopoeia for what the fox says below. I'm sure Ylvis got it right somewhere. He said too many different things for one of them not to hit the mark.

A Week of Hogwash: What Is It With Wild Boars?

If you look through old mythology, you'll notice one common thing: wild boars can be terrifying, awesome creatures. Boars were one of the mascots of Ares; whole war helmets have been made out of boar bits. Freyr, another warlike deity, has a metallic boar, Gullinbursti, as a pet. The Celts acknowledged the male boar's courage and the female boar's generosity and fecundity. They are pretty much universally acknowledged as badasses. As a reminder, they also spawned the domestic pig.

Source: Huntercourse.com.

This is what piggies (Sus scrofa) used to look like. Wild boar are native to Europe and Asia, but have since been turned loose in North America and Australia. Unlike the aurochs and wolves, wild boar are not under any threat whatsoever, being extremely fecund. They have also been domesticated since time immemorial, although exactly who decided taming hundreds of pounds of vicious pig was a good idea remains up for debate. They are omnivores and scavengers, just like most domestic pigs are.

Although the official size record for "world's largest pig species" goes to the giant forest hog, some populations of wild boar can outdo them in terms of size. European wild boar can get up to 700 pounds. Again, they also have razor-sharp tusks, charge swiftly, don't back down, and are covered in tough bristles as opposed to the relative hairlessness on domestic swine. As huntercourse.com put it, "boars will circle a human adversary, charge rampantly and attack from behind." Put a few hundred pounds onto that and you have something terrifying.

And now the part at least some of you have been waiting for: yes, wild boar hybridize freely with domestic swine. "Hogzilla" is the most famous example of a boar-pig hybrid, weighing 800 pounds and growing roughly 8 feet long. Thus far, this is still the biggest hybrid out there - and likely the biggest pig on record. Feral swine can get massive and retain all their wild behaviors; the pig is far less removed from its wild relative than, say, the dog or cow. You will never see ham the same way again.

The wild boar remains probably the most intimidating wild beast with a domesticated counterpart. A boar, male or female, will fiercely protect its piglets and charge with surprising vigor. The Year of the Pig is frequently changed to Year of the Boar in the wild counterpart's honor. The boar can still be seen on heraldic crests because it is one badass pig.

They Actually Eat That/A Week of Hogwash: Head Cheese.

Originally, this entry was going to be dedicated to Hormel. Not only are they probably awful factory farmers, depriving piggies of their natural well-being, but they will put everything and anything ham-related into a can. That includes canned bacon and taquitos. Look it up if you're curious; I'm just going to sigh, say "oh, Hormel," and move on to something even more disgusting than canned bacon. 

This is commonly known in the U.S. as "head cheese." It is also called "souse" or "brawn" if one simply must make it sound more classy to offset exactly what sort of meat is in question. As one can probably guess, it is made from the head of the pig, sheep, or calf. It has been around since the Middle Ages as a European peasant food. Gee, I wonder why?

Let's think about that for a moment.  There are plenty of meaty parts on an animal's body. The head is not one of them unless the animal in question happens to be a whale or dolphin. Feel your own head for a minute and imagine someone thinking, "hey, there might be meat, there." You'd probably think they were the stupidest, sickest people on earth, right? So, how does that relatively thin skin even remotely qualify as food?

Hey, remember aspic? How about gelatin? Head cheese is usually in a meat gel like that. The meat around the skull naturally gels that way to some degree. Head cheese can look like perfectly OK loaves of mystery meat (see also: meat glue), or it can look like modern food/art gone horribly wrong. Some people think it looks really beautiful; while I can see why they think that, I do not necessarily agree.

OK, this one from the Houston Press does look nice.

Who would do such a thing? Everybody. China does it, every country in Europe does it, and America does it by default. It's a good way to use up parts of a pig that nobody would otherwise eat, even if it happens to be from the 2nd ring of Hell. If a culture eats pigs, it has head cheese in some form. Now enjoy your 4th of July barbeque if you happen to be in the United States. :)

Creature Feature: Springtails.

By request of one of our readers, we began looking stuff up on insect evolution. It's not covered too often, so the request was more than welcome. This led to our discovery of the oldest insect in the world, Rhyniognathus hirsti.

Source.

Wait a sec. What is that? Not in this blog's usual WTF way, but really, that fossil's hard to see. 
So here's the next best thing: a living fossil of an insect called a springtail.

