Crypsis
A Draco lizard showing camouflage, background matching, reduction of shadow, and hiding.
Bandipur National Park
Bandipur National Park
Crypsis is a word in ecology which means "hiding". It refers to the ways animals avoid being seen, or otherwise detected. It also includes the situation when an animal is noticed, but is not recognised for what it is. It may be either a defence against predators, or a device for predators to get near prey.
Methods include camouflage, nocturnality (night-time activity), subterranean lifestyle, transparency, and mimicry.[1] The word can also be used about eggs,[2] and about pheromone production.[3] Crypsis can in principle involve visual, olfactory or auditory camouflage.[4]
- Hiding is the simplest case of crypsis. The animal moves to a place where it cannot be seen.
- Camouflage is the case where an animal can be seen by (for example) a predator, but not recognised.
- Mimicry is the case when an animal can be seen, but seems like another animal or plant. Warning colouration is an example.
Crypsis Media
Camouflage allows animals like this disruptively-patterned spider to capture prey more easily.
References
- ↑ Zuanon J. & I. Sazima 2006. The almost invisible league: crypsis and association between minute fishes and shrimps as a possible defence against visually hunting predators (2006). "A remarkable sand-dwelling fish assemblage from central Amazonia, with comments on the evolution of psammophily in South American freshwater fishes". Neotropical Ichthyology. 4 (2): 219–214. doi:10.1590/S1679-62252006000100012.
- ↑ Nguyen L.P. et al 2007. Using digital photographs to evaluate the effectiveness of plover egg crypsis (2007). "Using Digital Photographs to Evaluate the Effectiveness of Plover Egg Crypsis". Journal of Wildlife Management. 71 (6): 2084–2089. doi:10.2193/2006-471. S2CID 83705425.
- ↑ Raffa K.;R. et al 2007. Can chemical communication be cryptic? Adaptations by herbivores to natural enemies exploiting prey semiochemistry (2007). "Can chemical communication be cryptic? Adaptations by herbivores to natural enemies exploiting prey semiochemistry". Oecologia. 153 (4): 1009–1019. doi:10.1007/s00442-007-0786-z. PMID 17618465. S2CID 16437625.
{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) - ↑ "Definition of Crypsis". Amateur Entomologists' Society. Retrieved August 19, 2012.