What Is Animal Camouflage?

What Is Animal Camouflage? — page 1 — Many animals can hide in plain sight They do this using camouﬂage Camouﬂage is coloring or patterns that help disguise an animal This is useful to animals in many ways and there are many different types of camouﬂage Most types help animals blend into their habitats This allows animals to hide or WHAT IS CAMOUFLAGE Habitats are places where plants or animals normally live or grow VOCABULARY This walking stick is hard to see because it looks like part of the branch 4

What Is Animal Camouflage? — page 2 — defend themselves from animals that might eat them The walking stick for instance is an insect that looks a lot like a long stick or a twig It blends so well into its surroundings that hungry animals go right past it But camouﬂage also helps some animals sneak up on their next meal Big cats have patterned coats that help them to hide from their prey A lion’s light-colored coat blends in perfectly with dry grasslands The pattern of spots on this African leopard’s coat helps it to stay hidden 5

What Is Animal Camouflage? — page 3 — It is hard to spot the tawny frogmouth These birds have brown and black feathers that help them to blend into the trees where they live They perch on a tree branch close their yellow eyes and tilt their heads back They sometimes wait in the tree motionless for unsuspecting prey This form of animal camouﬂage is background matching Beneath the ocean’s surface are rocks and coral reefs Among them you may ﬁnd the most venomous ﬁsh on earth the stoneﬁsh Stoneﬁsh blend in MATCHING COLORS If a predator comes near the tawny frogmouth it stiffens its body like a branch 6

What Is Animal Camouflage? — page 4 — almost exactly with their surroundings in both texture and color These patient creatures wait for shrimp or small ﬁsh to swim by Then they open their mouths for a quick meal Their 13 sharp spines and venomous sacs make sure that other animals don’t eat them How does camouflage help tawny frogmouths and stonefish to be great hunters THINK ABOUT IT This pair of stoneﬁsh blend into the coral reefs in the waters of northern Australia 7

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