Boing!

Actually, we aren't even sure if springtails are insects. Some people think that they diverged from insects a while back, and thus deserve their own class (Entognatha). They have most of the right stuff- six legs, exoskeleton, etc. - but also have some traits that stick out. Unlike most insects, they never really metamorphose, and don't have external mouthparts. Also, as per the name, springtails possess a long structure in their rears (called a "furcula") that lets them jump. That last one doesn't keep them from being insects - it's just cool.

Springtails go way back. They go so far back that the first bug ever was first thought to be Rhyiella praecursor - a basal springtail. The same chert section with R. praecursor held the fossil first mentioned up above. This makes springtails among the first arthropods to ever walk on land. No wonder their taxonomy is confused.

Springtails may be creepy, but are they harmful? Yes and no. They are agricultural pests at worst, a title shared with many insects. They are, however, sensitive to herbicides and many other soil alterations. One springtail in particular is used as a model organism to test for potentially-toxic soil. See? They're not all bad.

If you wish to find springtails, well, this was an entry covering a whole class of bizarre little arthropods. Springtails are tiny, but can be found beneath leaves and in other humid places. As shown above, they are tiny, and frequently confused with fleas. They eat decaying matter and keep microoorganisms in check. Plus, they bounce; there's not much to hate, even though some people thing any creepy crawly is legitimately creepy.

"They Actually Eat That:" Porcupine.

Is there any vertebrate that sounds less appetizing than porcupine? It's big, and there's a lot of meat there, but it has spines, teeth, and claws to deal with. Granted, boars and bulls can be pretty nasty, but their skin won't turn your face into a bloody mess (plus, bacon). Who looks at a porcupine and goes "yeah, that looks delicious?" Well...a fair amount of people, actually.

Wherever there are porcupines, people will eat them. They usually do not want to, though. Native Americans can and will use porcupines as meat during the winter. Kenya had a porcupine crisis in 2005 - the most logical solution, after the porcupines had dug up graves and destroyed crops, was to eat the buggers. This may have been dirty porcupine meat, but there is no greater revenge than eating the ones who ate your food.

Porcupine meat is not just for the non-industrialized, either. Porcupines are assholes, for lack of a better word, on a regular basis. They carry diseases, nibble on everything, stick you or others with their hair-turned-needles, and generally are just unpleasant to have around. Last year, people in Pennsylvania started eating porcupines, too- or at least made hunting them legal in the wake of a porcupine outbreak. Again, revenge.

The practice of eating porcupine is still largely reserved for Native Americans and people with porcupine issues in the West, but China and Vietnam at porcupine regularly. It is so popular over there that porcupines are actually threatened. We knew that Vietnam and China ate almost anything. It seemed unlikely that they would hunt a rodent enough to cause a population decrease of 20 percent. Revenge? Noooo, this is just how Southeast Asia rolls. They even farm porcupines.

So how does it taste? Supposedly...weirdly good. It has been described as being "like duck meat, but with more flavour and very crunchy." That particular person actually liked it better than duck; given what I've seen from people's reactions to duck, that is quite the compliment. Maybe the Vietnamese are onto something.

Creature Feature: Bigfoot Porcupines.

In the vein of speculation about the new Grass-type starter, "porcupine" has come up repeatedly. The idea of getting a massive porcupine as a starter brought to mind a certain "Bigfoot" video that was debunked in a flash. We already had a yeti Pokemon; a porcupine becoming Bigfoot would not be out of the question. I doubt Game Freak will be that creative, but just in case, the stuff connecting porcupines and Bigfoot is pretty crazy anyways.


Late last year, this video was blogged by an ardent cryptozoologist. Unfortunately, not only was it a year or two too late, but the video had been debunked. Not "no way, you're avoiding the truth!" debunked, but legitimately, "OK, yeah, our bad" debunked. It continues to fool people today regardless. So, what was it, really?

A few PhotoShops and de-fuzzes later, "Bigfoot" was revealed to be a rather large North American Porcupine. For those of you who are secretly mole people, porcupines are spiny rodents native to virtually every landmass except Australia and Antarctica. They are herbivores, but are armed with spiny hairs ("quills") which they do not shoot, merely bristle whenever a predator approaches. They are also fairly large, third only to the beaver and capybara in size.

