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This crab is under construction! Read more on the Aquarium's website. 🦀🦺

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NEW !!! SNAKE DISCOVERED

ITS CALLED THE LIMESTONE EYELASH PIT VIPER. THAT iS SO CUTE. ITS SO PRETTY

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Crocodiles afraid of the shovel

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Remember: toe beans are the sign of a killer.

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i learned that there's a Japanese beetle that when eaten by a frog will haul ass through its digestive system and escape out the back end unscathed (x)

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Us if we were giant isopods

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did you know that the well-known factoid that male anglerfishes degenerate after attachment until they’re basically just a pair of testes is false? i knew of course that they don’t just become “growths” on the female because I’ve handled dozens of attached pairs and every male I’ve ever seen has been very much obviously a whole and complete second fish, but I sort of assumed there was internal degeneration, perhaps muscle atrophy, etc. i can’t believe no one ever corrected me on this but this just doesn’t happen. in obligatorily parasitic species, the male actually continues to grow and increases considerably in size after he attaches to the female, because the two of them can only reach sexual maturity together. me, an octavia butler fan: is this the height of romance??

what is true is that attached males do have hugely enlarged testes proportionate to the rest of their bodies & organs, and that they receive all nutrition from the female’s bloodstream so their stomachs are always empty, though their own gills seem to still be functional, as are their fins and muscles—you can even induce movement and swimming motions on recently dead attached males. I can only assume that at some point someone said that basically the only biological function a male anglerfish needs to perform is sperm production and this got taken out of context and luridly exaggerated over time. he’s not just a pair of testicles! he’s her forever partner! one flesh one end!

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Casper Octopus (Caspar sp.), family undetermined, Nazca Ridge, off the Coast of Peru (Pacific Ocean)

Recently discovered, 2016.

photograph via: Ocean Census

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the African wild cat (from which house cats are descended) looks like a normal house cat but with uncomfortably longer legs

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SpaceDancer over on patreon suggested land sharks so here are some land sharks from the Small Guide universe.

all land sharks are amphibious and they come in a wide variety of shapes and sizes. when some people think of land sharks they tend to imagine a dog or cat with shark attributes, but nature itself pushes beyond the mammalian cross borders and asks: but what if slug? what if crab? what if snake? if it can hang out on land for any period of time it its chosen ecosystem then that body plan is free real estate.

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Anolis Aquaticus (By: Lindsey Swierk)

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BIG LOBSTER NEWS apparently an orange lobster at the university of New England had babies and half of them are orange and half are normal

So the answer is yes. Weirdly colored lobsters do have weirdly colored babies.

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Pixel art of "Out of the Ooze" (Ray Troll, 1994)

The original linocut version and the linocut + digital colour version.

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thinking about creatures.

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Vannifar, Evolved Enigma

Artist: Olena Richards TCG Player Link Scryfall Link EDHREC Link