Discovery Science 🧬

a potential girlfriend at the bottom of the ocean. Fortunately, the aromas of love are in the water - female pheromones. Using them, males look for their beloved, even if she is damn far away. What happens next is unknown to science. The personal life and childhood of largemouths are hidden by the veil of deep water. And while scientists are not ready to hold a candle at a depth of several kilometers. 🏀 Hit the hoop and get an NFT gift — https://t.me/BasketbolX_bot

Largemouth: The yawn of the abyss itself. New data changes understanding of this fish The largemouth, or pelican eel, is not a fish. This is the yawn of the abyss itself. There is no aggression or deceit in his appearance. There are no terribly sharp teeth or nasty growths. Only empty eyes without a shadow of curiosity, an all-consuming mouth and a cold statement of fact: you are food. I am hunger. You are unlikely to be able to meet the black hole of the entire ocean in person. The pelican eel lives at depths from 500 to 3000 meters. Life here is not much like life at all. Eternal cold, constant pressure and pitch darkness. This is how emptiness would feel if it were a place. Largemouth bear little resemblance to fish in the classical sense of the word. It has no scales, swim bladder or even fins. The bones had turned to soft cartilage, and the skeleton had deteriorated to the point that it had lost some key parts. For example, ribs. A typical inhabitant of the dark depths and stories of Lovecraft. But what distinguishes the eel from its deep-sea neighbors is its eyes. Compared to other inhabitants of the abyss, they are tiny. The only task of the eyepieces is to catch rare bioluminescent reflections in the pitch darkness. The beast itself, by the way, also placed a whole package of LEDs on its tail. The light show is crowned by a bright red beacon at the very tip. However, the scattering of shiners is not used for food production. Everything is exactly the opposite: stealth is the main weapon of the largemouth. Absolutely black skin works better than the invisibility cloak. It absorbs light so that in the kingdom of eternal night our hero turns into the shadow of darkness itself. Pelican eel hunts without preludes, cunning plans and complex tactics. He swims up to a small squid, a gaping fish, a school of shrimp, opens his mouth and... that’s it. The hunt was a success! The fact is that our hero has a very specific feature of his face. Are you ready? He has a big mouth. No, you don't understand, it's really huge. The mouth occupies ¼ of the total length of the fish - 20 centimeters of mouth on 60-70 cm of a thin body, more like a whip. When folded, the full scale cannot be seen. But as soon as the fish opens the bread slicer, the thread-like squishy turns into a black hole for absorbing prey. A giant mouth with elastic skin stretches in all directions. And the lower jaw leans back as much as possible. This design allows largemouths to swallow fish their own size, or even larger! True, scientists have never recorded such finds. And tiny teeth are not able to hold something more or less large in the mouth. This suggests that the eel is not a predator, but a filter feeder. Having filled its mouth with water, the fish slowly releases the liquid back into the ocean through its gills. Everything edible that was caught remains in the mouth. What to do if you want to give life, and not take it? It's almost impossible to spot

Three-toed sloth: You'll be surprised how much life is crawling inside its fur Whoever understands life is in no hurry? Well then it’s clear why the three-toed sloth is such a drag. He not only understood life, he was its creator. After all, each sloth is a whole ecosystem in miniature! Well, the creator has no need to rush. The most visible and important inhabitant of the sloth ecosystem is the algae that colors its fur green. Moreover, this is not a random set of algae species whose spores fell onto the sloth’s fur from the air. The animals cultivate Welker's trichophilus on themselves, a unique species that grows only on the fur of sloths - and nowhere else. The most real domesticated plants, it turns out. For a very long time, people believed that sloths needed trichophilus solely for camouflage. And there is logic in this - Mother Nature deprived mammals of green pigments, so none of us are able to masquerade as leaves. Nobody but sloths and their little friends. But in 2018, researchers found that sloths have another good reason for their symbiosis with algae. Houseplants are an important source of food for them. Although algae cannot replace a sloth’s diet of leaves, the animal can’t live without it. After all, the fat content in algae is 5 times higher than in tasteless greens! There are also useful vitamins there! But you can’t feed algae with water and sunlight alone; you also need to give them nitrogen, and a lot of it. But the sloths managed to get out of this too - they got themselves tame fire butterflies! Butterflies also live in the fur of sloths: they communicate, reproduce and, of course, throw away waste products. And this waste not only gives sloths a unique aroma, but also provides food for their tame bacterial-fungal ecosystem. And that, in turn, decomposes the experiments and remains of butterflies, producing simple nitrogen compounds that algae use for their growth. A pleasant side effect of such a complex system is the extremely high resistance of sloths to skin inflammation. The fact is that the bacteria living on the sloth not only process waste, but also release antibiotics into the external environment that protect their owner. Thanks to this ability, they are not afraid of dermatitis, and any wounds of sloths are disinfected by themselves and, in most cases, do not require additional treatment. But for all the goodies of their ecosystem, sloths pay a high price - they are forced to go to the toilet. Instead of routinely defecating from trees, sloths must spend precious time and energy going down to the ground and doing their dirty work at the roots of trees. At this moment, the already vulnerable animals become completely defenseless: any predator passing by is capable of grabbing the animal, and it will not be able to offer even symbolic resistance. However, while they are sitting in the bushes, the moths hanging on their fur are doing the most important thing in their lives: laying eggs nea

