Nature has a huge arsenal of tricks as it tries to fool potential predators or prey, not just on April Fools’ Day but year-round in northern Illinois.
If humans are observant, they can see some of the signs of nature’s trickery.
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Some wild critters play dead. Others fake injuries. Others have false scary eyes on their bodies, while some rely on their plumage to trick predators into thinking they’re not there.
For example, opossums pretend they’re dead if they feel threatened. However, the opossum doesn’t know it’s playing dead. It likely just fainted from stress. While passed out, its sharp teeth are exposed and a secretion from its glands produces a terrible smell. The behavior may deter some predators, especially ones that want live, not dead prey.
A hognose snake also plays dead. I’ve seen it in action — or perhaps the word is inaction — at Illinois Beach State Park in Zion once while hiking with my husband. He pointed out to me the reptile laying on its back with its tongue hanging out. It was definitely alive, but something must have frightened it, so it did its tomfoolery to pretend it was dead meat.
Other northern Illinois snakes fake being rattlesnakes. The northern watersnake, which is harmless, vibrates its tail to suggest it’s a venomous rattlesnake. The sound and sight might be enough to scare away some unknowing critter.
The killdeer, a common shorebird that nests in northern Illinois, has another line of defense. When something or someone gets too close to its nest, it screams and drags its wing as if it’s broken. The killdeer moves farther away from the nest, performing its broken-wing act to get the predator to follow it. When the killdeer flies off, the predator is left clueless. Killdeer notoriously react that way when humans get too close to their nests. I’ve seen many a fake broken-wing act while outdoors.
Squirrels like to fool one another, too. Sometimes they pretend they’re burying a nut in the ground when they actually aren’t. Another squirrel will come along and try to dig up the nonexistent meal.
Insects have their own trick weapons. Some butterfly, moth and caterpillar species have pigments on their bodies that look like large eyes. That may make a predator think it’s a much larger animal and back away.
Spicebush swallowtail is one species of butterfly whose caterpillar has large, fake eyes.
The viceroy butterfly uses mimicry to fool a would-be predator. With its orange and black coloring, it looks almost like a monarch. Birds avoid eating monarchs because they contain a toxin that makes them sick. One taste of a monarch and a bird isn’t going to try to eat anything else that looks like it again, including a viceroy.
Camouflage is another important trick for nature. Great horned owls and eastern screech-owls, which nest in northern Illinois, have brownish, mottled plumages that help them blend right into a tree trunk and their twiggy nest.
Birds that nest in grasslands like the savanna sparrow, are often brown and tan to mirror the colors of the grasses in which they nest.
Certain moth species sport color patterns that look like a dead leaf or tree bark. Researchers have found that some moth species work to find just the right place to settle on a tree so that they look invisible.
Predators have their own tricks, too. The green heron, for example, has a sneaky way of fishing. This bird actually drops twigs, feathers or other objects in the water. That entices fish to check out the commotion, and when one arrives under the eyes of the heron, the wading bird grabs it and swallows it whole.
An alligator snapping turtle (endangered in Illinois and only found in the south) waits, quietly hiding in the mud with only its eyes and nostrils showing. When a fish comes along, the snapping turtle opens its mouth to expose a growth on its tongue that looks like a wiggling worm. The fish thinks it’s getting dinner, but instead the turtle fools the fish, grabbing it with its strong jaws.
Sheryl DeVore has worked as a full-time and freelance reporter, editor and photographer for the baiduhai and its subsidiaries. She’s the author of several books on nature and the environment. Send story ideas and thoughts to [email protected]