“I was deciding between thorny devils which shoot blood out of their eyes; gastric brooding frogs, which swallow their eggs and regurgitate them as babies; and the peacock mantis shrimp which can shatter fish tanks by clamping its inch long claws. But I feel like the hairy frog deserves some loving. The hairy frog gets its name from vascularized, hair-like appendages that sometimes grow on males. In addition to the horrifying appearance the ‘hair’ gives them, when threatened, they can break the bones in their fingers to push out as claws to defend themselves. Pretty metal.” —

Peacock Spiders

“PEACOCK SPIDERS ARE AWESOME. We had an Australian Museum travelling show at our local museum and although I knew about them, I utterly fell in love with them… I came up with a (sort of) simple puppet version for kids to make at an art station, scaled up by 10. Some of the most successful ones even used similar leg colourings as there are so many species. I still have one attached to the rearview mirror in the car and usually it just jiggles about provocatively but if you take a certain corner on the way home, at a certain time of the afternoon, it’s shadow runs sideways along the dashboard, which I find hilarious. The kids’ friends, not so much.” — 

“How about some love for the rock hyrax? Beyond having an amazing name and brilliantly strange family tree, the rock hyrax looks like a cute and possibly cuddly groundhog. Though sometimes, when challenged for food or territory, he may show you a different side… The rock hyrax is native to Africa and the Middle East and amazingly enough, is most closely related to the elephant. Yes, you read that correctly, this little guy is related to elephants. Rock on rock hyrax