5 Animals With Extreme Defense Mechanisms

A horned creature propelling blood out of its eyes. A six-legged monster shooting scalding-hot acid toward its victims. These sound like something you’d see in a horror flick, but they’re real defense mechanisms from some of the animal kingdom’s most unassuming residents. We’re not talking about the same old claws and camouflage that many animals rely upon to protect themselves, but rather survival tactics are extreme and extremely effective. Here are five feisty animals in particular that deploy intense defense mechanisms.

Exploding Ants

What do fireworks, airbags, and ants have in common? The answer — as shocking as it may be — is they can all explode. Native to Southeast Asia, the ant species Colobopsis explodens has a name that hints at one of the more extreme defense mechanisms in the animal kingdom. To the naked eye, the insects look like any standard ant; they have a brownish-red color and no large claws or pincers, which makes them an appealing target for predators (typically larger ants). But when attacked, these ants will explode in order to protect fellow members of their colony.

In perilous situations, these ants angle their backsides toward the attacker and flex them to the point that their abdomens burst. In doing so, they release an acrid, yellow goo to kill the attacker. The explosion results in the death of the ant being threatened, though it’s an admirable sacrifice to protect other ants from the same fate.

Horned Lizard

To humans, making your eyes bleed is usually a figure of speech, reserved for terrible movies, awkward situations, and other things we’d rather not see. But that’s not the case when it comes to the genus Phrynosoma, which includes several North American species of lizards known more commonly as horned lizards or horny toads. At least eight species within the genus have the ability to squirt blood from their eye sockets when they feel threatened. This blood is mixed with toxic chemicals that are derived from the lizard’s ant-based diet, resulting in a liquid concoction that isn’t exactly poisonous, but still has a deeply unpleasant taste.

The lizards squirt blood by restricting the blood flow from leaving their heads, which in turn increases blood pressure and causes blood vessels to burst around the eyes. These small creatures can then shoot out a stream of blood at a distance of up to five feet. While birds aren’t so turned off by this defense mechanism — given they lack taste buds — the tactic is highly effective at deterring canine predators such as coyotes, dogs, or foxes. It’s also admired by football players at Texas Christian University, where the mighty horned frog serves as the school mascot and its telltale blood makes an appearance on helmets and jerseys alike.

Northern Fulmars

While many birds simply take to the skies and flee to safety, the northern fulmar isn’t like other birds. This seabird typically resides in the North Atlantic and North Pacific, where it feasts on a diet of oil-rich sea creatures — similar to a nice fish fry from Long John Silver’s. After being consumed, those fatty oils are stored in a special chamber called the proventriculus, where they thicken into a sludgy goop. When threatened, the northern fulmar projectile vomits the mixture out toward any oncoming predator.

Given its thickness, the toxic vomit is extremely adhesive in nature. So much so that it sticks to that predatory bird’s feathers and weighs it down to the point that it can sink and drown in the water. Northern fulmar chicks are able to produce projectile vomit, even without a parent present, in the event their nest is attacked.

Hairy Frogs

The species Trichobatrachus robustus is known to many as the hairy frog, but also by the names horror frog and wolverine frog. That latter moniker comes from the animal’s similarities to the X-Men hero Wolverine, who has retractable claws made of the fictional element Adamantium. The hairy frog’s retractable claws are made of bone that can tear straight through its skin to defend itself — a nightmarish idea for anyone who’s ever suffered a compound fracture.

When threatened, the hairy frog will flex its foot muscle, causing its sharp claws to break through the fleshy nodules at the tips of its toes. It’s like how a cat protrudes its claws, only with an added element of gore. The frog will then use its newly exposed claws to lacerate its attacker until the situation is secure. Once safe, this frog pulls its claws back into its toes, though it requires time thereafter for its skin to heal over.

Bombardier Beetle

In an 1846 letter, Charles Darwin described being on the receiving end of a threatened beetle that shot acid down his throat. This was an early recorded example of beetles that shoot chemicals — as if from a cannon — at would-be predators. Among the many beetles that do this, few have perfected it to the degree of the aptly named Bombardier beetle, which gives the concept of chemical warfare a whole new meaning.

The Bombardier beetle launches a foamy secretion out of its abdomen at up to 22 miles per hour and at temperatures of up to 212° Fahrenheit — the boiling point of water. If you’ve ever burnt yourself while making pasta, you know how unpleasant this can feel. The beetle can also fire this scalding secretion as if it were coming out of a machine gun, generating between 368 to 735 pulses per second. This spray combines hydrogen peroxide and hydroquinone, which are stored in separate sacs within the beetle’s body. The chemicals are then mixed together inside an abdominal chamber, and propelled if needed.