It mimicking a caterpillar actually makes sense, because it isn’t just mimicking a harmless caterpillar- it is mimicking a Megalopygidae caterpillar. Megalopygidae are flannel moths, and they include the Furry Puss caterpillar. The internet has compared the furry puss caterpillar to looking like Trump’s hair. I’m using the Furry Puss Caterpillar as an example because it probably the only species of Megalopygidae you have heard of. The colors of the bird look similar to other caterpillar species of Megalopygidae. Caterpillars of the Megalopygidae are described as looking like cotton, but you don’t want to touch them because there are venomous spines hidden in the hair and they are EXTREMELY painful and toxic. Since the defenseless baby bird is trying to mimic the caterpillars they have evolved overcompensating defenses against predators, this is Batesian mimicry. It might seem backwards that a bird’s defensive behavior is mimicking the sane organism it eats (caterpillar). But a baby bird is an easy meal for predators, while a Megalopygidae caterpillar is NOT.
beastmaster64 it happens man, I spent years in a tent in the jungles finding moments like this, and not learning the internet... I’m glad everyone is enjoying it now.
@@animalmanodano This is absolutely phenomenal footage and insight. I've watched nature shows and nature in person since I was a kid, this is outrageous mimicry .
@Sebi You're right on Kim, however I'm scared with possibility that something other will came to surface instead. Being 40 years old now, I was born in times where other values were credited much more, I was watching every nature TV show I could get and was taught that scissors and screwdriver are tools humanity need more than anything that society values today's more.
Tomislav Koren move to the forest, It works. I learned more living with natives and walking around the Amazon than I could have learned in a lifetime sifting the internet and walking the cities. Even now I own a lonely property in the middle of a 56,000 acre national forest, living off the land and limiting my contact with civilization... I could care less about tomorrow as long as I’m living right today..
This is so ODD. I knew caterpillars can mimic other species, like snake. But in all my life there's a BIRD who mimics the caterpillar itself? Sorry nature, you're not scary. You're uber weird.
It’s mimicking a Megalopygidae caterpillar. Those caterpillars are extremely toxic. I love caterpillars (and bugs in general) and I enjoy letting them crawl on me. Caterpillars have different walking patterns and all of them are adorable, just like the caterpillar. Expect for Megalopygidae caterpillars. I would never let one of those crawl on me. Their venom is EXTREMELY painful.
Ding Dong Thru years and years the nestlings with this behavior thrived and past on their genes. They don’t know that they’re mimicking a caterpillar. That’s humans putting the connection together.
Aiman Ghazi it’s called a fecal sac, Condensed up waste that the mother removes from the nest to prevent predators from smelling it. The survival rate of a nestling in that location is less than 1 percent.. With that kind of stress on it nature can act in some weird ways.
@@animalmanodano Woah! Thank you dude, very interesting information! I was looking into a moth (Hemeroplanes triptolemus) that does almost identical behaviour, mimicking snakes. I wonder, do they see things like we do? Insects and birds and animals in general have very different visions compared to us, I wonder how they're able to mimic things so articulately about other creatures and reflect that themselves, it's not like they have a mirror to see themselves after they mimic something. Nature is fascinating... yet so mysterious.
@@animalmanodano 1%. One percent. That would be like if one hundred babies are born 99 would be killed by burglars before they get to school. In my country that would be one child on four classrooms.
Joey Mormann there is a journal entry in the American Journal of science from that year describing the behaviors. To see this animal in the wild you have to go on a hell of an adventure, over the worlds largest mountain range into the worlds largest forest and you need a lot of luck. this nest was found just before my 100th day at this site in a year of which I spent over 300 days in the forest and I only encountered this one individual.
It is ridiculous to think that unguided evolution could explain an animal imitating another animal. Evolution can't see the future. It can't set goals. It can't say, "In 10,000 generations, we're going to look like that and do that." The universe and all within it look like they were designed, because they were designed.
Richard Dawkins once wrote: “Biology is the study of complicated things that give the appearance of having been designed for a purpose” ... but then he proceeded to argue that they were not designed. Of course he would do that. Many sinful people hate the idea of a Judge ruling the cosmos. So they suppress the truth in their minds, according to Romans chapter one in the Bible.
More Dawkins: “It could be that at some earlier time, somewhere in the universe, a civilization evolved by probably some kind of Darwinian means to a very, very high level of technology- and designed a form of life that they seeded onto perhaps this planet. … And I suppose it’s possible that you might find evidence for that if you look at the details of biochemistry, molecular biology, you might find a signature of some sort of designer.” The fingerprints of design are throughout the creation.
