The Masters of Disguises -liars and cheaters

Dear mouse,

If you think that my cable TV is tuned in the TFC 24/7, you're wrong. 23 1/2/7 lang.

That is for my TV in the living room. In the bedroom, no TFC. Pa-intellectual naman kuno ang dating.

Last Sunday, my idea that chameleon is the only animal that can quickly change in appearance and color to fool predators vanished when I saw a documentary about animals that are masters of disguises to protect themselves from enemies. Spy agencies may have been able to get some bags of tricks from these inferior creatures but definitely they could not duplicate the Nature-endowed abilities for animals to drive away unwanted companies.

Not all snakes have venoms. Snakes that you may see in the backyard may not be venomous at all but they have a way to fool a dangerous adversary, the domesticated cat. The small snake may try to pose like a deadly cobra,ready to strike but cats cannot be fooled easily not unless they encounter the type of snake that can cheat them by posing as if it were dead. DEAD as it looks like it is dead and smells like it is dead that even the flies are attracted to it. So the next time, you see a dead snake in your yard,check if it is really dead. Ooops, don't, it may not be dead at all.

Butterflies are beautiful but before they became one, they have to undergo series of disguises in order to finally metamorphose into one beautiful winged art of nature.

As a caterpillar, it can go to the most extreme disguise of looking like a bird dropping. Some animals cannot be fooled however, so it can switch to disguises including that of a small snake .

As a last trick, it can change its body form into a coccoon that can adopt shape and color to its environment. It can look like a green leaf or a small fruit hanging from one of the twigs.

The leafy sea dragon is not a dragon and not a sea weed either but it looks like one with its green tentacles attached to its sea-horse body.

It's really a sea horse but it looks more like a sea weed especially when the male carries the eggs of the young. The part of the body where the eggs are deposited by the female to the male partner becomes sticky that some sea stuff attach to it and conceal the eggs from the predators.

The master of disguises however is the mimic octopus. It can disguise as a snake, a flounder,a sea weed all in a few seconds because of its capability to change colors, shapes and movements when it mimics a particular animal of its choice.

Interesting. In the spy world, this is the ability to be invisible, to adapt and be among the enemies without being detected. These animals have their ways to teach us something that humans can not do even with their superior brain.

Excuse me while this Ca t changes to a human disguise. Ahem.

The Ca t