<div style="margin: 12px 0px; font-family: arial; color: #333333; background: #ffffff; border: solid 4px #e5e5e5; width: 100%; clear: left;"><div class="CM_CTB_Content_Wrap" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;background-color: #ffffff;"><div style="border-bottom: solid 1px #dcdcdc; white-space: nowrap; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: #eeeeee ;background-image: url(http://clipmarks.com/images/source-bg.gif); background-repeat: repeat-x; height: 24px; line-height: 24px; vertical-align: middle; padding-bottom: 4px; color: #666666; font-size: 10px;" ><a href="http://clipmarks.com/clip-to-blog/" title="see clips that are hot right now"><img src="http://content.clipmarks.com/blog_embed/513d6ba5-557d-47db-a764-fb54f8d3b66f/BFF6F4C3-DF1C-433C-8390-B7CA5BB59C0F/" alt="" width="19" height="19" border="0" style="vertical-align: middle; margin: 0px 4px; display: inline; border: none; float:none;" /></a>clipped from <a title="http://www.thefreedictionary.com/" href="http://www.thefreedictionary.com/" style="font-size: 11px;">www.thefreedictionary.com</a></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://www.thefreedictionary.com/"><DIV id="CA_ITN_0_DataZone"><MAP name="icon_news"><AREA title="Add to Google" href="http://www.google.com/ig/add?moduleurl=http://www.thefreedictionary.com/_/WoD/news-module.xml" target="_blank" coords="0,0,11,11" shape="rect"></AREA><AREA title="Add to My Yahoo!" href="http://e.my.yahoo.com/config/cstore?.opt=content&.url=http://www.thefreedictionary.com/_/WoD/rss.aspx?type=news&.page=p1" target="_blank" coords="13,0,22,11" shape="rect"></AREA><AREA title="RSS feed source" href="http://www.thefreedictionary.com/_/WoD/rss.aspx?type=news" target="_blank" coords="23,0,34,11" shape="rect"></AREA> </MAP> <IMG src="http://img.tfd.com/m/g-y-rss.gif" class="feed_icon" usemap="#icon_news" /><A href="http://uk.reuters.com/article/scienceNews/idUKN2150641520080221?sp=true" linkindex="78" set="yes"><IMG width="100" vspace="0" hspace="0" height="74" align="left" src="http://img.tfd.com/IOD/Poplar_hawk-moth.jpg" class="box1img" /></A><H3>How Caterpillars Hide Disguised as Bird Droppings</H3><SPAN>The ability to blend in with surrounding foliage and hide from predators is an important survival mechanism in the wild. Young <A href="http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/swallowtail" linkindex="79" set="yes">swallowtail</A> caterpillars have the unique ability to disguise themselves as bird droppings. Researchers studying the unusual <A href="http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/camouflage" linkindex="80">camouflage mechanism</A> have discovered that a special hormone keeps the caterpillar in its black and white excrement disguise. <A href="http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/juvenile+hormone" linkindex="81" set="yes">Juvenile hormone</A> appears to regulate genes involved with color, pattern, and surface formation; when levels of the hormone drop, the appearance of the <I>Papilio xuthus</I> larva begins to shift and mimic the coloring of its host leaf. The bird dropping camouflage may protect young larvae from hungry birds until the caterpillars become more mobile.</SPAN> <A href="http://uk.reuters.com/article/scienceNews/idUKN2150641520080221?sp=true" linkindex="82">More on the subject...</A></DIV></blockquote></div><div style="margin: 0px 6px 6px 4px;"><table style="font-size: 11px;border-spacing: 0px;padding: 0px;" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="100%"><tr><td style="background:transparent;border-width:0px;padding:0px;">&nbsp;</td><td align="right" style="background:transparent;border-width:0px;padding:0px;width:107px" width="107"><a href="http://clipmarks.com/share/BFF6F4C3-DF1C-433C-8390-B7CA5BB59C0F/blog/" title="blog or email this clip"><img src="http://content6.clipmarks.com/images/c2b-foot.png" border="0" alt="blog it" width="107" height="17" style="border-width:0px;padding:0px;margin:0px;" /></a></td></tr></table></div></div>

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