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22
Anna's hummingbird
An Anna’s hummingbird can back away from a flower in midair. In wind-tunnel recordings, the birds tilted their bodies steeply, bent their heads forward, and changed how they swept their wings. That let them fly backward while keeping their heads oriented toward the feeder.
More about Anna's hummingbird23
Paradise Flying Snake
After launching from a branch, this snake flattens its body and sends broad bends along its length. The expanded profile helps generate lift, and the aerial undulations help keep the snake stable as it glides between trees.
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Wallace’s Flying Frog
When this tree frog drops from a branch, it spreads its long fingers and toes to open wide webs. Those four small sails and the skin flaps along its limbs slow the fall and help it steer toward another branch.
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Sumatran Flying Dragon
The thin skin along this small lizard’s sides opens on elongated ribs. When it pushes off from a tree trunk, those ribs spread the skin into a pair of gliding surfaces and help make another trunk reachable without a trip to the ground.
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Southern Flying Squirrel
The squirrel stretches a furry sheet of skin between front and hind legs when it jumps. The membrane turns the fall into a glide, and the tail helps it steer. The trick makes a gap between trees crossable without going down to the ground.
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Ballooning Money Spider
This little spider can lift its abdomen and send out silk threads that let it travel through the air. Wind can carry the silk, and experiments with spiders in its genus show that an electric field can also draw them upward.
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Western Barn Owl
Tiny comb-like projections along the leading edge of the owl’s flight feathers soften the sound of air passing over its wings. The fringed trailing edges and velvety upper surface also help keep the wingbeats quiet. The result is a quieter approach to prey.
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Spotfin Flyingfish
A flyingfish builds speed in the water and uses quick strokes of its tail to launch. Its enlarged pectoral and pelvic fins then hold it just above the waves in a glide. The paired fins give this species the profile of a four-wing glider.
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Flying Squid
These oceanic squid launch with a burst of water from the funnel, then spread their fins and arms for lift. The droplets in the research photo show how the stream of water keeps providing thrust for part of the flight.
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Whirligig Beetle
This water-surface beetle uses paddle-shaped middle and hind legs to propel itself in quick loops. Its long front legs are free to grab prey. It can also dive, which is handy if something comes after it from above.
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Water Boatman
A water boatman rows under the surface with flattened, hairy hind legs. The hairs spread to push against the water on the power stroke. It swims with its back up, a useful way to tell it from the similarly shaped backswimmer.
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Northern Clingfish
Modified fins form a suction disk underneath the fish. The soft edge conforms to a rock and helps seal in the suction, even on an uneven surface. That grip keeps the fish in place where waves would pull an ordinary fish away.
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Coconut Octopus
A coconut octopus can roll backward along the seafloor on two arms and gather the other six around its body. The tucked posture gives it the profile of a piece of debris while two arms do the walking.
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Sea Star
Each arm carries rows of flexible, fluid-filled tube feet. Their tips attach to the bottom, pull the star forward and release for the next step. The close-up reveals why a sea star can move steadily even with no obvious stride.
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Long-Snouted Seahorse
The small dorsal fin flutters to push the seahorse forward, and a pair of smaller fins near the head steers the upright fish. When it needs a rest, it can wrap its tail around a stem instead of having to hold its place in the current.
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Sea Butterfly
The flapping wings on this tiny swimming snail are modified parts of its foot. Their motion through water resembles an insect’s wingbeat in air, letting the snail rise through the plankton instead of just sinking in its shell.
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Chambered Nautilus
A nautilus draws itself into the largest chamber of its shell and expels water in a jet. That thrust lets it swim backward and turn. It manages buoyancy separately by moving liquid in and out of the smaller chambers.
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Somersaulting Mantis Shrimp
When stranded on wet sand, this small mantis shrimp can curl itself into a wheel and perform repeated backward somersaults. The curled specimen shows the tight shape it uses to roll when there’s too little water to swim.
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By-the-Wind Sailor
The small diagonal sail on this floating colony catches the wind. Its angle carries some colonies to the left of a straight downwind course and others to the right. The direction is set by the sail and the wind, much like a sailboat with a fixed sail.
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Violet Snail
The violet snail gathers air with its foot and traps the bubbles in mucus. Suspended beneath its homemade raft, it drifts at the surface where it can reach floating prey. The shiny clusters of bubbles are visible next to the violet shell.
