Pig Faces

You are what you eat. I'm, therefore, a wooly, wallowing, be-pierced porcine creature.

Photo source: ...




















Photo source: Christine Davis


























Photo source: ifjruzsi

Plaintive Puppy

First of all, Happy Birthday to Ugly Overload. The blog turns four years old today. That's past middle-aged for a blog, especially given that I do at least one post for every day of the year. And as luck would have it, Blogger is showing me that this blog now has exactly 1,500 posts. That's a whole lotta ugly.

... a whole lotta hours ... with nary a cent to show for it ... I'm surprised my wife has been so accommodating.

Back to the uglies.

Laura captured this beastie in her home town of Redding, CA. She's wondering if its a barn spider or a wolf spider, or if maybe that's the same thing. Regardless, she let the poor thing go. Who could deny that plaintive look? It's actually pulling off a decent pupp-do-eyes face. It's now roaming the wilds of northern california -- a blessed couple of hours from me.

I'm thinking it's a wolfie, with those two forward eyes. Thanks for the photos, Laura.

Machismo

Photo source: Nicole LaBarre
I was raised on stories of alligator snapping turtles with their snake-like, lightning-fast strikes. So how can this guy be so nonchalant in his handling of a reptile that can snap his hand off?

Were the childhood stories told to me wrong? This is like finding out about the tooth fairy, only in a good way: there's one less monster on the planet.

Or is it simply that this man is a lot more macho than I am? Being a lifelong suburbanite who spends all day basking in the fluorescent lighting of my accounting office, that's not at all hard to do. Still, this knocks me down the manliness ranking once again. I'll need to go handle some freshly printed paper roughly, to run the risk of a paper cut, thereby restoring my machismo.

Meet the Desman

I'm always happy when someone introduces a new ugly species to me. After nearly four years of daily blogging, it's good to know there's still more material out there.

Courtney introduced me to the Russian desman. They belong in the mole family, and like their cousins, they are functionally blind insectivores. However, these creatures come equipped with laterally-flattened tails and webbed feet. That's right; they're aquatic.

How do they find their prey? Like other moles, they come stock with Eimer's organs -- sensitive touch organs at the tip of their bi-lobed snouts. Like the good toucan says, they follow their nose.




































Their wild populations have been on the decline for decades, but seem to be on the rebound recently, thanks to stricter enforcement of Russian laws protecting them. One thing you can do to help: don't buy desman fur coats. Or, if you do, buy them secondhand. No one will notice the cigarette and stale perfume smell from the old lady you bought it from.

Thanks for the desman, Courtney.

Why the Long Tongue?

The sun bear is called basindo nan tenggil in Malay, which means “he who likes to sit high." That's because, as the smallest of the world's eight bear species, the sun bear is able to clamber high into the trees, where it spends most of its nocturnal life.

Why the long tongue (and long face, for that matter)? That pink ribbon allows it to lap away at honey and insects deep inside trees that it has torn open, spots where those of us not so endowed aren't able to reach. Winnie the Pooh could have used a tongue like this. Though, that may have hampered the show's success.

Photo source: Vearl Brown

Devilfish Yellow Eyes

Cate lives in Hooper Bay, Alaska, which has afforded her many adventures that Southerners like me will likely never have (like carving up seal carcasses for dinner). One such adventure involved an arctic devilfish.

These fish are so spiny, that, as Cate puts it, even accidentally catching one can wound you for life (devilfish = aptly named). This particular specimen had been in the tidal mud for a while, yet still it lived, and its yellow eyes tracked Cate as she walked past it. An experience like that could wound a softy like me for life.

But Cate's tougher than that. I highly recommend visiting her blog: but only if you've got the stomach for life in Hooper Bay and among the Yup'ik.

Eighties Spider

Photo source: JETS Garden
What's worse than a massive spider as big as your hand that weaves webs at face level and masquerades about with the deceptively innocuous name of banana spider (Nephila clavipes)? The same spider, but with leg warmers.

I've looked this spider over, and I think I can just make out a Flock of Seagulls hair doo and pegged jeans. Maybe even a jean jacket. But it's hard to tell--spiders can be so good at camouflage.

Get Out of My Belly

Should you ever find yourself sprouting a massive saucer-like growth from your abdomen, refer back to this post for more details. You might be about to hatch an adult parasitoid wasp--one that's been pupating inside you as a little, wriggling larvae, and is now preparing for a dramatic exit from your belly.

That's what happened to this aphid. It suffered an Alien-like end to its life, only with the added flair of the saucer (making it even more extraterrestrial).

Photo source: Brian Valentine