Related topics: predators

Birds colour-match their interior designs

Researchers at the University of St Andrews have produced the first experimental evidence that birds actively select nest-building materials that camouflage their nests: published today in influential ornithological journal ...

Egg camouflage research animation

Did you ever look at the marks and speckles on an egg and wonder what they are for? Pretty as they can be, they are not merely ornamental but have evolved to hide the egg from hungry predators.

The camouflage games: Can you spot the bird?

So how long did it take you to spot the nightjar in the video on this page? For the predators trying to outsmart their concealed prey it's about not going hungry. But for the birds and the eggs that they are protecting it's ...

Who's eating my eggs

Nature, as the great poet Tennyson reminded us, is a violent place, or "red in tooth and claw", as he put it. One of the mechanisms animals use to avoid a bloody end is camouflage – blending in with the background – to ...

Snake's ultra-black spots may aid high-tech quest

Scientists have identified nanostructures in the ultra-black skin markings of an African viper which they said Thursday could inspire the quest to create the ultimate light-absorbing material.

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