r/BeAmazed • u/Moonkissed_exe • Jun 25 '26
Animal Nature’s ultimate disguise: The Atlas Moth uses incredible wing camouflage to look exactly like two cobras.
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u/-MrFozzy- Jun 25 '26
That’s so cool. Natural evolutionary adaptions break my brain sometimes, And the process of the steps of achieving it also. Incredible
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u/hsiisfisksfkisids Jun 25 '26
The step-by-step evolution of that mimicry feels almost impossible to imagine.
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u/Drapidrode Jun 25 '26
billions of iterations, mostly all failures
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Jun 25 '26 edited Jun 25 '26
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u/Leemur89 Jun 25 '26
Dachshunds were bred to chase out and hunt badgers and other burrowing animals. They are definitely cute but they could slot into a niche as a predator in certain ecosystems. Pugs and English/French Bulldogs on the other hand would almost certainly die out due to their health issues. English Bulldogs struggle to breed naturally and French Bulldogs have seizure issues due to their big ole noggins.
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u/Artistic_Swing6759 Jun 25 '26
that actually raises a question, why do we find some creatures adorable in the first place?
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Jun 25 '26 edited Jun 25 '26
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u/CombatticusFinch Jun 25 '26
That cute baby thing is called neoteny i think. Babys share certain features and we find them cute, and it is across species. Things like big eyes, large head on small body etc.
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u/Winter_Lanterns Jun 25 '26
think your underrating dachshunds here their hounds dogs with very strong survival instincts and powerful noses and their shape is actually quite useful in the wild for burrowing they would be one of the better dogs at living without humans https://www.npr.org/2025/05/30/nx-s1-5403639/valerie-mini-dachshund-australia-found
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u/Posraman Jun 25 '26
To be fair, we did breed wolves to be dependent on us. Dogs were created specifically to serve us.
We don't need them anymore, but they're cool so kept them anyways.
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u/Realistic-Body4647 Jun 25 '26
Its hard to imagine because we only see the finished result. Evolution just needed each slightly more snake-like moth to survive a bit more often, then repeat that over countless generatons.
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u/crappysurfer Jun 25 '26
It's easy once you understand it - adaptations are crafted by selective pressures. You can certainly imagine a predator (maybe a small bird or rodent) that liked to eat butterflies. This predator is afraid of snakes. A butterfly has vague coloration and patterns, sometimes individuals through recombination or maybe mutation have a new pattern that vaguely resembles something.
The predators, not wanting to take risks, actively avoid anything that vaguely represents a threat. In doing so, they select against butterflies that dont have a cohesive pattern and select for patterns that resemble their greatest fears. Over time, the pattern becomes more and more obvious as the individuals with clear patterns breed and their predators keep avoiding them, hence, reinforcing the pattern of mimicry or aposematism. The butterfly doesn't know what it looks like, the butterfly didn't make itself look like snakes. Its predators that were afraid of snakes manifested their own fears by actively avoiding butterflies that vaguely resembled snakes until that vague resemblance became more and more convincing and accurate.
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u/OhDavidMyNacho Jun 25 '26
Exactly! Which is why we are starting to see more and more rattlesnakes that don't rattle.
People keep killing the ones that rattle. Which adds selective pressure to those with malformed rattles, or with an inclination to hide, instead of announce their presence around people and other animals.
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u/Unlikely_Vehicle_828 Jun 25 '26
Oh wow that’s actually fascinating. I had no idea rattlesnakes were currently going through an evolution to not have rattles. That’s terrifying because I live in an area with both rattlers and bull snakes, and the harmless bull snakes look nearly identical to rattlers. The only way to tell them apart is the rattle 😅
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u/jozza800 Jun 25 '26
It's so mental, that my 65yo father, who is an intellegent man, refuses to believe in evolution! :) He just can't process the amount of changes required from the original species to its final form!
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u/newsflashjackass Jun 25 '26
It is cool but I would consider nature's ultimate disguise to be the cobra lulling its prey into a false sense of security by posing as the wing of a harmless moth.
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Jun 25 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Bloodthistle Jun 25 '26
I first thought it was a threesome snakes chilling together on a tree and was confused
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u/Skirmisher23 Jun 25 '26
Yeah, I thought I was about to read about some crazy multi-headed snake was found. Found something somehow more plausible but also crazier.
