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Bats, frogs and videotapes
A tungara frog sits in a pool of rainwater in a gutter and calls for females. The Animal Behavior Lab at Salisbury University has designed a robofrog that can mimic all three modalities of the tungara's courtship display. A frog-eating bat is attracted to these displays and flies out of its roost to inspect the artificial frog.
In total darkness, it approaches the frog, which comes with a backpack of bite-sized raw fish, and attacks on the wing. These stunning images, taken at 1500 frames per second with the help of infra-red illumination, display the bat's deadly flight skills - ferocious yet elegant.
video credit: Grant Maslowski (grantmaslowski at gmail.com) & Eric de Framond, STRI Panama
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