It turns out porcupines can look an awful lot like large primates when they want to. The first instinct of a porcupine is not to turn buttwards towards a mouth of teeth; they would rather run than fight, and resemble rather large, furry, short-tailed monkeys when they climb away from predators. Giant, short-tailed thing? Clearly Bigfoot.

One of the craziest conspiracy theories has a basis in fact: that porcupines may be hiding Bigfoot bones. Macabre as it sounds, porcupines do indeed hoard bones. Bones are the rodent version of vitamin tablets. If a porcupine finds a bone, it may well chew on it in order to gain phosphorous.  Whether Bigfoot wound up in there and absolutely nowhere else or not is another matter entirely. I would suspect the men in black before a porcupine conspiracy.

...

You didn't see anything.

Creature Feature: Trilobites- K. brutoni.

Of all things this blog has covered, trilobites have not been among them. We've done Anomalocaris, triops, and various other prehistoric shelled things, but never the classic trilobite. So, for the sake of a trilobite finally having its day in the sun, here:

Cambrian (early) trilobite.

For starters: what is a trilobite, anyways? Trilobites were a huge group of extinct arthropods. They came about before the Cambrian Explosion and lasted until the Permian Extimction (252.28 Ma). They took over the world, or at least the seas, during much of their time on earth; if a landmass was underwater up to the Permian, it'll have trilobites somewhere. We are still not sure whether these bizarre creatures were more closely related to crustaceans or arachnids. This is after finding millions of trilobite specimens. Just treat them as their own thing, for now.

Trilobites are by no means rare. There were millions of them in the prehistoric seas. They had four distinct orders and several hundred genera. It is possible to tell where a fossil formation is from just by looking at the trilobites. They came in all sorts of shapes and sizes, so they were able to fit a million different niches. Now, they're so common in fossil collections that rock shops sometimes sell them for cheap. By fossil standards, anyways.

The kicker is that there were so many different trilobites that I would feel guilty compressing them all into one entry. That said, I picked what I thought was the most...shocking...out of the trilobite species: Koneprusia brutoni. 

This is the TOP of the trilobite. (Credit: Wikimedia.)

K. brutoni was one of the most elaborately-decorated trilobites in existence. It lived during the Devonian in what is now Morocco. Its genus was a member of the order Lichida, which is notorious for spiny trilobites. These spines may have evolved to coincide with the advent of jawed fishes, but nobody really knows. Alas, despite its awesome looks, information on K. brutoni is very, very sparse.




This trilobite just looks badass. You could slap this thing on a heavy metal album cover and it would sell for the sheer WTF. It's one of those trilobites that has spines all over and generally looks like something from Alien. Regrettably, there have been no horror movies about giant trilobites...fund it. We need to break the alien/zombie fad going on.

From here. The price is exceptional for this excellent specimen.

So, what happened to all the trilobites, including K. brutoni? They slowly lost their ecological niches as time went on. Some people think that the last remnants might be horseshoe crabs and certain types of abyssal shrimp. Now trilobites are remembered as the generic "prehistoric bug...." and Kabutops, who remembers that trilobites were once badass.

I'll make YOU extinct!

Creature Feature: Rose-ringed Parakeet.

As Black Friday edges ever closer, be on the lookout for "robo-pets." These are cute, often remote-controlled amusements that will sate one's interest for a while, but generally get boring fast. They never quite have the thrill of a real animal; alas, moms generally will not buy their kids real tigers and cheetahs.



Wait a sec. That's a real bird?

Yep. He's a ringnecked, or rose-ringed, parakeet (Psittacula krameri). Specifically, he's most likely an Indian Ringneck Parakeet (P. krameri manillensis), the most common in the trade. These parrots are native to a small little ribbon in Africa and a much larger proportion of India, hence the name. There are several subspecies in this relatively wide range, which is only getting wider with time.

Unlike many common pet parrots, female and male rose-ringed parakeets are easy to tell apart: the male has a ring and the female doesn't. This is only visible in adult birds, however. Both make equally good pets, although it's usually said that male birds will talk more readily. For your convenience, they come in many colors, including blue, green, yellow (lutino) and albino. That said, please don't get one without doing your research; parrots are fairly high-maintenance as far as pets go.

Ringnecks are probably the oldest species of domesticated parrot. They go back to at least 200 B.C., when Indian religious leaders began keeping them for their ability to mimic human speech. The Greeks and Romans were also fond of the various ringnecks, meaning that keeping them goes back even farther in India. The ringnecks became even more popular in the 1920's, when birdkeepers started to breed them for the bright color palette seen above. Of course, the birds' intelligent, charming temperament helped in maintaining their popularity.

