Our beloved class pet, Peanut, has something to be proud of this week-- her species, the leopard gecko, is in the news! Well... their tails are, anyway.
When people first meet Peanut, one of the first questions they ask is why her tail is so funny looking. Her tail may be fat, purple, and generally kind of weird, but it serves a purpose! We already knew that the tail can come off and flop around to distract predators, but recent research has brought out new details. Scientists used a high-speed camera to record exactly how the tail moves. If the tail just moved in a simple back-and-forth pattern, predators would understand that it was a trick, and chase after the poor gecko instead of being distracted by the tail. But it turns out that the tail actually has special neurons (nerve cells) to make its movements more complicated and realistic. Amazing!
Check out the video:
