It doesn't matter if you don't know, it doesn't affect our understanding that zebra stripes are a camouflage means. Wild animals are designed to confuse predators and better protect their survival wisdom.
Master of Camouflage: Survival Wisdom of Wild Animals shows us the survival skills of nearly 20 kinds of wild animals in a very large format. Not only camouflage in place, but also various amazing hunting artifacts.
The chameleon that we are most familiar with, besides freely changing skin color, also has eyes that can rotate in different directions at the same time and a tongue that strikes like lightning!
This hunting equipment is a perfect match. The stripes on the body can make the chameleon hide in the light and shadow of the leaves, actively create a favorable environment for the enemy to be bright and dark, flexible eyes can easily lock the prey, and the predation distance can be accurately measured. Coupled with the arrow-like tongue, the whole predation process is less than 1 second, and the probability of survival of the target prey is almost zero.
And small creatures with few sharp weapons also have their own ways to save their lives.
For example, syrphids avoid hunting chameleons by imitating the flight of wasps; Owl butterflies use spots on their wings to scare away predators; Nissle, a toad in South America, disguised himself with spots on his back that looked like poisonous snake eyes; When the reed frog is threatened, it will show its red thighs to scare the attacker; There is also a stick insect with a high level of "mimicry", which can always confuse predators perfectly.
Although all the wild animals in the book are stunted, they can't escape the "battlefield without smoke" of nature, and the scene of predation is staged one after another.
This is also the difference between Master Camouflage as a popular science picture book.
The author does not introduce these creatures to us page by page in isolation, but integrates them into a complete food chain.
The chameleon preys on flies, but gives up the mimicry syrphid beside it. In addition to mimicry, syrphids are also masters of hovering with hummingbirds. Hummingbirds not only suck nectar, but also feed on insects, but the spots on the wings of owls and butterflies, which are similar to owls' eyes, keep them away. ...
The brown-eared eagle is about to catch a lizard. The lizard sensed the danger and cut off its tail to escape, but it still coveted the sleeping bat. The same owl in Nocturnal Animals can't do anything about the hedgehog curled up into a thorn ball ...
The transfer and flow of matter and energy between species in the ecosystem are vividly reflected in this seemingly simple picture book, which vividly restores the survival law of nature in a way acceptable to children.
Master of Camouflage is not only the animals playing camouflage, but also the words are hidden.
When I first read this book, I was particularly surprised and lamented the simplicity of this book. Although the pictures are exquisite, the knowledge content is really not worth mentioning.
Or sharp-eyed children remind me to look at those slender twigs, fluffy feathers, thick locust legs, black and white stripes, swaying reed leaves, and so on.
Those places that you ignore are convenient to hide these secret survival stunts. If you find out, it's really a surprise.
In order to perfectly adapt to the habitat, the creatures in nature have their own strengths, which are amazing and bring infinite enlightenment to mankind. Don't let the harmony between man and nature become an empty slogan. Let us constantly remind ourselves from a little book like "Master in disguise: Survival Wisdom of Wild Animals" to appreciate the difference between life and * * * and to understand the truth of survival and interdependence.
Put an egg at the end. Zebras are dark horses with white stripes. Did you guess right?