For most insects, the sticky, slingshot ride straight into a frog’s mouth spells the end. But not for one stubborn water beetle.
Instead of succumbing to the frog’s digestive juices, an eaten Regimbartia attenuata traverses the amphibian’s throat, swims through the stomach, slides along the intestines and climbs out the frog’s butt, alive and well.
“This is legitimately the first article in a while that made me say, ‘Huh! How weird!’” says Crystal Maier, an entomologist at Harvard University’s Museum of Comparative Zoology. “There are still a lot of truly bizarre habits of insects that still wait to be discovered,” she says.
Surviving digestion-by-predator is rare, but not unheard of in the animal kingdom. Some snails survive the trip through fish and birds by sealing their shells and waiting it out.
But research published August 3 in Current Biology is the first to document prey actively escaping through the backside of a predator.
~
Science News Org
Water beetles can live on after being eaten and excreted by a frog
B UTTONS over 1 year ago
A regular day in the life an elected politician.
Silly Season over 1 year ago
For most insects, the sticky, slingshot ride straight into a frog’s mouth spells the end. But not for one stubborn water beetle.
Instead of succumbing to the frog’s digestive juices, an eaten Regimbartia attenuata traverses the amphibian’s throat, swims through the stomach, slides along the intestines and climbs out the frog’s butt, alive and well.
“This is legitimately the first article in a while that made me say, ‘Huh! How weird!’” says Crystal Maier, an entomologist at Harvard University’s Museum of Comparative Zoology. “There are still a lot of truly bizarre habits of insects that still wait to be discovered,” she says.
Surviving digestion-by-predator is rare, but not unheard of in the animal kingdom. Some snails survive the trip through fish and birds by sealing their shells and waiting it out.
But research published August 3 in Current Biology is the first to document prey actively escaping through the backside of a predator.
~
Science News Org
Water beetles can live on after being eaten and excreted by a frog
oakie817 over 1 year ago
oh please you’re just full of ….
Zebrastripes over 1 year ago
It’s probably the worm that came to life when the permafrost melted from thousands of years ago. Aaaacckk,
SavannahJim Premium Member over 1 year ago
No sh*t
Judeeye Premium Member over 1 year ago
Kind of a crappy life.
banjoAhhh! over 1 year ago
Mr. Wiggly: 1st panel. -Ball is absentmindedly petting Mr. Wiggly. Mr. Wiggly loves it!