This is called MΓΌllerian mimicry.
Toxic / poisonous / venomous / dangerous animals tend to look like each other. This enforces pattern recognition.
You can see this within wasps / bees. The textbook example is the Heliconius butterflies.
PC: Meyer A, PLoS Biology
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The other side of this is Batesian Mimicry.
A non harmful thing mimics a harmful thing. Basically banking on that predators have learned established patterns.
Here are a bunch of hover flies. (Syrphidae) They're all are generalized bee mimics.
PC Alvesgaspar CC by SA 3.0
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In old textbooks you'll find that we thought the Viceroy butterfly (top) was a batesian mimic (not harmful) of the monarch. However a study in the 90's showed that both the viceroy and the monarch are toxic making them mullierian mimics
Pc DRosenbach CC by SA 3.0
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Some of the most common batesian mimics are flies mimicking bees.
Here's a convincing syrphid fly.
PC: Copyright Β© 2015 Joy Markgraf
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But lots of things have mimics. Tarantula Hawks have one of the worst stings in the insect world. But it has a little katydid mimic (left) that is harmless.
PC:
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We think that butterflies have eye spots because they mimic vertebrate eyes that might otherwise be a predator to their predator. Owl Butterflies (Caligo sp.)
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Replying to
How do you get butterflies to hang off your fingers like that? Or are these dead ones?
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They're in a butterfly garden. Born and raised so they're pretty lazy and are super chill with people.
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I had no idea they had enough of a brain for that kind of conditioning to occur π€
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Yup! Bugs are totally trainable. Maybe I should do a thread on this ...
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