I’ve learned a lot recently.
But most importantly, today I learned that only 3% of modern birds have penises. I didn’t know that the cloaca is employed by both male and female birds as a means of fertilizing eggs; I thought that male birds had both a cloaca and a penis. I was wrong!
I also learned that mantis shrimp have 16 photoreceptor cells in their eyes but don’t actually use them to see color the same way that other animals make use of rods and cones which seems like a bit of a bummer to my human-centered perspective. The amount of colors that we are able to see and appreciate with only red/green/blue is pretty amazing and I can’t help but wonder what it would be like to see colors +13.
Kat White 