Vampire Bat: I Vant to Drink Your Blooood (no, really)

Good evening. It is I, Vampire Bat. You may have heard talk of me before; my reputation often precedes me, for I am super scary. I hope that you are well and pulsing full of blood this morning. I have written to the slimy ocean creature to tell the world of my kind. For though it is true that I thirst for your arteries at night, there are many in my order who pose no threat and should not be feared, as they play an important role. But first, I will tell you about myself, Desmodus rotundus, the great hematophagist before whom you should cower.

Desmodus rotundus: The Scariest of the Bats

I am the only known parasitic mammal, and therefore am the most evil of all mammals. I roost with my large and fearsome family in the darkest depths. We make our home in caves, where we bond closely with one another. We watch after our own, even those among us that are orphaned. Just because we are the only species of bat to do this doesn't make us nice! Nor does sharing food with friends who are hungry; we can only live for one or two days without eating, so we sometimes share, to our own detriment, with those who do not have enough. Not that this is a nice thing to do! We are pure evil!

We long to feast upon the blood of the living. We hunt only in the blackest of the night, creeping slowly upon the ground toward our unsuspecting victim. We can walk, run, and hop, which isn't cool or cute, it is terrifying, for you will never hear us coming.

I can hear if you are asleep, and smell the warmth of your delicious, blood-filled arteries. You cannot hide, for our vision is also excellent. You will not feel my bite for my teeth are that sharp.

No, it's not a big bite, it doesn't have to be big to be scary. It's a scarily tiny bite, from which I will lap your blood with my specialized tongue. My saliva will help to keep your blood from coagulating, so I can drink up to half my body weight. By the time I'm done I tower before you at a terrifying 1.5 - 2 ounces! And my saliva will help with the treatment of your stroke patients! Fear me!

Chiroptera: The (mostly non-terrifying) Order of Bats

Terrible and terrifying though I may be, others of my order have a different approach, but still get a bad rap. Megabats, my fruit eating kin, and microbats, those that echolocate, help pollinate flowers, spread fruit seeds, and reduce insect populations. I am almost ashamed to say, they are not frightening at all. Though I shudder at the very thought, some might say they are . . . cute. Flying Foxes, the largest of the fruit eating megabats, seem to get along well with your kind:

And 70% of bats are insectavores, grabbing bugs out of the sky in a neat, non-scary fashion:

So, bloodbags, go and live in blissful harmony with these mild, helpful bats, and save your chiroptophobia for the creature that is truly terrifying: the REAL me:

Face your fears and learn more about me and other bats

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bats
• http://www.batconservancy.org/
• http://batconservation.webs.com/batfacts.htm
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xGn77KJwa3s

Hi readers, Giant Pacific Octopus here. Is there a creature you would like to see featured? Let me know in the comments!

Jumping Spiders: Eight-Legged Cats

By Thomas Shahan

Hi! Hi hi! I'm Phidi! I'm the largest jumping spider in North America and I'm super friendly and curious. I hope people aren't scared to read about me; I won't bite (or if I do, it's pretty harmless)! Sorry if I seem a little jumpy, er, that is, excited. It's just that all this crazy stuff happened to me yesterday and I've been dying to tell someone! 

So first of all, yesterday morning I was just hanging out in my silken nest (which I made for sleeping, not for catching food, because I LOVE hunting) when I saw this juicy bee fly by. My large anterior median eyes are totally adapted to see prey really well, and also things like distance and a whole bunch of awesome colors including UV. I have four pairs of eyes so I can see things to the side and behind me, too. Not to brag, but I actually have the best eyesight of all invertebrates. 

By Thomas Shahan 

Anyway, so I saw this bee and I jumped several times my body length towards it. I know my legs don't look that muscular, but I have this cool hydraulics thing where the pressure of fluids in my legs alters so I can still jump really, really far. Even though I'm awesome at jumping, I make sure to tether a line of silk every time I jump, just in case. Also, sometimes I do this so I can swing over and catch prey hanging upside-down, like a tasty ant on the bottom of a leaf. Other times when I just don't feel like cooking I just grab some food stuck in someone else's web.

But this time I was feeling like a good bee dinner, and so I expertly attacked it, bit it to inject it with venom to immobilize it, and ate it, like usual. It was delicious!

THEN, later that day, this guy I know decided to ask me out! Since I have such great eyesight, I guess he thought I would be impressed with this crazy dance. 

The thing is, I've seen way better dances. Some guys are much better at using their iridescent hairs and fringes or incorporating some vibrations I can feel through the ground into their dance. I mean, if you're going to ask me out, do it right, you know? I just felt kind of embarrassed for this guy, but he tried really hard so I didn't eat him.

But then of course I was still hungry, so I went out looking for lunch. I ran into a bunch of family members, which is not unusual since there are around 500 genera and 5,000 species of us Salticids!

Photo by Brad via Flickr

Suddenly I saw this weird red thing and I went to check it out, because I'm naturally super curious. I jumped on it and tried to taste it but there was nothing there! 

After that I kind of lost interest because I have pretty complex behavior for an invertebrate and I'm good at adapting my hunting behavior to specific situations. But it was fun to see something new!

Well, thanks for reading about my adventures. Now I'm ready to jump off and relax for the night. What a crazy day!

Learn more about me and my many relatives!

Here is a fantastic paper all about jumping spider biology and behavior:

• www.informatics.sussex.ac.uk/research/groups/ccnr/Papers/Downloads/Harland_Cimb2000.pdf

And here are several other great resources:

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jumping_spider
• http://news.discovery.com/animals/insects/spiders-watching-eyes-121016.htm
• http://tolweb.org/Salticidae

See more awesome pictures of us here:

• Google image search: jumping spider

Check back next week for an all new Creature Feature!

