The most amazing thing about this is that the plant has never seen a hummingbird.
Think about it. The plant has no eyes nor the ability to change its own leaves. What must have happened? Maybe an ancestor had leaves that randomly, vaguely resembled a bird? Perhaps the descendants that happened to look more like hummingbirds were then pollinated more often than the rest?
This is species of spider that has evolved to look like an ant. They do this so they can infiltrate the ant’s nests and get a free meal by just eating the ants food.
The thing is the ants blind so there was no point looking the same as they wouldn’t have been able to tell anyway.
The most amazing thing about this is that the plant has never seen a hummingbird.
Think about it. The plant has no eyes nor the ability to change its own leaves. What must have happened? Maybe an ancestor had leaves that randomly, vaguely resembled a bird? Perhaps the descendants that happened to look more like hummingbirds were then pollinated more often than the rest?
Nature is so fucking crazy and I love it.
You should probably google Boquila trifoliolata.
But yes, it’s impressive if it never met anything that looks like a hummingbird.
Holy shit, thanks for sharing! I think it’s impressive in either case.
For anyone else, here’s an article I found about it: https://www.vox.com/down-to-earth/2022/11/30/23473062/plant-mimicry-boquila-trifoliolata
This is species of spider that has evolved to look like an ant. They do this so they can infiltrate the ant’s nests and get a free meal by just eating the ants food.
The thing is the ants blind so there was no point looking the same as they wouldn’t have been able to tell anyway.
It should, however, emit some pheromone, as the ants use that to identify each other…
Can’t they feel the shape?