Recharge Water Fire Extinguisher

Spider (Family Tetraghnathidae) inoculating their venom in a rare prey, a worm land.

When darkness falls, many predators that had remained hidden during the day leave their hiding places and come to find food. When we think of these animals, we tend to forget that beneath our feet are more sophisticated predators of our wildlife and in most cases, is usually measured over two or three inches long. Some made traps to catch their prey, others have poisons that can kill instantly, others inoculated paralyzing substances and enzymes that digest the soft tissues and then suck once you have completely liquefied. Some chase other animals that can double in size by killing them with their mandibles specialized.

Amaerobius sp. in his den waiting for his next victim

Spiders are all predators and perfectly represent this guild of hunters, most are solitary hunters that paralyze their prey by injecting poison with their chelicerae (Click on the first photo to view in detail.) All spiders have silk-producing glands that is used by some species to produce complex networks and also to immobilize prey once they fall into the trap. Other people, such as Licósidos, burrows and traps manufactured using to stalking. Although many are diurnal, mostly hunt at night.

centipede running down a vertical wall

Other species of centipedes are nocturnal hunters. These millipedes like spiders use powerful poisons to kill their victims. In the case of other arthropods, centipedes chase and catch the last pair of legs that have modified nails for hunting. Appendages called later by forcículas injected with a solution containing a combination of crippling poison and digestive enzymes as in the case of the spiders begin la digestión extracorporea.

Carabus ( Chrysotribax ) rutilans

Pero no todos los artrópodos cazadores son venenosos, muchos son cazadores mas "tradicionales" que provistos de fuertes mandíbulas capturan a otros invertebrados para posteriormente devorarlos. Entre estos cazadores, unos de los mas especializados son los carábidos , que son unos insectos coleópteros que en ocasiones tienen colores metálicos muy llamativos.

Spa Games Icluding Wax

Night of the Hunter Selection sex in birds: the nest decorating the night of snail

's been only a few weeks since the millions of starlings came every night to roost in central Asturias have left their breeding grounds. Most European starlings (Sturnus vulgaris ) that spent the winter among us have migrated to northern Europe, but many have stayed to breed. A few years ago this species nesting in Asturias but soon started to breed and now is an abundant species, especially in areas of countryside.

several weeks starling males have begun to find a suitable place to nest, and from there started to sing and displaying to attract females. Some people get in a short time while others can spend days and days without any female is fixed on them. In the choice by the female influences both song and plumage (honest indicators of male genetic quality) as the place chosen for the nest. Not only that, but that females visit the nests chosen as potential holes and fixed in its content to assess male quality.

green leaves added by a male starling before putting

As researchers have found Vicente Polo and Pablo Veiga , male starlings enter the nest green leaves as indicators of quality. The leaves are replaced when they begin to dry and contrary to what is thought not introduced as a building material but as an ornament. A male who carries a lot of leaves and keep the house well decorated will be a good male.



Once the female has convinced the male to be the best father for her children start to build the nest. But contrary to popular belief, sexual selection takes place not only in males who want to attract females, but in some species, females must also demonstrate that they also have enough genetic quality for the male to spend their energies on raising their children. And in the case of starlings are several ways to prove during different stages of farming.

waterfowl feathers made by a female starling

As we have seen, the male introducing greens to attract females. For females respond to this stimulus by introducing colorful feathers as indicators of their own genetic quality. As was the case with green leaves, first thought the pens were made by females as material for padding the nest or make it more comfortable, but the same researchers showed in another article published in the Journal of Animal Ecology in 2006, the feathers, like green leaves in the males, were introduced as an ornamental during incubation.

Figure: Number of feathers added daily by female starlings over the two days before starting on until two days after hatching. The black circles are nests in which experimentally added green leaves. The arrows indicate the start of incubation and hatching of first egg (Polo and Veiga, 2006).

And even more, they found that had a direct relationship between the amount of green leaves made by males and the number of pens that placed the female. To prove it did an experiment that introduced nest boxes and other extra leaves them off. In those cases where leaves were added to give the appearance that the male owner was more attractive and potentially a good father, females carry more number of feathers to show him that they would also be good mothers and that it was worthwhile to work hard to bring up their children in common. The conclusion was that both the ability to decorate with green leaves by males and feathers by females could be seen signaling and two behaviors involved in mutual courtship and social status signaling.

But once the commissioning and the start of incubation, the female will signal their quality with the color of the eggs. The color will reflect the physical condition of the female, and as we saw in another article in this blog , males batten with more intensity and frequency of poultry from darker eggs, which were also indicators of a better condition. References




Polo, V., & Veiga, J. (2006). Nest ornamentation by female spotless starlings in response to a male display: an experimental study Journal of Animal Ecology, 75 (4), 942-947 DOI: 10.1111/j.1365-2656.2006.01103.x

Veiga, J. , Polo, V., & Vinuela, J. (2006). Nest Green Plants as a Male Status Signal and Courtship Display in the Spotless Starling Ethology, 112 (2), 196-204 DOI: 10.1111/j.1439-0310.2006.01148.x

Does Menchiesuse Corn In Their Yogurt

Although we all have kept in mind the mantra of spiral horns out in the sun, the truth is that most of these animals are nocturnal and twilight, and the sun but who gives joy to the parched and killed. Because it avoids the middle of the day and prefer rainy and cloudy days and dark to light.

In warm humid night, shortly after sundown, conch horns begin to appear. They come in all shapes and colors, many of them smaller than a pinky fingernail, others as big as a thumb. All come out of their daytime refuges to forage and to reproduce.

Cepaea nemoralis

few days ago, while walking behind Dartford salamanders by chance I noticed the large number of snails that share the slope with them. I was surprised by the variety of species that I saw in a small space and I was surprised how beautiful they were.

Some had smooth shells, others with stripes, others were bright golden color, had some colorful shells and other spots were scattered across its surface. The shells were flattened while others were rounded and globular. Had they had the surface intact while others were broken and to squash, perhaps by a fall or by the peck of a bird.

Snail Quimper ( Elona quimperana )

While they watched and took pictures I spent hours without realizing it and secure it with a little more time would have found many more. As I said several times, you just need to shop around and look a bit to realize how little we know and how much there is to learn.

And obviously I have a lot to learn, I would be grateful to those who know much more than I echéis me a hand with the identification, to see how many species we get together.

Choking On Phlegm Cold

Tailed Salamanders on the night of crossbills

Last Thursday evening as we walked a road in Belerda (Casu, Asturies), we find no less than seven Tailed Salamanders ( Chioglossa lusitanica) that came to feed the slope. Some walked slowly among the moss while others still remained hidden in the caves that served as shelter.

This small urodeles amphibians is one of the most unique of our herpetofauna and Iberian endemic whose distribution is restricted to Galicia, Asturias and part of northern Portugal.

Dartford Salamanders preferred siliceous substrates, being virtually absent in areas of limestone. They also need high humidity so they tend to occur in the vicinity of streams on rocky or sandy soil and covered with moss.

These salamanders, as its common name, has a long tail disproportionate to its body, and as with the lizards have the ability to discard it if a predator harassing them and can regenerate later. Thus, the predator will be entertained with the glue that will keep moving for a few seconds while the salamander escapes life saving.