That’s hilarious. I was wondering why it was called that and found this answer online:
Why are sexy shrimp called sexy?
The Sexy Anemone Shrimp is named for its unusual body movements. When walking, Thor amboinensis sways its abdomen back and forth with exotic flair.
There’s Hooker’s Pussytoes. Though that does seem a little bit like maybe it doesn’t really need to be the default common name because most non-inat sources including the wikipedia page it links to appear to use Racemose Pussytoes…
So that just blew my mind. Maybe when the first specimens were brought, the frog expert at the moment said ‘‘no tengo ‘niputidea’ de qué tipo de rana sea esta, nunca la había visto antes’’…
Oops…
Note: I don’t like cuss words but this was inevitable…
My understanding is that it translates roughly into “no freaking idea” in reference to the frog which probably looks like a lot of other very similar frogs from South America ? That would be a good specific name for many organisms.
For me, part of what makes it a bit contradictory is in a genus of giant clams, the specific epithet maxima goes to the “Small” Giant Clam. There are some other similarly weird clashes between size indicated by English and scientific names like Great Frigatebird, Fregata minor
This is exactly the case. Tridacna gigas is the “true” giant clam according to some, and it’s 3 times larger than T. maxima. Whether or not “giant clam” is applied just to T. gigas or the whole genus is up for debate.
We’ll for a giant clam it’s rather small, but for a typical clam it is still giant.
Not an animal, but I do wonder what the people who named the islands of Guadeloupe were thinking.
Basse-Terre means Lowland, and it is the higher of the two.
Grande-Terre means Mainland, and it is the smaller of the two.
Oh boy, the ‘‘Fregata minor’’ thing is something that I remember asking since my childhood because I read about that bird in a book. Why is it called Great Frigatebird?