SAY AHHH

EVERY LIVING THING HAS TO EAT SOMEHOW... WHATEVER TYPE OF MOUTH IT MIGHT HAVE. AND THERE ARE SOME TRULY BIZARRE MOUTHS IN THE ANIMAL KINGDOM. SOME OF THE MOST EXTRAORDINARY EXAMPLES ARE ENOUGH TO LEAVE YOU SLACK-JAWED

- DR BRITTNEY G BOROWIEC

CAT GOT YOUR TONGUE?

PENGUIN

Penguins are agile predators underwater, zipping around like torpedoes as they chase down fish and squid. But how do they keep their prey from squirming out of their grasp? The answer lies in what the birds already have in their mouths.

A penguin's mouth and tongue are covered in hard, backward-pointing spines called papillae. It's the same feature that makes a cat's tongue feel like sandpaper. But you wouldn't want a penguin to lick you - the spines aren't just large, they're also sharp (a lick from one of these would easily make you bleed). The spines dig into slippery prey and help move it down the bird's throat.

A penguin's tongue is also very muscular, so is probably used to push and manipulate the food in their mouths, like humans. Unlike us, however, penguins can't taste the fish they eat, as they don't have the genes to register sweet, bitter or savoury (umani) flavours. Scientists think that penguins lost their sense of taste because they don't use it: not only do they swallow their food whole, but the proteins needed to send taste signals to the brain malfunction at cold temperatures.

RAPID INFLATION

GULPER EEL

Food is scarce in the deep ocean, so animals living down there have to make every meal count. Few animals take this as seriously as the gulper eel, which is also known as the pelican eel as it shares a similar characteristic with the bird.

The gulper eel has a huge, loose-hinged mouth that's about a quarter of the length of its body. The mouth is paper-thin, fragile and unwieldy, so the eel tucks it away when it's not feeding.