Nature, being ridiculous

The blobfish's famous droopy, sagging face only happens at the surface. It lives 600–1,200 meters down, where the water pressure is up to 120 times that of sea level. Its gelatinous flesh, slightly less dense than water, is built to hang in place in that crushing pressure with almost no muscle or bone. Haul it up to the surface and the pressure drop lets its whole body collapse into the sad, melting expression that made it internet-famous.

The ocean sunfish (Mola mola) has no real tail. Instead of a tapered body, it looks like it's just a massive disc-shaped head — the tail fin is replaced by a rudder-like structure called a clavus, formed from fused fin rays. It's the heaviest bony fish in the world, regularly exceeding 1,000 kg, and it swims by flapping its dorsal and anal fins side to side like wings.

When startled, the frilled-neck lizard snaps open a huge ruff of skin around its neck, supported by long rods of cartilage connected to its jaw — instantly making its head look several times larger. If that doesn't work, it turns and sprints away on its hind legs only, tail up for balance, frill still often flared, looking exactly like a shrunken theropod dinosaur mid-chase scene.

Male blue-footed boobies court females with an exaggerated, deliberate marching dance — lifting each bright blue foot high and holding it up for a beat before setting it down, over and over, sometimes while whistling and presenting sticks. The bluer and brighter the feet, the more attractive the male — foot color comes directly from carotenoid pigments in the fish they eat, so it's an honest, real-time signal of how well-fed and healthy he currently is.

The marabou stork stands up to 1.5 meters tall with a bald, mottled pink-and-grey head, a huge dagger-like bill, and a pale pink inflatable throat sac that dangles below its neck. Its habit of standing hunched with its wings folded like a cape — often near carrion — earned it the nickname 'the undertaker bird.' It's also one of the largest flying birds alive, with a wingspan that can reach 3.7 meters, rivaling the largest vultures and condors.

The male long-wattled umbrellabird has a spiky, forward-drooping crest of feathers that flops over its bill like a mohawk, plus a long, feathered wattle hanging from its chest that can reach 35cm — nearly as long as its own body. To court females, it inflates the wattle with air and delivers a deep, resonant booming call that carries through the forest, all while displaying the crest.

Adult male proboscis monkeys grow a nose up to 10cm long that droops down past their chin, so large it sometimes has to be pushed out of the way to eat. The oversized nose acts as a resonating chamber, amplifying the male's honking alarm and territorial calls — the bigger the nose, the louder and lower the call, which females appear to find more attractive and rival males find more intimidating.

Unlike almost every other raptor, the secretary bird hunts almost entirely on foot, striding through the savanna on long crane-like legs. When it finds prey — including venomous snakes — it delivers rapid, forceful stomping kicks, striking with a force up to five times its own body weight in as little as 15 milliseconds, faster than the snake can react and strike back.

When two sarcastic fringeheads dispute territory, they don't bite or chase — they face off and both open their mouths as wide as physically possible, revealing a huge, brightly colored gape lined with fang-like teeth, sometimes wider than the fish's entire body. Whoever has the bigger mouth usually wins without a single strike landed; if the sizes are close, they may press open mouths together in an actual wrestling match to settle it.

To court a female, the male superb bird-of-paradise flares an all-black cape of feathers up and around his body until he looks like a solid, perfectly round black disc — then tilts it to reveal an iridescent blue breast shield shaped unmistakably like a smiling face. He then hops and vibrates side to side across the branch in front of the female, the glowing 'smile' bouncing with him, in one of the strangest courtship displays ever filmed.

Adult male hooded seals have an inflatable black hood on top of their head that they can pump up like a balloon when excited or threatened — and, more dramatically, they can push a bright pink-red membrane out through one nostril and inflate it into a balloon nearly the size of their own head, bouncing it while making a droning sound. Both displays are used to intimidate rival males and impress females.

Male peacock spiders court females by raising a flap-like extension of their abdomen — covered in iridescent blues, reds, and oranges — into a fan, then waving specially adapted third legs alongside it while vibrating their whole body in a rapid, precise dance. If the female isn't impressed at any point in the routine, she often eats him. Some species' dances have been compared by researchers to a tiny, extremely enthusiastic backup dancer.

The panda ant isn't an ant at all — it's a species of velvet ant, a family of wasps in which the wingless females look like unusually fuzzy, brightly patterned ants. The panda ant's black-and-white fur pattern makes it look almost like a tiny stuffed toy. That fur is a warning: females have one of the most painful stings in the insect world, powerful enough that the common name for the wider velvet ant family in North America is 'cow killer' — not because it can kill a cow, but because the sting is reportedly bad enough that it feels like it could.