That said, this popularity has yielded an expected, yet still somehow surprising, result: Feral parrots. Everywhere. The U.S., Japan, South Africa (which isn't too far from home, really), Italy, and the war-torn Middle East all have thriving feral parrot populations. Even Australia has these guys. These birds are that hardy and adaptive to human "disturbances," plus they get so much yummy bird seed in those feeders. One wouldn't expect to see them in the U.K., but there ya go. India's revenge on the Brits is cute and feathery. No word on anything Hitchcock would write, though.

They still seem to be conspiring against us...

Creature Feature: Dung Beetles.

Animals do all sorts of weird things involving stuff that humans wouldn't touch. THis has largely to do with that animal's personal world - for example, urine is an excellent indicator of scent (and most of the animal world does see by scent) and rabbits eat their own droppings so as to eat the extra nutrients. It all makes sense in the animal's own view of the world.

That said, dung beetles must be one of the most baffling species in the world to humans. All dung beetles are scarabid beetles, and they can be found on every continent except Antarctica.  Trying to name off every single species would be an exercise in futility. They eat and lay eggs in feces. Gross, right?

What's gross to us is really quite monumental in the beetle's own little world. Dung beetles are amazing. The dung balls that the beetles make are either a) massive food stores or b) nests made of quite a convenient material. The balls of feces they accumulate can be up to ten times their weight, so rolling one is like a single human pushing 6 buses full of people! Also, it's kind of funny that the males are usually the ones doing the rolling- make jokes about THAT at will.

It's a small world, after all.

This use of dung is quite a valuable service. Rolling the dung means rolling foul-smelling excrement away from whatever made it, refertilizing the soil and keeping pests away at the same time. Dung beetles save the U.S. cattle industry somewhere around 38 million dollars every year. Seriously, it's a good thing that somebody is handling the dung; we humans do not want to deal with it ourselves.

Finally, what would an entry on dung beetles be without at least mentioning ancient Egypt? The Egyptians, for all their pyramids, agricultural advances, and nifty inventions believed that the sun was rolled across the sky like a dung beetle rolling excrement. It was also believed that all dung beetles were male and that they reproduced by masturbating into a dung ball. We can understand falcons, ibises, crocodiles, and jackals being impressive. The dung beetles are actually pretty cool, too, but giving them the sun might be pushing it.

Creature Feature: Assassin Bug.

Some of you have probably noticed little ads on YouTube or Blip for a cartoon whose tagline is "nature is dirty."Yes, nature is dirty on every single level. It's all about screwing, killing, mind control, and getting high - you know, things that one would expect from the mafia. That said, nature even comes equipped with its own band of assassins...

Photo by Debbie Roos.

...who just so happen to be insects.

There are a lot of leafhopper-ish bugs under the big happy family of assassin bugs. They get their name from being ambush predators, mostly of other insects, but also vertebrates. They all belong to the family Reduviidae, which is related to water bugs. I really hate doing single entries on whole families of things, but this really is an interesting bunch. There are about 7000 species in total. This is not doing the whole family justice.

All assassin bugs have venom. For those of you out there who aren't toxicologists, most types of venom contain digestive enzymes. Assassin bugs inject a mix of these enzymes and an anaesthetic into  the skin of their target. In the case of insects, the internal tissues are also liquefied. The resulting juice is then sucked up through the assassin bug's strawlike rostrum like some horrible smoothie.

 

Since there are so many kinds of assassin bugs, it's hard to make any sort of generalization about them. You can probably find an assassin bug near you, but whether it will be after your blood or not depends on exactly where you are. Some kill unwanted pests, like roaches, moths, Japanese beetles, and mosquitoes; others drink mammalian blood just like mosquitoes. There is a chance that bloodsuckers in South America might harbor a particularly nasty disease simply called "Chagas' disease"- gross stuff comes with the hematophage territory. 

Chagas' disease is carried by assassin bugs in the tropical Americas. Actually, if you want to be technical, Chagas' disease is caused by a parasite on the assassin bug called Trypanosoma cruzi  - a parasite of a parasite, if you will. It is deposited in the bug's feces, which easily gets into human skin with but a scratch. The most obvious sign of the disease is localized swelling around where the bug's feces were deposited, but if left untreated, the protists strike the muscles and heart. The bloodsucking assassin is just a vector in this protist's life; I'd say "don't shoot the messenger," but that's really the best way to stop the bug from spreading feces. Like I said, nature is dirty. 

