Leafyfern - Flora And Fauna

We humans are awfully keen on pointing out how ridiculous other species’ means of obtaining food are given that our own native hunting strategy is to aggressively power-walk toward our prey until it falls over and dies.

Butterfly breeder Carl A. Anderson with monarch butterflies on his face, 1954.

Quick illustration of me turning into a fucking goliath birdeater tarantula shortly after snapping under the pressure of living in America

Here’s an interesting comparative anatomy photo! Adult male and fetal human skulls.

hand over the cursed Sphenodon facts.

sure, but PUT THE GUN DOWN. 

the Tuatara is a medium-sized reptile native to New Zealand.

it looks like a lizard but it IS NOT- the Tuatara is actually a very basal reptile related to snakes and lizards but belonging to an entire different branch of the tree of life, of which it is the sole surviving member.

and it may look like a lizard on the outside, but the inside is what really counts! and on the inside, the Tuatara is basically a reskinned amphibian.

they only have a single lung, their heart is the most basic of all reptiles, and their nervous systems shares more in common with our friend the axolotl than with its lizard kin!

so if you happen to see one at the zoo, take a moment to stop and really appreciate the uninterrupted 240 million years of reptilian history you’re lucky enough to be looking at!

I’ve never seen a wild red fox in my home state but I spotted this poor beauty on the side of the highway today. I really wish that I could have seen her out in the woods where she belongs and this sight broke my heart. Please please watch for wildlife when you’re out on the roads; animals don’t understand why their world is changing and their forests are shrinking. We have to do better by them. 

new trick!! he’s starting to say “wings out” too

One of these things is not like the others!

This handsome skull belongs to an iguana.

These all belong to water monitors.

And this one belongs to a tegu.

The tegu’s skull is missing a hole!

Those little openings on the top of the monitors’ heads and the iguana’s is where the pineal eye is located. The pineal eye can distinguish between light and dark, and helps with thermoregulation. But tegus don’t have it! They lost their pineal eye sometime during the course of their evolution- which is evidence of how even though they might look a bit like monitors, they really aren’t that closely related!

Little squeak 

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