SHEA GUNTHER
Activist and author blogs about politics, energy and Earth's resources.
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Tue, Apr 07, 2015 at 05:53 PM
Well, all except this one. (Photo: Mark Freeman/flickr)
Life can be strange.
When you take all the living creatures in the world and mix in a healthy dose of time (measured in millennia) along with a strong shot of evolution, you get some bizarre life forms. Of course, even strange things take on the air of the familiar with enough exposure, which is why the truly weird forms of life are the ones we never lay eyes on.
But thanks to the power of the Internet, there aren't many creatures left on the planet that we haven't seen in photos. We pored over the great catalog of life and pulled out 17 animals that you probably didn't know existed. Enjoy!
Red-lipped batfish
Photo: Barry Peters/flickr
The red-lipped batfish lives in the waters surrounding the Galapagos Islands and are known to be terrible swimmers — they get around by using their fins to walk on the sea floor. The red-lipped batfish makes our list for obvious reasons: they look like they just found their mom's lipstick!
Photo: Wikipedia Commons
Lowland streaked tenrec
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
The lowland streaked tenrec lives in Madagascar and grows to be no more than 6 inches or so in length. Feeding mostly on earthworms and other insects, the streaked tenrec protects itself from predators with sharp barbed spines that grow out with its fur.
Japanese spider crab
Photo: Takashi Hososhima/flickr
The Japanese spider crab is the largest arthropod (animals with exoskeletons, a segmented body, and jointed limbs) in the world and can grow to be as large as 12 feet wide and 42 pounds in weight. As their name would suggest, they are found mostly in the waters surrounding Japan.
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
Tufted deer
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
I vant to suck your blood! Winning the award for the creepiest, yet cutest, species of deer is the tufted deer, a creatures that combines an adorable face with somewhat terrifying fangs that grow down from the top jaw and pointy little horns that are reminiscent of little devils. Tufted deer can be found in China and other parts of Asia.
Photo: Heather Paul/flickr
Glaucus Atlanticus
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
This animal is gorgeous and it knows it. The glaucus Atlanticus is a sea slug that spends its days floating upside down in the water (like in the photo below) feeding on prey like the Portuguese man-o-war. The little sea slug can absorb the stings of the tentacles and store the toxins to use for its own protection (which is why you should be careful about picking up them).
Photo: Sylke Rohrlach/flickr
Giant isopod
Photo: Damien du Tout/flickr
Whoever named the giant isopod didn't expend too much energy coming up with that name. In short, it's a giant isopod, a big giant crustacean that crawls around in the deeps of the Atlantic and Indian oceans.
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
Aye-aye
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
The aye-aye is a species of lemur that lives on the island of Madagascar and it lives more like a woodpecker. To find food the aye-aye taps on trees to find buried insects and then gnaws a hole in the wood to allow them to reach in with their long thin fingers to grab the tasty treat.
Photo: Frank Vassen/flickr
Star-nosed mole
Photo: gordonramsaysubmissions/flickr
Looking a little like something like a boss from an old school Nintendo video game, the star-nosed mole lives in Canada and the United States and makes use of its strange flanged face to feel its away around the tunnels it digs. The star-nose is packed with nerve cells and is believed capable of detecting even subtle seismic waves traveling through the Earth.
Photo: gordonramsaysubmissions/flickr
Blobfish
Photo: James Joel/flickr
Another easily named animal! The blobfish lives in the deep waters around Australia and New Zealand and has adapted to its environment by evolving into a gelatinous mass of flesh with a density just above that of water. This allows it to easily float just off the sea floor deep below the surface. When the blobfish is pulled out of its deep water high-pressure environment, where they look more like the pictures below, they end up taking on the appearance seen in the photo above. Hence, the blob fish.
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
Goblin shark
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
Of all the animals on our list, this is the one that I'd like to least run into while out for a swim. The goblin shark comes from an ancient line of sharks believed to have changed little in the last 125 million years. They can grow up to 13 feet in length and spend most of their time in deep waters near the sea floor looking for food.
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
Saiga antelope
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
Sadly, the saiga antelope is a critically endangered animal that one ranged over Eurasia but has since been confined to a single region in Russia and a few in Kazakhstan. The antelope's rather large nose evolved to help it deal with filtering out dusty air in the summer and to warm freezing cold air in the winter.
Gerenuk
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
The gerenuk looks a little like someone took an animal into Photoshop and shrunk its head. The graceful slender animal lives in Africa and has been called "the giraffe-necked antelope." As you can see in the photo below, it's not a poorly chosen moniker.
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
Dumbo octopus
Photo: NOAA Ocean Explorer/flickr
The dumbo octopus got its name from the cute little flappy ears (actually fins) found just above its eyes. Toss in the most adorable little tentacles you've ever seen and you get an animal that you could almost want to cuddle ... if you were a mer-person.
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
Pink fairy armadillo
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
The pink fairy armadillo lives in Argentina and has evolved to enjoy life in the desert. These funny little creatures dig burrows in the soil and use the flattened part of their butts to compact the soil, greatly reducing the chances of a tunnel collapse.
Cantor's giant soft shelled turtle
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
OK, who left their turtle out in the sun to melt? The Cantor's giant soft shelled turtle is a large freshwater species that lives throughout Asia and can grow up to six feet in length.
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
Purple frog
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
The purple toad can be found in southern India and is known for its fat, bloated body. Spending most of its life underground, the purple toad only comes to the surface for roughly two weeks every year to mate.
Okapi
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
You might think that the okapi, which can be found in the Democratic Republic of Congo, was related to the zebra but it's actually a closer relative to the giraffe. The okapi was first brought to the attention of the western world in the late 1800s when explorer Henry Morton Stanley mentioned them in one of his popular travelogues. The first live okapi was brought to Belgium's Antwerp Zoo in 1918 and to the Bronx Zoo in the U.S. in 1937.
Photo: Wikimedia Commons
Read more: http://www.mnn.com/earth-matters/animals/blogs/17-surprisingly-real-animals#ixzz3X2s9X0jZ
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