Creature Feature: Bed Bugs.

"Good night. Sleep tight. Don't let the bed bugs bite!"

Hahaha. As I've been finding out recently, easier said than done. We have bedbugs or something else. I want to say that it's some sort of mite, but for now, let's look at bed bugs. (I will make another entry on mites if need be.) There is more to them than meets the eye.

The term "bed bug" usually refers to Cimex lectularius, the common bed bug that feeds on human blood. It can, however, refer to any member of the genus Cimex or even the whole family Cimicidae. Bed bugs are found everywhere and have been feeding on humans for millennia. Don't feel too bad about finding them in your house - you're just a few generations behind.

The bed bug has to be one of the most durable little insects ever. They do not really care how hot or cold things are; too cold and they just hibernate. Bed bugs do not care whether your house is clean or dirty. All they want is your blood and a place to hide and reproduce in. That's really all they need: Food, shelter, and sex.

Oh wow. Yes, let's talk about bedbug reproduction for a moment. It's...special.

Pic by Rickard Ignell.

All bed bugs mate through something called "traumatic insemination." While taking that literally might just translate as "rape" to most people, it is a very special kind of rape in scientific circles. Some animals do not have openings for a penis to go into, so the male inserts himself wherever he pleases into the female's flesh (and thus blood). That is how bedbugs get knocked up: by having the male pierce the female's exoskeleton with his hard-on. Face it: Even the kinkiest people wouldn't find that kind of penetration sexy.

So, how do you know if you have bed bugs in your house? Well, seeing one or getting repeated blisters for no good reason are fairly sound signs. Dead bed bugs apparently smell like raspberries, so if you aren't a fan of raspberries and randomly smell them, that's a pretty good hint, too. Get an exterminator; they might even bring a bed bug-sniffing dog along. Bed bug attacks have been on rise rise, so have the number handy. Just remember that the females get a really raw deal.

Creature Feature: Argentine Ants.

No matter how advanced humans get or how much we spawn, insects will always outdo us. They spawn faster, evolve faster, and several species are remarkably social. Hell, now, they've even caught up in the invasive species department. We thought we had that market cornered.

First, a reminder: Ants are already secretly terrifying, and not just when they happen to be on your food. They are the only animals aside from humans (and maybe chimps) that wage war. They also have livestock in the form of aphids and agriculture in the form of fungi. These little insects are so much like us that it's uncanny. They're almost idealized as hard workers that are so driven to work that they are all but born into a caste. This is eusocial? Creepy.

The Argentine ant takes the creepiness up another few levels. It is a dark ant native to Brazil, Ecuador, and, of course, Argentina. Now, they can be found on every continent except Antarctica (y'know, the only continent with "ant" in its name). They probably spread via human transport, but "alien conspiracy" would not surprise us, either. They're ants, so they'll eat whatever's around.

If you thought Japanese beetles were bad, they have nothing on the invasive power of Argentine ants.  These ants have spread to every area willing to accommodate them. All it takes is ten workers and a single queen to churn out a whole colony. Since these are ants we're talking about, they are also perfectly capable of displacing current ant species, making the Argentine officially the One Ant to Rule Them All. People worry about culture becoming homogenized; these ants are already most of the way there.

You know what's even creepier? Every single Argentine ant colony outside of Argentina is genetically related. Scientists have taken ants from Europe and mixed them with Asian and North American colonies with no ill results. Go ahead, try this with humans (even triplets who had to separate for some reason). The result will not be this clean.

Also, if you happen to have a problem with these ants...too bad. Pesticides make the queen lay more eggs. There also tend to be many queens. Congratulations, Argentine ants: you have officially taken over the world. Way to beat Pinkie and the Brain to the punch.

Fungus Among Us: Skirted Stinkhorn.

Since the power outage unfortunately cut our fungus week short, here's what I would have done if the power hadn't gone out. Yes, I know, we already did a stinkhorn, but this stinkhorn is a little more eerie.

More here.