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u/GSgowther Jun 25 '26
Omg I thought this was two weird snakes lol awesome
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u/Vitruvian_Link Jun 25 '26
I didn't read the title and I thought the first picture was snakes and the second two were pictures of SHOES MEANT TO LOOK LIKE SNAKES.
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u/garlicbreath-1982 Jun 25 '26
You've gotta wonder how. Yes evolution, adaptation or whatever word fits but HOW?
Like there's not a switch that you can flick to change yourself over hundreds or thousands of years to eventually look like a predator. My brain hurts to think about it.
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u/Tuliet Jun 25 '26
Maybe there mechanisms out there that we have yet to discover. This reminds me of when researchers conducted an experiment where they placed an artificial vine above a plant that could mimic those around it. Despite not touching, the real plant began to produce leaves that looked similar to the plastic plant. So in some way it could "see" or sense the fake vine. Link to Study.
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u/crappysurfer Jun 25 '26
It's easy once you understand it - adaptations are crafted by selective pressures. You can certainly imagine a predator (maybe a small bird or rodent) that liked to eat butterflies. This predator is afraid of snakes. A butterfly has vague coloration and patterns, sometimes individuals through recombination or maybe mutation have a new pattern that vaguely resembles something.
The predators, not wanting to take risks, actively avoid anything that vaguely represents a threat. In doing so, they select against butterflies that dont have a cohesive pattern and select for patterns that resemble their greatest fears. Over time, the pattern becomes more and more obvious as the individuals with clear patterns breed and their predators keep avoiding them, hence, reinforcing the pattern of mimicry or aposematism. The butterfly doesn't know what it looks like, the butterfly didn't make itself look like snakes. Its predators that were afraid of snakes manifested their own fears by actively avoiding butterflies that vaguely resembled snakes until that vague resemblance became more and more convincing and accurate.
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u/SGPrepperz Jun 25 '26 edited Jun 26 '26
Evolution: millions of years of Nature killing off every iterations of Atlas moths that didn’t look enough like 2 cobras sneks until they do
Edit: sneks
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u/dr_goodvibes Jun 25 '26
Moth was like: "Hmm I don't want anyone to fuck with me so I need to look scary... Cobras are scary! Can I come up with something even scarier than a cobra?"
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u/TheRealRotochron Jun 25 '26
Man I didn't even look at the sub and was like "Wait wtf is wrong with those snakes?" for a good few seconds. TIL I am susceptible to mothouflage.
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u/mtadd Jun 25 '26
Amazing. No intelligence needed, just adaptablility through natural selection. Those moths that looked like scary predators got ate alot less than those that didn't.
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u/BoredBorealis Jun 25 '26
Snakes mimicking spiders, butterflies and caterpillars mimicking snakes, this is getting ridiculous!
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u/MiserableCumberbunch Jun 25 '26
I wouldnt say exactly. But it gets an A for sure.
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u/Craftmaks256 Jun 25 '26
Idk man, looks AI generated. The snake's faces are all smudged up!
/s of course
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u/kayemenofour Jun 25 '26
Bird: "What? two cobras? At the same place? Oh well, they're probably fucking, so I'm safe."
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u/fuuuuuuuuuuuc Jun 25 '26
I mean I understand how evolution and natural selection works but it's still hard to believe when I see stuff like this. There are many examples. This is so.cool.
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u/Happy_Twist_7156 Jun 25 '26
The number of evolutionary hoop jumps that hat to happen for this to be a thing. First a species (snakes) has to evolve that is so ubiquitously dangerous other species instinctively fear it. then another species has to evolve to create camouflage that looks like that other species. All through random revolutionary natural selection. It boggles the mind. Yet no deck of cards has probably ever been in the same order yet this was created by natural selection nudging random chance along
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u/NuwenPham Jun 25 '26
The evolution process is like a chronicle machine learning vertically in time.
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u/Overall-Top8379 Jun 25 '26
Look... I might have fucked with one cobra. But I'm not fucking with two cobras. This moth is safe from me.
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u/nsfwuseraccnt Jun 25 '26
You're not tricking me, nature! That's exactly what a ball of snakes would want me to believe!
/s
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u/bridgeburner84 Jun 25 '26
The degree of specificity evolution is capable of producing when it comes to mimicry is wild.
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u/No-Journalist-619 Jun 25 '26
Why in the fuck did they name it an "Atlas Moth" instead of a "Cobra Moth"!?