rby. When the larvae hatch from them, they will find next to them a slightly processed and very nutritious (by the standards of butterflies, of course) mass on which they can grow into a large and strong insect. And as soon as the butterflies grow up, they will fly and go looking for sloths in order to continue supplying their algae with nitrogen. These are the jokes of complex ecosystems. If you want to eat well, please poop properly! Author: Yaroslav Ilyin 🏀 Hit the hoop and get an NFT gift — https://t.me/BasketbolX_bot

not leave the nest and frantically guards her babies. And now - the meatiest part. Should a person escape from a salpuga? Not really. The image of an evil and dangerous creature migrated from folk legends to the Internet. There are a lot of stories about how the salpuga killed, maimed, poisoned someone. But our furry monster cannot seriously harm a person purely physically! Can salpuga bite? Yes. With powerful chelicerae, it can easily bite through skin and even nails. Will this hurt you? Maybe. Just like any other cut. Will you die from this? No! Not a single species of salpugs out of 1000 has poison. None. Absolutely. Corpse poison is also a story. Secondary infection with any pathogenic infection can occur from any cut if it is not disinfected in time. Another legend says that the camel spider purposefully pursues a person. And it's true. Only he does this not out of thirst for human blood. The irony is that at this moment the salpuga does not perceive us as a living being at all! The only thing she's after is our shadow! The devil is not as scary as he is painted. Salpuga is not as scary as it is described on the Internet! Author: Elizaveta Isaeva 🏀 Hit the hoop and get an NFT gift — https://t.me/BasketbolX_bot

Solpuga: Scarier than a spider and a scorpion. Monster of the south of Russia. It specifically pursues a person! He lives among the scorching sands, but just the sight of him makes the blood run cold. He rushes so hard that you can’t run away from him. He will chase a person until he kills him with one bite. Meet the salpuga, camel spider, wind scorpion, or phalanx—perhaps the desert's most misunderstood predator. There are so many rumors, tales, legends around him - and everything is believed with great eagerness. But which of this is true and which is blatant slander? Let's figure it out. There are more than 1000 species of salpugs. They are distant relatives of ordinary spiders. All salpugs are so scary that they turn out the lights. The potbellied, hairy body grows up to 7 cm in length. And together with sweeping paws - up to 12 cm. The size of a palm! Powerful chelicerae add spice - those same giant “fangs” that stick out from the head of the furry chupacabra. The camel spider's jaws are more like claws than mouthparts. They are so strong that they can cut off fur, feathers, cut through skin and even bones. Do you already want to say goodbye to our beauty and run away with your heels sparkling? Don't get your hopes up. Salpuga will easily catch up with you. It accelerates on sandy soil up to 16 km/h! Is this too much? Well, let's just say that only a trained athlete can escape from it. If you are unlucky with your sports training, you will definitely lose in the race for survival - the average person rarely accelerates more than 12 km/h. It is for this reason that the people of the salpuga acquired another name: “wind scorpion”. Such speed is not a whim, but a vital necessity. The abode of the salpuga is deserts and steppes around the world. Here in Russia we also have a furry beauty. Residents of the Caucasus, Astrakhan region and Crimea - get a big fiery hello from the wind scorpion! Kilometers of sand, rare bushes and a merciless sun that is ready to bake you alive. Finding prey in such conditions is like a miracle. But the salpuga does not count on luck. In search of food, it is helped by the vegetation on its body - ultra-sensitive hairs detect vibrations of the surface. Yes, the phalanx literally feels you trembling with fear. Having discovered the victim, the salpuga accelerates towards it at the speed of a racing car. Tiny ants, armored beetles, poisonous scorpions, small birds, rodents, lizards and even carrion - the camel spider will catch and grind anyone into mince with its powerful chelicerae. Salpuga eats like it was the last time. Some individuals overeat so much that they temporarily lose the ability to move! Salpugs also don’t shy away from having a snack with each other. Especially during the breeding season. Females kill males 40% of the time! Not out of great anger, but out of great love for your kids! Arthropods lay 50-200 eggs and guard them for several months. All this time, the caring mother does

