666 days visited on the iNat Forum! The Mark of the Beast! Let’s have a bit of fun with this theme. I’d love to hear about your devil-related observations . . . Devil Rays (Family Mobulidae), Tasmanian Devils (Sarcophilus harrisii), and more!
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Hmmm what about devilish observations in general?
Insects with red eye are always very funny: here is a perfectly normal green cloverworm moth on my fence on night:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/332102053
Several photos with and without flash
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Contributing Gastropteron pacificum, which is referred to by some as a “sea devil”
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I don’t have any good observations to contribute, but here’s all the species in the world with (English) “devil” somewhere in their iNaturalist list of names:
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations?place_id=any&q=devil&search_on=names&view=species
Many of them are familiar species that I don’t find devilish at all (like the cute little Sitta carolinensis AKA “devil downhead”), but apparently somebody did.
Feel free to add lists for other languages - simply replace “devil” in the URL with your translation of “devil.”
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My only satanic observation is Devil’s needles, in the solanum family. https://inaturalist.ala.org.au/observations/311336892. There is also Devil’s fig Solanum torvum and giant devils fig Solanum hispidium. When you consider other members of the Solanaceae such as deadly nightshade and super hot chillis and the apple of Sodom, Solanum linnaeanum , you might wonder if this is a particularly hellish genus of plants. On the hand this genus also contains sunflowers, tomatoes and potatoes. Hold on, could potatoes be on a mission from Hell to tempt humans into obesity through indulging in french fries and hot chips?
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Here few of my observations of devil rays, with their little horns as if they were in a German opera.
And here my truly evil encounter:
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Have some Devil’s Beggarticks!
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I wonder if it’s an indication of our innate trait of human optimism to discover that there are over 20% more species with the word ‘angel’ in their common name?
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This spider has a devilish pattern on abdomen:
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In Spanish there is pepinillo del diablo - devil’s cucumber and caballitos del diablo - devil’s little horses - for damselflies!
My only observation in a broad sense is this witch’s or zombie’s finger:
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Devil Scorpionfish
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Devil’s club is devilish in so many ways other than the name. The stalk is covered in spines up to a centimeter long, as are the leaves which have spines on both the top and bottom sides (a bit hard to see in this photo). Also, the spines can cause infections and the berries are toxic.
https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/237493470
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Susanne,
Thanks for sharing the species page on iNaturalist. From the About tab: (Source: Wikipedia)
Also called the squirting cucumber. Its unusual common name derives from the ripe fruit squirting a stream of mucilaginous liquid containing its seeds as a means of seed dispersal
It sounds very sexual! I watched a video about it. It’s not that sexual. It’s closer to . . . have you ever juiced a lemon on one of those cone-shaped, handheld citrus juicers? You squeeze the lemon, and some seeds shoot out? It’s a bit like that. https://youtu.be/LLBg0In8Dtw?si=WXlNI0yOmaFB0g3e
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There’s the Common Devil’s-claw, of course.
https://www.inaturalist.org/taxa/78747-Proboscidea-louisianica
I’ve had the dried seed pods attach to my boot while out hiking, but they’re not really as devilish as some spiny or sticky plants.
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When I first experienced it I didn’t know what was going on. It shoots its seeds quite far and is very wet. I walked in a wasteland with bare legs and was attacked and spat at. :-))
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There is also the horn of plenty, (Craterellus cornucopiodes), which is also known as the devil’s trumpet, devil’s horn, trumpet of death or trompette de la mort. It is related to the chanterelle mushroom, (Cantharellus cibarius) and is a choice edible despite its frightening assortment of names.
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Beautiful photo, Cara! @Cryptomarasmius Thanks for keeping this thread alive,
And thanks for all of your IDs for others! Almost 30,000 IDs in only 7 months on iNaturalist!
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Thank you @AdamWargon ! This was my first contribution to the forum, and I thought saying something about fungi might be a good introduction, as it is my favourite subject. I hope to use this site more, I have learnt a lot from reading forum posts over the last few weeks.
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https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/289853400
Little Devil moth
Didn’t know it was a moth until ID.
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