Perhaps this would have been a little more appropriate for Halloween, but the skirted stinkhorn (Phallus indusiatus) is the quintessential "weird mushroom." It's identifiable as a mushroom, but looks like it was laced with cobwebs or the skirt of a ghost. Every tropical region in the world has this thing. It's that one mushroom that people photograph and demand to know what it is. Now you know, and knowing is half the battle.

P. indusiatus has a very distinctive 'skirt' of lacy indusium- the stuff beneath the cap on this mushroom. As in the basket stinkhorn, this mushroom uses its scent and presumably holes to help spread its spores around. Again, the spores are stored in a sticky fluid called gleba as opposed to being airborne. Is it just me, or do all stinkhorns sound like something out of alien movies?

Unlike the other stinkhorn we covered, yes, this baby is edible. It was a rarity in Qing dynasty cuisine for a long time. The notorious Empress Dowager Cixi had a particular fondness for skirted stinkhorn, and Henry Kissinger got a taste of it as well. It has been successfully cultivated in China since 1979. It is now sold commonly in Asian markets, so if you're curious, take a look there.

Along with actually being edible, P. indusiatus has a few compounds in it that may prove useful. One, hydrxylmethylfurfural, could prevent browning in commercial food. Extracts are antioxidants and antibiotics. There is almost nothing bad about this mushroom...except that it might be an alien spore. Quick, run!

Fungus Among Us: Athlete's Foot.

Today's entry has to be one of the least glamorous ever. Really, we've done the majestic bald eagle, cool big cats, and giant blue iguanas...but athlete's foot? This has to be a new low for the blog. That's coming from the woman who finds tapeworms kinda cute.

Actually, I find athlete's foot fascinating in the same way I find pigeons fascinating. Athlete's foot is one of those mundane things that we take for granted. I'm sure people still consider fungi gross, but isn't it at least somewhat impressive that one has evolved seemingly specifically to invade our bathing spaces?

Yes, athlete's foot is caused by a fungus. Also called tinea pedis, it's usually the work of Trichtophyton rubrum or T. mentagrophytes. It thrives in dark, moist areas and is spread in places where people go barefoot, such as gym lockers and For whatever reason, it prefers the crevice between toes 4 and 5 on most individuals. Who knew a fungus could be so picky?

Athlete's foot manifests itself as a rapid peeling of the skin on the bottom of one's foot. It's more of an annoyance than truly painful unless you obsessively peel away the skin. Most of the time, you know athlete's foot when you see it. It itches like crazy, but has a million easily-accessible cures to prevent you from clawing your feet red. If you haven't encountered it yet, you have never been in a gym.

Do NOT pick on athlete's foot. I know it's tempting.

Usually, athlete's foot is nothing to worry about. There are plenty of over-the-counter remedies and  If left untreated, however, it can lead to the exposure of raw skin and bleeding. Such cuts open the way for more severe bacterial infections. Athlete's foot can also spread to the crotch, by the way, but "athlete's groin" is so unceremonious that we have to call it "tinea cruris."

Never badmouth a fungus that can attack your crotch. You never know when it might be listening. 

Fungus Among Us: Basket Stinkhorns.

Still don't think fungi can be made into art? Well, sometimes, nature decides to do the work for us. There are some fungi that look like pieces from a modern art museum, only alive and spontaneously making the landscape a little weirder.

Stinkhorns, particularly those in the Clathus genus, resemble some sort of weird, alien art. Most of the time, they just look strangely like mammalian genitalia. Clathrus ruber, however, has a fruiting body that is bright red and would not look out of place in a museum of modern art. It is also called the basket stinkhorn. Although originally native to Europe, it has since spread to every continent bar Antarctica.

In the case of basket stinkhorns, you guessed it, the fruiting body looks like a basket. It starts looking like a sort of egg on the ground, but blossoms into the strange, netlike structure after some time. Like something out of a sci-fi story, a greenish, spore-filled goop called "gleba "coats the inside of this structure with spores. Just about the only thing creepier would be an alien fetus resting within that net.

Wait, no. There is something creepier than an alien fetus in that net. As the name 'stinkhorn' might indicate, this fungus reeks of rotten meat. This scent, combined with the latticed structure and bright colors, lures flies into the cage to help spread the spores. Luckily, this only lasts 24 hours after the 'egg' ruptures, so threat of a massive alien invasion are unlikely. The coming of the Lord of the Flies is another story.