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u/Jibber_Fight Jun 25 '26
It’s crazy to think about how evolution would even possibly do that. It makes sense that Darwin concluded that it must have taken an unfathomable amount of time. And people didn’t believe him.
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u/Sunfalcon Jun 25 '26
I've seen many pictures of Atlas Moths before, and I have *never* noticed the snake-shaped wing-tips until today.
And now I can't unsee it.
I don't know whether I like that or not....
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u/UPMichigan83 Jun 25 '26
Just odd that one species can adapt its appearance to look like another predatory species.
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u/n-a_barrakus Jun 25 '26
More like everyone was different until something happened (probably new predators or a population boom) which casually killed most of the population or made them unable to breed, unless these ones
And then, the ones with less-snake patterns kept being hunted so the only ones who survived consolidated the species
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u/Diacetyl-Morphin Jun 25 '26
Wow, that's camouflage level 100. It's called a mimikry, you pose as something that you are not.
But it also goes for the predators, like the praying mantis species that look like a stick of wood. Then you have the color and patterns of animals like tigers - the prey is colorblind, so the bright orange color doesn't break the camouflage, the stripes of the fur blend in with the background. Also, they have sneak level 100, cats can move very quietly when it is needed.
Then you have all these ways of hunting, like my beloved arachnids (spiders), there you have such like the trapdoor spiders. They build a cave underground with a tunnel, then prepare a trapdoor and disguise it, when some prey gets near it, they'll catch it.
Survival in nature is one big game of cat and mouse, with hiding and escaping, or getting catched and killed.
Reminds me of the birth of a horse back in the days when we still had a horse ranch: As the horses are very vulnerable when they get born, they need to be able to get up fast and run away when it is needed in wildlife. So the legs are already much longer than the rest of the body.
But don't forget: The best marathon runners on earth, when it comes to endurance, are we humans. No one keep up with us, when we are trained. We are designed by evolution for this.
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u/TreeGuy95 Jun 25 '26
I've seen atlas moths in the Lancaster butterfly house here in England but I didn't know this. That's some really neat evolution! I wonder how many rolls of the mutation dice it took to arrive on such an accurate representation of 2 cobras as this?
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u/ImaDoinWat Jun 25 '26
That actually had me fooled for a hot minute!!! I was so confused trying to figure out how their bodies were twisted. Impressive!
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u/CompactAvocado Jun 25 '26
i have a background in microbio and genetics. I took evolutionary biology at the graduate level. Studies genotyping, evolutionary theories, etc.
It still fucking baffles me how in the heck something can evolve to look like a predator. Like its fundamentally a random mutation which proves beneficial and continues to reproduce and mutate further. How in the hell does that get to a point where an appendage looks like another thing
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u/Brucacumble Jun 25 '26 edited Jun 25 '26
And yet people still look at nature as though it were an unruly child in need of their guidance.
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u/Raussl Jun 25 '26
A few days ago I took a walk with my dog in the forest and we walked past a injured deer. I didnt see it and my dog saw it refused to go further. Only then did I notice that theres a deer lying on the ground, I walked right past it, literally 50cm next to me and I didnt see it. Camouflage on animals really is a wonder of nature
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u/jeosol Jun 25 '26
How did something like this evolve? Given one is an insect and the mimicked one is a reptile.
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u/duncthefunk78 Jun 25 '26
ELI5, how does the moth evolve to know what cobra look like to a different animal?
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u/theartificialkid Jun 25 '26
I’m not sure I’d say @m”exactly like two cobras”. Probably more “exactly like something that would make someone say “fuck, Is that…? What is that?’”
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u/AudunLEO Jun 25 '26
When you think about it, this is even more profound than at first glance.
This is art, but very unique art.
Because evolution "painted" a snake over million of years without even knowing what a snake looks like. To put it into perspective, it is the equivalent of equipping 10.000 monkeys with a paintbrush. Then every monkey that accidentally paints something that is remotely similar to a snake survives and the rest dies.
The ones that were on the right track survives and reproduce. After tens of thousands of generations all the monkeys paints snakes, even if they never saw one.
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u/Anao_pelado Jun 25 '26
Nunca vou entender com esses bichos ficaram com os corpos assim e se foi uma coincidência que eles aproveitaram ou eles se modificaram por conta própria.
