Creature Feature: Tropicbird.

If you've ever been on Cracked.com, you will see constantly-updated lists of real things that are not PhotoShopped. Well, now it's time for one of our own. Your mileage may vary:

Source.

This is a red-billed tropicbird (Phaethon aethereus). There are only three species of tropicbirds, all of which focus around, well, tropical islands. They are usually cited alongside frigatebirds and boobies as some of the many odd birds of the Galapagos. Being seabirds, fish and squid are on the menu. They were once lumped in with pelicans, but really have no extant relatives.

Tropicbirds do not look like real birds. They look like the birds that would happen if someone who only had the vaguest idea of what a bird was designed a bird. The feet are small and positioned far to the back of the bird's body, with all four toes webbed. The white tail is long. It's a "derp here's a bird" design, if that makes any sense. Tail, feet, wings, beak, and almost no regard for proper avian anatomy. Yet it works.

Tropicbirds are meant to fly and swim. Aside from their wings looking undersized, much of their time is spent at sea. Their strange feet don't just look odd; they are all but useless, making the tropicbird barely able to waddle on land. They dive, get back up in the sky, then dive again. Those feet really are useless. Remember how the bird-of-paradise was once considered "footless?" Title claimed by the tropicbird instead.



As one might imagine, tropicbird chicks have it rough. They might not eat for days at a time, which is  why they have evolved fat stores. Unfortunately, this means the little tropicbirds have to hobble into the ocean and fast the fat off. Whaddya know? Binge diets are natural.

Creature Feature: Blue-Footed Booby.

Ornithologists must have a ton of fun. Not only does their job consist of cataloging birds, which already sounds cool even if the birds in question are sparrows, but birds have all the silly names that get censored by forum mods. A friend and I have a running gag that talking a walk through the bird section at the Field Museum gets one some very good looks at tits, cocks, and boobies - all with a PG-13 rating.



No, you do not need to adjust your screen. That booby - yes, that is its name- really does have bright blue feet. The Blue-footed Booby (Sula nebouxii) is a seabird native to the tropical islands around Latin America, most notably the Galapagos. Like most seabirds, it eats various fish. It is not even remotely threatened - a miracle in those parts.

Unlike the word "manatee," the word "booby" has nothing to do with female naughty bits. Instead it may come from a Spanish word meaning "idiot," for the birds were notorious for landing on ships. There, they were easily captured and eaten. The most famous instance of this was on the Bounty, one of the most referenced sea voyages ever.



The booby's blue feet are used in the birds' exotic mating dance. The male raises his feet and displays his wings in order to earn the affection of his lifelong mate; soon the female copies him if she's interested. They have no mating season per se, so the boobies dance all year 'round. Sorry if that sounded dirty to you.

Creature Feature: Marine Iguana.

"The black Lava rocks on the beach are frequented by large (2-3 ft), disgusting clumsy Lizards. They are as black as the porous rocks over which they crawl & seek their prey from the Sea. I call them 'imps of darkness'. They assuredly well become the land they inhabit."


If this doesn't sound like something from the Dante, only more terrifying, we do not know what does. No, a religious guy from Texas did not write the above passage. That was Darwin. DARWIN. Mr. Evolution himself. Lamarcke, Darwin's predecessor, also treated reptiles as slimy, gruesome beasts. Even so, what reptile could possibly merit such a vile description?

The reptile Darwin was describing was the marine iguana (Amblyrhynchus cristatus), a large iguana native to all islands of the Galapagos. The largest specimen on record was a male 5.6 feet/1.7 meters in length. It feeds almost exclusively on marine algae. Like many creatures of the Galapagos, it is considered vulnerable. Contrary to Darwin's description, some marine iguanas are quite colorful.



The marine iguana is the only marine lizard in existence. By this, we mean that it is the only extant lizard to live and eat near or in the sea. It feeds on nothing but sea algae, can swim up to ten meters deep, and is capable of staying underwater for almost half an hour. It deals with the salt in the water via a special nasal gland that sneezes it out on land. The spilled salt makes the iguana's face look white, just like eating fast food inevitably leads to breakouts.


Big and impressive as these lizards are, they are not adapted to dealing with predators -let alone efficient mammalian carnivores. Cats and dogs are the biggest hazards to these slow-moving, herbivorous iguanas. You wanna ban an invasive species, government? Ban humans and their inevitable furballs.

So, does this giant marine lizard merit Darwin's ghastly description? Kinda.While this lazy algae eater may hardly sound monstrous to most of us, at least one movie monster has been inspired by the marine iguana:

 

...yeah, kill THAT with fire.