For centuries, there have been superstitions about simply touching this fungus leading to illness. It's called "witch's heart" in Yugoslavia. Nobody knows if it's really edible or not; the eggs might be, but the one person who was daring enough to try a 'blossomed' basket wound up getting sick. Something that smells like rotten meat would probably not be good to eat by the smell alone; China's tried anyways.

But is it art? 

Who's That Pokemon- Unova Edition: Karrablast/ Escavalier

There are two Pokemon in Gen V that break all the rules of Pokemon evolution that we thought we knew:  Shelmet and Karrablast. While there have always been Pokemon that evolve via trading, these two only evolve when traded for each other. Then one must trade back to add the new Pokemon to one's Pokedex.

The result: Shelmet becomes a shell-less, super-fast ninja slug called Accelgor (wrap your brain around that), while Karrablast walks right into the slug's old home and resembles an insectoid knight called Escavalier (shown above). This is, believe it or not, based on a real thing:

Awesome photo by J. Konuma. Slender specimen.

Several types of ground beetle are specially-adapted to eat snails. The group to look at, Carabidae, has several members that can fit right into a snail's shell and eat the slug while it's still inside. They are flightless and found in many parts of the world, including Japan, Europe, and the Americas. Aside from eating snails, they will also eat other insects or fruit that happens to be lying around.

The carabid beetles come in two flavors: long and small-headed and large and heavy-headed. These are both effective when it comes to eating snails for completely different reasons. On one hand, you're slender enough to break into the snail, but have trouble cracking their armor; on the other, large-headed beetles can crush the snail in their jaws, but can't fit their heads into the shell as can their slender counterparts. There's an evolutionary tradeoff that relates entirely to eating snails and the physics therein. This has promoted differentiation among ground beetles. They're like the Darwin's Finches of the insect world.

We're almost glad Pokeymanz didn't make this one too realistic. Yes, Karrablast gets a diet plan and steals Shelmet's shell, but at least the pink squishy inside Shelmet lives. The slug gets to live a happy life as a ninja when traded over as opposed to being devoured. Be free, ninja slug. Be free.

Creature Feature: FLEAS.

Hooo boy. For those of you with cats and dogs out there, flea season has started in the northern hemisphere. Expect to see a lot more scratching than usual. Be prepared for vet visits and flea sprays/soaps. You've been warned.

That said, fleas (order Siphonoptera) are fascinating as creatures. Because of their prevalence on birds and mammals, there have been extensive studies done on fleas. They are found virtually everywhere, so there is no shortage of specimens. Roughly 2000 species have been identified, each of which has its favorite host. Yes, humans can have fleas, too. The ones that infest pets are in the genus Ctenocephalides.

As most of us who have furry friends have no doubt noticed, fleas are fast. They can jump up to 18cm vertically and 33cm horizontally - that's 1200-2200 times their own body length. They are slender, too, making them very aerodynamic. No matter how much of a nuisance they are, that's pretty impressive, especially for an insect.

Along with being fast, fleas are very hard to kill. They have evolved super tough, bristly exoskeletons. Remember, this is an animal designed to hang on while being scratched by an angry dog or cat. Even human fingertips can't squish these guys. The best ways to kill fleas are tape, wax, and somehow managing to catch the flea in your fingernails. Oh, and of course, flea removal products (which even then require killing at two stages in the life cycle). Did we mention that fleas can reproduce asexually? No? Now you know.



Fleas feed exclusively on blood. They seek warm-blooded animals like birds and mammals, like most hematophages prefer. Even as larvae, they eat the sanguine feces of the adult fleas, making one wonder how this vicious cycle got started. With over 2000 species, each one can pick on a very specific host. Cat fleas are different from dog fleas are different from human fleas, so no, your dog's fleas won't get to you.

It is usually very easy to tell whether your pet has fleas or not. They start scratching like crazy to the point where they may lose patches of hair. Basically, if your cat or dog starts acting abnormal and scratches a lot, fleas are probably to blame. In the worst-case scenarios, they may develop anemia. Still, if flea-crippling products do not suffice, please take your pet to the vet. It could be allergies or mange if it isn't fleas.

Of course, fleas are fairly popular in movies and TV...mostly as nuisances. They are often imagined as having little, anthropomorphized populations on dogs or cats. Some, like P.T. Flea from A Bug's Life  or The Flea from Los Luchadores, have more important roles than chewing on a dog's rear. Like it or not, fleas do impact human life quite a bit, and they're probably here to stay.