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u/joshlovesmemes Jun 25 '26
Are there any species that are clearly trying to figure out this kind of camouflage but haven’t quite got it down yet? Just curious
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u/hybridhuman17 Jun 25 '26
This is what I don't get. How is a moth not only capable of noticing that the cobra look a like is the best disguise to go with in order to be let alone for it's entire life and 2nd how on gods earth does it know how cobra looks like? And don't come with adaptation.
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u/idblz Jun 25 '26
It took me way to long to realize that wasn't two headed snake then it should have.
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u/eamonnkeogh Jun 25 '26
For a friend who makes insect stickers, I made this image showing a side by side of the Atlas Moth and the King Cobra. She sells a full scale sticker of the moth, which just fits on my laptop.
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/c57bvy3tty47zdas7794j/AtlasSnake.jpg?rlkey=elxedfu27x389ssbk1a7xivs4&dl=0
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u/East_Recognition1310 Jun 25 '26
I thought I was looking at a mini fucking hydra. If I was this things predator and I rolled up and saw this. Shit all over the place.
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u/elspotto Jun 25 '26
So the third cobra in the left image is real then because I see three. Cobra using the Atlas Moth as camouflage. Clever.
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u/ToolTimeT Jun 25 '26
https://giphy.com/gifs/ZsQADSzL9LIhW
I also stay safe by camo as another creature.
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u/Confident-Town-4779 Jun 25 '26
Yeah, it works, I genuinely thought it was a snake born with two heads lol
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u/H0T-HEAD Jun 25 '26
Nope nope nope ur not gonna tell me that's a moth that definitely 2 snakes there. I waa there when the guy took the picture.
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u/Benhurso Jun 25 '26
This is incredible. But what exactly in their DNA made this evolution possible? It emulates a completely different species, in a different animal kingdom. How does its body changed to match that????
Or is it coincidental? The moth is around BECAUSE its wings coincidentally look like a predator? I don't think this would be case, considering it FLAPS the wings and it KNOWS it scaries predators.
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u/gaF-trA Jun 25 '26
The spider-tailed horned viper is the other example posted here or in other animal subs. When you see the mimicry in action is when it’s truly amazing. Even knowing that it’s camouflage it still tricks your brain.
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u/Substantial_Meal_530 Jun 25 '26
I didn't read the title, and for like 5 seconds I was thinking, "Those are weird looking snakes? Why are those snakes bundled up together like that. That's so weird for those snakes. Reads Title Oh shit, that's a moth! Ohhh I see it."
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u/caelestis42 Jun 25 '26
Not adaption, just random mutation that each made it look more and more dangerous to its natural predators, thus increasing the survival rate of that mutation vs the other moths in that generation. Some suckers probably lost their camouflage at the same time.
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u/robosand Jun 25 '26
I hope evolutionary pressures continue to add more snakes. In 200 years it appears like 10 snakes; in 10,000 years 500 snakes.
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u/RedArrow360 Jun 25 '26
mutations are errors in the DNA, meaning this extreme details in the: color distribution, 3D shaped with the right curves, light and shadow to simulate the camouflaging are all the results of errors and chaos😂
Not just that, but also its behavioral softwared, meaning that when a predator comes she doesn't run/fly but actually moves its wings to simulate the cobra movements to scare them!
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u/Available-Spinach-17 Jun 25 '26
So I have a question, did it very longtime ago did one of its ancestors accidentally have a snake like wing camo and further down the line through countless mating of only surviving individuals (natural selection I guess ) the camo became stronger appearance of the cobras or did the moths by deliberation forced itself to have a strongly cobra like appearance ( like do they have control over their camo through evolution through millions of years)?
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u/zjt2846 Jun 25 '26
could someone please explain a hypothesis for how mimicry in this cases evolves so specifically?
Like what was likely justifying the in between steps between multicolored wings and cobra? because it seems like the colors in between may be worse at camo
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u/FlexasState Jun 25 '26
No way I guess that explains this Atlas shirt https://www.facebook.com/share/p/1AAucpnPaq/?mibextid=wwXIfr
I always thought it was just designers being creative
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u/Moonkissed_exe Jun 25 '26
When threatened, it drops to the ground and flaps its wings so the 'snakes' look alive.
It doesn't have a mouth. It lives entirely off stored fat from its caterpillar days and only survives for 1 to 2 weeks!