Search results
Results From The WOW.Com Content Network
A xerocole (from Greek xēros / ˈ z ɪ r oʊ s / 'dry' and Latin col(ere) 'to inhabit'), [2] [3] [4] is a general term referring to any animal that is adapted to live in a desert. The main challenges xerocoles must overcome are lack of water and excessive heat. To conserve water they avoid evaporation and concentrate excretions (i.e. urine and ...
Secondary aquatic adaptations tend to develop in early speciation as the animal ventures into water in order to find available food. As successive generations spend more time in the water, natural selection causes the acquisition of more adaptations. Animals of later generations may spend most their life in the water, coming ashore for mating.
It lives along the plant-covered banks of stagnant and slow-flowing bodies of water, where it feeds on small fragments of plant material, animals (such as nematodes), or carrion. It swims with characteristic jerky movements. Cyclops has the capacity to survive unsuitable conditions by forming a cloak of slime. Average lifespan is about three ...
Hoarding food for the long, cold winter. Adequate food resources and energy reserves are essential for an animal’s success and survival but winter food supplies and energy reserves are critical ...
A last-ditch defence is for the animal's flesh itself to be toxic, as in the puffer fish, danaid butterflies and burnet moths. Many insects acquire toxins from their food plants; Danaus caterpillars accumulate toxic cardenolides from milkweeds (Asclepiadaceae). [56] Some prey animals are able to eject noxious materials to deter predators actively.
Aquatic animals generally conduct gas exchange in water by extracting dissolved oxygen via specialised respiratory organs called gills, through the skin or across enteral mucosae, although some are evolved from terrestrial ancestors that re-adapted to aquatic environments (e.g. marine reptiles and marine mammals), in which case they actually ...
[20]: 587 This lack of ossification is an adaptation to save energy when food is scarce. [26] Most of the animals that live in the bathyal zone are invertebrates such as sea sponges, cephalopods, and echinoderms. With the exception of very deep areas of the ocean, the bathyal zone usually reaches the benthic zone on the seafloor. [24]
They have their specially-adapted characteristic flora, mainly consisting of annuals, the seeds of which survive the drought, but also some uniquely adapted perennials. [15] Animals adapted to these extreme habitat types also exist; fairy shrimps can lay "winter eggs" which are resistant to desiccation, sometimes being blown about with the dust ...