It disappeared for 40 years and was named "extinct", but it recently reappeared!

In the past two weeks, we have collected these fresh and interesting natural research and news:

1) Why did the crabs cross the road together?

2) The flower named “extinct” is not extinct;

3) Why do geckos shake their heads frantically before eating?

4) Squids will also change color;

5) A shark that died at the young age of 100;

6) A strange squid: a giant strawberry in the deep sea.

Crabs crossing the road

A strange sight recently appeared in Cuba - thousands of crabs crossing the road!

Picture | Ramon Espinosa/AP Photo

The crabs, called the Ruricola ruricola, live in Cuba and the Antilles, and they make the long journey from the forest to the Bay of Pigs every April and May to mate and reproduce.

During their migration, millions of wild crabs will "borrow the road" through human living areas, crossing streets and highways. For tourists, this may be an unprecedented spectacle, but for locals, the hurried crabs are already a frequent visitor to the city.

Their destination was the Bay of Pigs | P.Lindgren / Wikimedia Commons

However, human habitats are dangerous for land crabs. Every year, about 3.5 million land crabs die on the road, mostly from being crushed by vehicles. It usually takes a minute and a half for a land crab to cross the road, and by the time a driver sees a land crab, even if they try to swerve to avoid it, it is often too late. The crabs' resistance measures are also often a headache for drivers - when they feel threatened, they will puncture tires with their pincers.

A wild crab crosses the road in Cuba | Ramon Espinosa / AP Photo

This great migration will last until July. At the end of March, the municipal authorities had already warned residents to try not to drive on the road in the morning and at night, because this is the favorite time for crabs to rush. Environmentalists also hope to suspend the use of the main roads for crabs during the critical period of migration to make way for crabs.

The "extinct" flower that is not extinct

Scientists named an extinct plant "extinct", but recently, "extinct" reappeared!

The Centinela region at the foot of the Andes Mountains has a forest with so many unique plants that it has been called "the mythical place of tropical botanists." However, in the 1980s, the forest was almost completely cut down and converted into farmland, and most of the unique plants became extinct.

In 2000, scientists first described an orange tropical wildflower based on specimens that once lived in the forests of Santinilla. Botanists believed the flower was extinct, so they named it Gasteranthus extinctus, with the specific epithet "extinctus" meaning extinct, hoping the name would serve as a warning.

Bright orange "extinct" flowers stand out in the forest | Riley Fortier

Unexpectedly, last year, when botanists once again explored the remaining forest, they actually found an orange flower - according to the plant specimens and text descriptions, this was exactly "extinct"!

Botanists have never completely given up on this devastated forest. Over the past 10 years, they have repeatedly returned to the forest to look for possible hope, and finally found the only "extinct" flower left on Earth. The researchers did not want to harm them, so they only collected some fallen flowers and took them back for DNA analysis. Although they are still highly endangered, the "extinct" flowers are not extinct, which is good news that gives people hope. This new discovery was published in the international plant taxonomy journal PhytoKeys on April 15.

A gecko shaking its head frantically before eating

Geckos usually look gentle, but when they see a scorpion, they suddenly go crazy!

Scientists fed scorpions and other prey to Coleonyx variegatus, and found that when the gecko saw the scorpion, it would instantly transform into a "shaking head killer", biting the scorpion and shaking its head wildly, and then quickly swallowing the scorpion, the whole process only took a few seconds.

Gecko in berserk mode | References [3]

Scientists filmed the process at 1,200 frames per second, and only then did they know what was happening. Once the gecko has a scorpion in its mouth, it will go into a violent mode, spinning its head and body back and forth and smashing the scorpion to the ground. Scientists believe that this allows the gecko to eat the scorpion more safely: on the one hand, in the experiment, 62% of the scorpions were unable to move after being shaken by the gecko, leaving them at the mercy of the gecko; on the other hand, 90% of the geckos were stung when catching scorpions, and shaking the scorpion can reduce the possibility of the gecko being stung, and smashing the scorpion to the ground can also break the stinger on their body.

Color-changing squid

Studies have found that squid, like octopuses and cuttlefish, change color depending on the environment.

A marine science station in Japan raises many Sepioteuthis lessoniana. Sepioteuthis lessoniana belongs to the order Lanceri, which is classified as a squid. Once, when the researchers were clearing algae from the tank, they accidentally discovered that when the surface of the tank gradually became clean, the squid also began to change color!

Squid color change experiment | References [4]

So the researchers conducted an experiment. They cleaned half of the tank, and the other half was still full of algae, and then captured the color changes of squid in the tank. As a result, when the squid were on the clean side, they were light-colored; when they got to the side with algae, they quickly turned black.

The squid on top of the algae and the squid on a clean surface have completely different colors | References [4]

This is the first time scientists have discovered this ability in squids to change color according to their environment. With this ability, they can better hide in a variety of environments and escape the eyes of their natural enemies.

Young shark dies at 100

A very rare Greenland sleeper shark (Somniosus Microcephalus) was found on a British beach, but unfortunately, it had become stranded and died.

Picture | Cornwall Marine Pathology Team

The Greenland shark lives at a depth of more than 2,000 meters in the Arctic and North Atlantic. It is mysterious and endangered. After discovering its remains, researchers immediately performed an autopsy. Its brain was discolored and congested, and the surrounding fluid was also very turbid. Pasteurella was also found in the brain fluid, and it is likely that it suffered from meningitis due to infection with Pasteurella.

The shark carcass is being transported back for a necropsy | Cornwall Marine Pathology Team

Researchers speculated that it was because of meningitis that the shark left the deep waters where it lived and eventually ran aground. The soft tissue around its pectoral fins was bleeding and there was silt in its stomach, indicating that it was still alive when it was washed ashore, but it still could not escape the fate of death.

The shark was 4 meters long, weighed 285 kilograms, and was about 100 years old - this age is still very young for Greenland sharks. Greenland sharks have a very long lifespan. A 2016 study showed that they can live to at least 272 years old, and may even live to more than 400 years old.

Strawberry-shaped squid

In California, USA, researchers photographed a squid that looks like a strawberry in 725 meters of water - and it is really called the strawberry squid (Histioteuthis heteropsis).

It seems not to notice the camera and continues to swim | MBARI

The strawberry squid is covered with "strawberry seeds", which are their luminous structures. Its eyes are asymmetrical: the left eye is huge and yellow-green, and the right eye is small and black. The big eyes can help them find food in dim waters, while the small eyes can quickly locate the bioluminescence emitted by predators and prey.

In this picture, the strawberry squid has a big eye on the right and a small eye on the left | MBARI

The strawberry squid looks bright red and seems to be easy to spot by predators, but this is not the case. Red light does not reach the deep sea, so they do not reflect red light. In the eyes of predators, they look black and blend in with the dark deep sea.

References

[1]https://phys.org/news/2022-04-cuba-crabs-embark-perilous-migration.html

[2]https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/949373?

[3]https://www.livescience.com/scorpion-shaking-killer-geckos

[4]https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-022-09209-6#citeas

[5]https://www.zsl.org/science/news/stranded-greenland-shark-likely-died-from-infection-of-the-brain?awc=1 5333_1649961069_0c986ace1c675bbc32de7e6535648dd5&utm_source=AWIN&utm_medium=78888&utm_campaign=Sub+Networks

[6]https://www.livescience.com/strawberry-squid-spotted-off-california

Author: Cat Tun

Editor: Mai Mai

This article comes from the Species Calendar, welcome to forward

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