{"id":56146,"date":"2019-07-12T13:56:58","date_gmt":"2019-07-12T17:56:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/wildwire\/?p=56146"},"modified":"2019-08-16T13:24:27","modified_gmt":"2019-08-16T17:24:27","slug":"animals-that-glow-in-the-dark","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/my-missions\/animals-that-glow-in-the-dark\/","title":{"rendered":"Animals that Glow in the Dark"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Did you know that there are animals that can light up like a light? In this article we highlight<\/em> (ha!) 5 animals that glow in the dark and explain how and why they do it. Check it out!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Firefly\nsquid<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Photo credit: Chiswick Chap<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Measuring only about 3 inches long, firefly squids are found in the waters surrounding Japan, and they use their glowing ability in a surprising way: to hide. When they lie horizontally and light up the underside of their body, they camouflage with the lights shining down from the surface. You can see the difference it makes in the picture on the right. This allows them to hide from predators swimming below them.

These squids also use their lights to attract mates and to communicate with each other.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Anglerfish<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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The female anglerfish certainly isn\u2019t what we\u2019d call cute, but she\u2019s definitely pretty cool. She has a light that hangs from the top of her head that she uses to attract prey. In the dark waters, a bright light like that can bring in all sorts of curious creatures, big and small. But she\u2019s ready for anything that crosses her path, as she is able to swallow prey 2 times her size!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Railroad\nworm<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Photo Credit: Aaron Pomerantz<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

This railroad worm isn\u2019t actually a worm\n\u2013 nor is it a railroad \u2013 but actually a type of beetle. While the males look\nmore like you would expect a beetle to look, the females will always look like\na larva, but they have something that makes them extra special: they glow in\nthe dark! Their bright lights act as a warning to predators that they are toxic\nand to stay away. Only the females and juveniles can glow and when they do, they\nlook like a passenger train at night, which is where their name comes from. Choo!\nChoo!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Lantern\nshark<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Photo Credit: Chris Bird<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

That\u2019s right; there are glow-in-the-dark\nsharks! The lanternshark is another deep sea creature that glows. These sharks\nonly grow to 50 cm long, and they have light-emitting cells that line their\nbelly and underside of their fins. Scientists aren\u2019t 100% sure what the sharks\nuse the lights for but they think it is probably a form of camouflage, just\nlike the firefly squid. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Firefly<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Photo Credit: Emmanuelm<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Of course, this list wouldn\u2019t be\ncomplete without fireflies!  These insects\nare perhaps the most famous light-up animals. It\u2019s not unusual to see these\ninsects flash their lights in the summer but why do they do it? They put on a\nwhole light show just to attract a mate!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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So\nwhat makes them glow?<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

All of the animals on this list are\nbioluminescent! This is what it\u2019s called when a light is produced by a chemical\nreaction in a living organism. The chemicals, stored in the animal\u2019s body, are\nmixed together and create a bright and colourful reaction that the animal can use\nto do things like attract a mate, lure prey or escape from a predator.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wouldn\u2019t it be cool if we could glow in the dark? Think of all the energy we\u2019d save by not using lights! Unfortunately, it doesn\u2019t look like we\u2019re going to be saying goodbye to lights any time soon but we can still save energy by being smart about how we use them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Accept the Flip the Switch Mission to learn how you can save energy and help save the planet. <\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n\"accept_btn\"<\/a>\n\n\n\n
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Generously sponsored by:<\/b><\/h2>\n\n\n\n\n\t
\"fortisalberta-logo\"<\/div><\/td>
 <\/div>\"Alberta-logo\"<\/div><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n\n\n\n\nSources: \nwww.nationalgeographic.org\/encyclopedia\/bioluminescence\/ | www.amnh.org\/explore\/videos\/oceans\/jellies-down-deep\/how-the-jelly-got-its-glow | www.nationalgeographic.com\/animals\/fish\/group\/anglerfish\/ | \nhotaruikamuseum.com\/en\/museum\/hotaruika | \nnews.nationalgeographic.com\/2018\/06\/bioluminescent-animals-living-fireworks\/ | \nwww.nationalgeographic.com\/science\/phenomena\/2015\/07\/28\/glowing-sharks\/ | \nnews.nationalgeographic.com\/2016\/07\/fireflies-lights-mating-behavior\/ <\/a>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Did you know that there are animals that can light up like a light? In this article we highlight (ha!) 5 animals that glow in the dark and explain how and why they do it. Check it out! Firefly squid Measuring only about 3 inches long, firefly squids are found in the waters surrounding Japan, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":56138,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[985,586,931],"tags":[1201,1204,1202,1203],"class_list":{"0":"post-56146","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-fts","8":"category-my-missions","9":"category-all","10":"tag-anglerfish","11":"tag-bioluminescence","12":"tag-firefly","13":"tag-glowing"},"pp_force_visibility":null,"pp_subpost_visibility":null,"pp_inherited_force_visibility":null,"pp_inherited_subpost_visibility":null,"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56146","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=56146"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56146\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/56138"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56146"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56146"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56146"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}