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10 Animals Evolution Plucked Straight Out of a Nightmare

Kate Lohnes

From frogs that give birth through their mouths to crabs with 6-foot legs, these animals are some of the strangest you’ll hopefully never have to see.

10 Yeti Crab


AP Images

Besides just looking strange, these crabs are exposed to some pretty extreme environments. Discovered in 2010, the yeti crab (Kiwa hirsuta) lives in thermal vents near Antarctica that reach temperatures of up to 720 °F (380 °C). Their white coloring and strange hair patterns are thought to be adaptations to these extreme environments. The thermal vents, while ridiculously hot inside, are surrounded by freezing waters. This forces all the yeti crabs to cram themselves into a small area. (One marine biologist found 600 of these crabs in one vent!) Females, however, must venture into the dangerously cold waters to brood, as the thermal vents are too high in sulfur content for the crabs’ eggs to survive. The mother yeti crab rarely survives the cold water, usually dying of starvation after her children hatch. As for those hairy arms, they are a garden of sorts, growing bacteria that the crab then feeds on.

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8 Red-Lipped Batfish


© Stephen Frink/WaterHouse

Red-lipped batfish (Ogcocephalus darwini) are by no means dangerous, but they are clearly a product of an evolutionary nightmare. This aptly named sea creature is found on ocean floors 3–76 meters deep and is known best for its bright red lips and the difficulty it has when swimming. Yes, you read that right—a fish that has difficulty swimming. Its fins serve as “legs,” of sorts, on which the fish walks across the ocean floor. This striking red-lipped femme fatale of a fish is actually most likely a male—those red lips are thought to attract mates. I guess everyone has a type.

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6 Blobfish


NOAA

If you haven’t had nightmares about this guy already, you definitely will now. Named the “World’s Ugliest Animal” of 2013, the blobfish (Psychrolutes marcidus) has made quite a splash (or maybe a flop) in the scientific and pop-cultural communities since its discovery in 2003. The blobfish is a gelatinous mass that floats above the ocean floor at depths of 600–1,200 meters. They have bones, but, because of the intense pressure they are exposed to at such depths, the bones are very soft and malleable. Since blobfish lack any substantial muscle, they feed only on crustaceans and other edible materials that happen to swim in front of their strange, strange mouths. Although these guys are absolutely ghastly looking on land and in observatories, their low-density flesh has led scientists to the understanding that they aren’t as, well, “blobby” when deep underwater. Their amorphous tendencies may fascinate scientists, but to laypeople the blobfish is just unsettling. Talk about a face only a mother could love.

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4 Philippine Tarsier


© iNNOCENt/Fotolia

Philippine tarsiers (Carlito syrichta), or really just tarsiers in general, are some of the strangest looking extant mammals on Earth. With eyes that take up half of their head, tarsiers grow only to be the size of a human fist. Their heads can rotate 180 degrees—an evolutionary trait that surfaced in response to the fixation of their eyes in their head. They have powerful hind legs that allow them to jump up to three feet at a time. As suggested by the size of their optics, they have fantastic night vision—which at times results in their pupils covering the entirety of their eyes. There have been problems involving these fellows being illegally sold as pets. There’s a market for everything—even scary-looking mini-mammals.

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2 Gavial


© Gerry Ellis Nature Photography

These crocodiles may appear to be just funny-looking cousins of the terrifying crocs we are more familiar with. However, their disproportionately long jaws are lined with 110 razor-sharp teeth. That’s 30 more than the typical crocodile, and their teeth are much sharper. Gavials (Gavialis gangeticus) can grow to be 20 feet long and can weigh up to 350 pounds. They are found in India and Nepal, specifically in major northern river systems. Males exhibit a sexually dimorphic trait atop the end of their snout called a gahra (after a type of Indian pottery), from which the crocodile gets its name. These massive creatures don’t attack humans but will feed on corpses set afloat during funeral ceremonies.

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