Originally published at: Freaky electric blue tarantula species identified in Thailand | Boing Boing
…
7 Likes
Picture I took last Saturday at this year’s Insectapalooza.
Like the tarantulas, these scorpions aren’t actually these freaky colors.
4 Likes
Hey! What are arachnids doing at Insectapalooza?
False advertising!
3 Likes
There were primates there too – like me!
5 Likes
Blue pigments are relatively rare in nature, though they do show up in jellyfish, starfish, and crustaceans. Blue structural colors…those are easier to make, and just offhand I can think of sea anemones, dragonflies and damselflies, flies, butterflies, beetles, lots of fish, some frogs, lizards, birds, and even a few primates.
This is still a very striking spider though.
11 Likes
Concept album title.
10 Likes
Pretty much all green colouration in frogs involves blue structural colour- it’s combined with a yellow pigment to make green.
That’s UV fluorescence though, isn’t it? The blue colouration of these tarantulas is visible under natural light.
4 Likes
Plus; that’s beautiful.
Downer: that’s a fucking huge spider.
2 Likes
New Blue Man Group member just dropped
2 Likes
What, no “Delightful Creature” tag?
3 Likes
It’s not very clear from the article, but the electric blue tarantula is Chilobrachys natanicharum. Evidently the previous discovery of Taksinus bambus triggered additional research on tarantulas in Thailand, which led to this discovery.
1 Like
One of the most famous of the blue primates has passed on, sadly.
This topic was automatically closed after 5 days. New replies are no longer allowed.
