So we’ve covered how people mimic nature to come up with new design and technology ideas, but did you know that nature mimics nature too? This week at The Brooklyn Children’s Museum, we taught a class called “Mimicry, Schmimicry!” where kids got to see and even touch the best mimics of the animal kingdom. We’ve met leaf and stick bugs before, but take a look at these other amazing and exotic plant mimics.
We created a game where each student had to match a mimic master to a picture of that animal’s habitat. We found a laminated pictures of 25 different camouflaging creatures and put their habitat on cards in the front of the classroom. The students took turns finding their animal’s habitat. When the match was made, they squinted their eyes and watched the animal disappear!
More surprising than these masters of camouflage are the creatures with tame defenses that have evolved to mimic the most deadly animals in their environment.
Our Honduran milk snake Slimy keeps away predators with his brightly colored red and yellow scales. Though he’s completely harmless, he mimics the same pattern of the fatally poisonous coral snake. Predators avoid the risk of getting a mouthful of poison with their lunch. Can you see the subtle difference in their patterns?
Can you pick out the real bee from these three pictures?
Trick question! All three are flies that mimic bees to stay safe from predators.
I had the students in our public program think of the scariest animals of the ocean, desert, and jungle and do their best to scare me with their mimicry skills. I was extremely amused by the kids renditions of a shark (teeth and claws!), rattlesnake, (teeth and tail!), and lion (teeth and claws!).
Next the kids practiced their mimicry talents by crafting a mask that would either help them blend into a specific environment or scare off predators. If you try this in your classroom, you can even have students go on a nature walk to collect fallen leaves and sticks for their masks!
We’ll be teaching this program again on September 22nd. Check back for some updated pictures from the program!