y of shades of scales and are sold at quite affordable prices. You can purchase representatives of almost all genera. Yes, even aspidoras*! *But not cave aspidoras, alas. Author: Yaroslav Ilyin 🏀 Hit the hoop and get an NFT gift — https://t.me/BasketbolX_bot

Armored catfish: Fish in the armor of a Roman legionnaire — Armored catfish, let’s take off your armor, who are you without it? — Survivors in extreme conditions, top-class architects and simply cave aspidoras. The emphasis is on the third syllable, if that's the case. - Got it, I’ll write an article about you. You won't be able to come across armored catfish by accident, even if you live in South America. After all, they live where no adequate person would go: in large stinking puddles, in small overgrown reservoirs and in the open waters of large swamps. And normal fish are not delighted with such beauties either - there is so much organic matter in these reservoirs that the lion's share of oxygen is spent on its decomposition - there is nothing special to breathe there! But armored catfish have adapted: they swallow air bubbles, push them through the intestines and breathe through the hindgut. It’s effective, but I wouldn’t want to repeat it. In such small and overgrown lakes there is no point in graceful shapes and high speed, so all the locals focused on camouflage or protection. Armored catfish, as you guessed, followed the second path. They abandoned the small, flexible fish scales in favor of long, wide plates that, when layered on top of each other, become plate armor, just like the legionnaires of the Roman Empire. And she copes with her task perfectly. Just to survive and thrive, it is not enough to protect yourself - you also need to protect your offspring. Therefore, the catfish thought of building nests. They choose a place with a sandy bottom, dig a hole in it, line it with algae and lay eggs there. Such eggs are not only difficult to find for enemies and easy to protect for parents, but also very convenient to fertilize. The number of fertilized eggs is approaching 100%, and this is already the level of human aquafarms, and not wild fish populations. But for some, even such architectural excesses are not enough. Armored catfish from the genus Hoplosternum have gone further and build real floating nests, perfectly camouflaged and invulnerable to bottom predators. Such a nest is a ball made of aquatic plants, inside of which there are eggs and many air bubbles. They provide the nest with buoyancy and the eggs with an additional supply of oxygen. However, not everyone was able to adapt to the harsh conditions of the South American swamps. The guys from the Aspidoras family did not take out the competition for living space and fled to the Brazilian caves. There they got rid of predators and the need to hide clutches, but paid for it with loss of pigmentation, lack of food and life in the eternal cold. The already small fish – no larger than the palm of your hand – have shrunk to a measly 3-5 centimeters! And if you, after looking at the photos and reading the letters, wanted to buy yourself a couple of armored fish, then I have good news for you! Catfish are widespread in the aquarium hobby, have a wide variet

Every pet needs this to maintain its health for as long as possible! This is not a luxurious maximum, but a basic minimum! Instead of spending money on veterinarians, it is better to take care of your pet in everyday life. Article number for ordering on Ozone: 1626510263 https://vk.cc/cShEQW Article number for ordering on VB: 244376071 🏀 Hit the hoop and get an NFT gift — https://t.me/BasketbolX_bot https://vk.com/video16000004_456252431