Turkey Vulture: Not Circling You Waiting For You To Die

Dear future dinners, I mean, human friends,

My name is Cathartes aura. There are many who call me Turkey Vulture. Some call me buzzard, but they are confusing me with these fellows, who clearly hold none of my charm or appeal. I am visiting the aquarium to write to you, with the help of Giant Pacific Octopus, to clear the misconceptions you seem to hold about me. I am not an evil bird, nor am I a harbinger of death. Hear me out and you will see the kind, bodily-fluid-spouting gentlebird I really am. 

It is true, I feast upon the recently deceased, tearing at their carcasses for the tenderest meat. In fact, the name vulture means tearer. 

But this is no reason to fear me. I do not kill the living; I merely fly low to the ground using my excellent vision and even better sense of smell to locate pungent, delicious carcasses. Though if it is my cousin (and frenemy) Black Vulture who creates those carcasses, it would certainly be rude not to partake. 

I am, by nature, a social fellow. I live in a venue, roosting in dead trees in open areas. We are a kind, gregarious community who migrate together on rising thermals, flying so gracefully with barely a flap. We rise together into the sky in a swirling black kettle, like an ominous vortex of . . . friendliness, which is completely not frightening in any way.

Perhaps you thought we were circling you until you die? The thought, I assure you, never crossed my mind.

You may fear that I carry disease due to the succulent carrion I feast upon. Kind human, you may put your fears to rest, for I frequently bask in the sun, partaking in the classic horaltic pose, to warm myself and to help bake away any lingering bacteria. 

By Bob Peterson [CC-BY-SA-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

My dapper bald red head serves another purpose beyond being both nonthreatening and handsome: I can plunge it into a body cavity of a fresh meal without fear of the aftermath sticking to my face. 

By Dori [CC-BY-SA-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Lest your fears be not abated, know that my digestive tract kills most bacteria, so after I step in a carcass I simply relive myself upon my legs, whereupon they are sanitized. As I told you, I am a true gentlebird. 

Like you, milquetoast humans, I become afraid at times. I have few predators, but if I am attacked, I do not let my fear get the better of me; I take action and vomit upon my attacker. This will distract them, sting their eyes, and lighten my belly for a rapid escape. And escape I must, for if you are a vulture, no one can hear you scream (because we lack a syrinx and can only grunt and hiss).

Finally, dear inedible friends, I do hope you may no longer fear my handsome face and innocuous flight pattern. I hope for nothing more than to provide a valuable and kind service by removing succulent, delicious carcasses from your yards and roads . . . and to feast upon your juicy flesh the moment your last breath escapes you.

Sleep well, dear friend

Learn more about me

Here are some tasty resources on Turkey Vultures and other American Vultures:

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkey_Vulture
• http://vulturesociety.homestead.com/TVFacts.html
• http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Turkey_Vulture/lifehistory
• http://science.howstuffworks.com/zoology/birds/vulture-vomit.htm

Check back next week for an all new Creature Feature!

Ocean Sunfish: Lovable Leviathan

Hi everyone. My name is Mola mola, but you can call me Mola, or ocean sunfish if you like. It's a pretty good nickname because I live in the ocean, I like to bask in the sun, and I'm a fish. My friend Giant Pacific Octopus is typing for me so I can tell my story to you humans, because I just feel so misunderstood sometimes.

My Story: Don't Judge a Book by its Cover

I know I look a little weird. It's okay, you can say it, I have thick skin. At up to 5,000 pounds I am the heaviest bony fish species in the world. But the truth is, I don't even have that many bones. With only 16 vertebrae, all other fish have more than I do. And I don't have any tail bones at all. My skeleton is mostly cartilage. In fact, if you could see my skeleton, it would look something like this:

Photo by Sandstein [CC-BY-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0)]

You may wonder how I get dates looking like this. Well, first of all, believe it or not, I'm not that bad looking for a tetraodontiform. My cousins pufferfish, filefish, and boxfish aren't exactly the most normal looking bunch. And more importantly, I don't actually have to meet any guys, I just release more eggs than any other known vertebrate into the ocean and swim away. This really avoids a lot of awkward first dates.

Despite being a little strange looking, I think I'm actually pretty normal. I hatched from an egg and then grew many million times in size, just like everyone else. I like to swim around in warmer waters all over the world eating an enormous quantity of jellyfish. And just like humans, I like to get my spa treatment; when I have a lot of parasites living in my skin I make a surface visit and have some seagulls take care of it. They're very good.

So if you can get past my looks, I would like to be friends. I know I come on a little strong sometimes (for the record, I did not mean to knock that boy into the water when I leapt onto that boat, I was just trying to be friendly). I've also been told that when I swim at the surface, humans sometimes think I'm a shark:

But you can always tell it's me because I swim by swinging my dorsal fin back and forth.

Sometimes I get the feeling that things are not going well between us. It seems like you are always catching me in fishing nets, and even if it is unintentional it is still very unpleasant. You also keep dumping those fake jellyfish into the ocean that I know I'm not supposed to eat, but frankly, it can be very confusing. Now that I am living at the aquarium I hope that we can spend more time together. I am happy that all of you can read my story here, and I hope you feel like you know me a little better now.

  by  exfordy 

This is my happy face

Still Curious? Learn more

Here is my best human friend giving a TED talk all about me:

• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vld1zXGtZGg

She also has an excellent website with more information:

• http://oceansunfish.org

Here are a few more great ocean sunfish resources:

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mola_mola
• http://australianmuseum.net.au/Ocean-Sunfish-Mola-mola/
• http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/Unraveling-the-Mysteries-of-the-Ocean-Sunfish.html?c=y&page=1

Next week on Creature Features we leave the ocean and get a visit from a flying friend. Stay tuned!