True Blue Trivia Quiz

Answer: Portuguese man o' war

Physalia physalis, known as a bluebottle Down Under and as a Portuguese man o' war elsewhere in the Pacific (and in the Indian and North Atlantic Oceans), is not really a jellyfish despite its translucent top and trailing, venomous tentacles. It is, in fact, a colonial organism - that is, it's made up of a huge number of individuals called zooids, which are so highly specialized that they can only survive together. Creatures like the bluebottle give rise to all sorts of fun biological questions - which is the true individual, a zooid or the zooid colony?

The zooids don't specialize for brainpower, so the bluebottle does not actually concern itself with this question. Instead, it floats through the water, carried by the currents and buoyed up by its "sail" - the translucent bladder at the top, filled with carbon monoxide and other gases. As the tentacles drag through the water, their venom paralyzes small fish and shellfish for supper. The venom isn't strong enough to knock a human being unconscious, but it will leave very painful welts and may induce a dangerous allergic reaction. Be careful on the beach: a dead bluebottle still stings!

Answer: The edges of rivers, lakes and ponds

Damselflies can usually be spotted flitting among aquatic plants in shallow or still regions. These plants are not only fruitful hunting grounds, but also comfortable spots for egg-laying! As is usually the case in the animal world, the brightest blues are typically found on males, with the females sporting colors that are far more drab.

You can tell a damselfly from a dragonfly by watching it at rest - perched on a frond, let's say. The dragonfly rests with its wings spread out; a damselfly prefers to hold its wings alongside the length of its body.

Answer: Iridescence from optical interference on wing scales

"Morpho," from the Greek for "change," was also an epithet for Aphrodite in ancient times. The reference to the goddess of love and beauty is clearly appropriate for this species. Their color comes from iridescence: their wings are covered in tiny ridged scales, and the blue arises from the play of the light on those ridges. The hue changes slightly depending on your angle of view, making the name still more apt.

This picture shows a Morpho peleides, also known as the common morpho. Its wingspan is quite large, ranging from seven to 20 cm (3 - 8 in). Like other blue morphos, it's farmed commercially so that the wings can be harvested for the decorative arts (inlaid wood, for example). It loves fruit juice, especially from rotten fruits (mmm!). Among other things, the bright blue color marks the butterfly as poisonous - toxins are no good if the predator doesn't know to stay away!

Answer: Bluefin tuna

Thunnus thynnus is one of a few species of bluefin tuna, all in the same genus; this one, which spawns in the Mediterranean and Caribbean Seas, is also known as the Atlantic bluefin tuna or the giant bluefin tuna. Other bluefins roam the Pacific and Southern Oceans. Once called a "tunny," T. thynnus can reach an astounding 450 kg (nearly 1000 pounds!), although weights about half that number are more common. Their average adult length is in excess of two meters or six and a half feet, all grown on a diet of small squid, crustaceans and fish.

Like many marine creatures, the bluefin tuna is countershaded, with a dark-colored back and a light-colored belly. This serves as a kind of camouflage. Fish looking up towards the sunlit surface see something light in color; fish looking down toward the depths see something dark. This strategy doesn't work very well against modern commercial fishing, however, and populations began dropping catastrophically in the latter half of the twentieth century. In 2011, the fish was classified as "endangered" on the International Union for Conservation of Nature's Red List.

Answer: Blue poison dart frog

There are a couple of different South American genera of frog that use poison skin glands to ward off predators. If a carnivore comes along and takes a bite of an okopipi, it will find itself paralyzed - and may even die from the poison, if it isn't killed by another predator while incapacitated. The okopipi's distinctive skin coloring serves as a memory aid, warning predators that this is one little frog they don't want a piece of. The name "poison dart frog" reflects the frog's use to humans: several indigenous peoples of South America have harvested these poisons to envenom the tips of arrows or blowdarts.

Despite its visual and chemical wallop, the okopipi is quite small, growing up to 4.5 cm (1.75 in) in length with a weight of 8 grams (0.3 oz). It feasts on insects, with the occasional spider as a treat.

Answer: It's a male during breeding season.

For most of the year, a male agama is a nondescript brown in color - but when the mating season rolls around, he harnesses the rainbow to win love. His head and perhaps his upper body become a bright, warm color, somewhere from orange to pink; the rest of his body becomes a deep blue or purple. Between that and the pushups, what lizard could resist his affections?

After a successful mating, the female (whose markings are also colorful, but much duller) will lay somewhere around half a dozen eggs; at this point, the male has already lost interest in parenting. Eating mostly insects, supplemented with plants and some unlucky smaller reptiles, the rainbow agama inhabits a huge range of sub-Saharan Africa, reaching as far north as Mauritania and Sudan and as far south as Angola. The exact species classifications in the genus are in flux, due to DNA analysis; some agamas are not as closely related as previously thought!

Answer: Insects and fruits

Bluebird beaks are not well suited for breaking into seeds, so bluebirds are not often found in backyard bird feeders - even though their range, covering much of North America among three species, puts plenty of backyards into range! Beetle grubs, or mealworms, are a particular favorite, and some birdwatchers load them into their birdfeeders as bluebird lures. Fruits and berries get them by in the winter.

The pictured bluebird is a Sialia sialis, an eastern bluebird; the western bluebird (Sialia Mexicana) and the mountain bluebird (Sialia currucoides), which is entirely blue and white, are also common. Bluebirds are generally fairly small, with a maximum length of about 20 cm (8 in) depending on the species.

Answer: South America

Ara ararauna prefers the tropical forests of northern South America, where it feasts on fruits, nuts, and seeds. (That beak makes a great nutcracker!) The species was once also native to Trinidad, but died out there due to hunting and habitat loss.

These birds are quite big for macaws, with lengths up to 86 cm (34 in) and weights up to 1.5 kg (3.3 lb). They're also smart, with the ability to learn some human words, and can develop affectionate and trusting relationships with human owners. They do make quite a lot of noise, though - they're definitely not suited for apartment life!

Answer: Mandrill

Mandrillus sphinx lives in tropical rainforests, as well as in transitional regions between savannah and forest. Only four countries have significant mandrill populations: Cameroon, Congo, Equatorial Guinea, and Gabon. The males, which are also the most brightly colored, weigh in at up to 50 kg (115 lb) and are the heaviest monkeys known; female mandrills only reach about half the size of the males.

Both sexes are good at eating their vegetables - or, at least, fruit, bark and mushrooms. Insects, snails, spiders, and eggs are also favorite mandrill treats, and small birds and mammals when they can get them. Female mandrills live in groups with their young; male mandrills turn up for romance in summer and fall. Interestingly, a male's body is marked by his position in mandrill society: dominant males sport brighter reds, brighter blues, and a different hormone mix.

Answer: Tiny crustaceans one or two cm (less than an inch) long

The blue whale, Balaenoptera musculus, has baleen in its mouth instead of teeth. Like other baleen whales, it feeds by opening its mouth wide, to fill with water and all the little creatures in that volume. It then uses the baleen as a strainer: water drains out, but its prey are trapped inside. Blue whales get most of their nutrition from tiny shrimp-like creatures called krill, but they will occasionally pick up some small fish or squid as an accidental bonus.

A blue whale is typically more of a gray-blue along its back, with a paler belly. Whaling activity in the 19th and 20th centuries reduced this once-abundant whale to endangered status. Blue whales still roam all the oceans of the world except the Arctic, but their population is a tiny fraction of what it was three hundred years ago.