Camouflage and Mimicry

About Me:
My name is Zach Demaree. Um...
Animals are a big deal to me, and
also bowling. I'm kinda of a bowling
addict. I plan on Majoring in Zoology,
and minoring in Veterinary Care.

Essay:CAMOUFLAGE AND MIMICRY

An animal uses camouflage to blend in with its environment. Camouflage is the use of color, pattern, and shape to look like the things around you.

Predators, or hunters, will use camouflage to help them catch food. Prey, or the ones being hunted, will use camouflage to keep from being caught. Many animals use color to help them hide. The polar bear's white fur keeps him hidden in the snow. Grasshoppers and lynx spiders use their green color to hide among the leaves and stems of plants. Crab spiders use color when they are hunting. See how the crab spider in the photo uses its yellow color to blend in while it waits for an insect to land.

Some animals, like the octopus, can even change their color to match their environment. The octopus can also change the texture of its skin to look bumpy like the rocks where it is hiding. The walking stick and the skeleton shrimp also copy both the shapes and colors of the plants. You have to look closely to tell which are the branches and which are the animals.

Pattern is another way of using camouflage. The stripes on a tiger blend in well when it is hidden in the tall grass. The halibut, or flat fish, has spotted skin that helps it to blend in when it buries itself in the sand.

Mimicry is using shape, color, and pattern to look like another animal, often one that is dangerous. The monarch butterfly tastes bad to birds, so they will not eat it. The viceroy butterfly mimics, or copies, the pattern and color of the monarch butterfly's wings so that birds will leave it alone, too. Some caterpillars and fish have large spots on their bodies. From a distance, these spots look like the eyes of a much larger animal. The jumping spider in the photo mimics the shape and color of the red ants that it hunts.

LINKS:
www.saczoo.com/3_kids/20_camouflage/camouflage_intro.htm
camouflage.unfiction.com
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camouflage
www.thewildones.org/Animals/camo.html
animal.discovery.com/news/briefs/20060102/spider.html