Arcane Animals Trivia Quiz

Answer: The new species was identified from a photo posted on Flickr.

Hock Ping Guek, a Malaysian photographer, took a picture of an unusual green lacewing with black markings on its wings, and posted the picture on Flickr, where a California entomologist named Shaun Winterton recognised that it was possibly a new species.

A year later a live specimen was collected, and sent to Steven J. Brooks at the Natural History Museum in London, who confirmed that it was indeed a new species. The three men collaborated on the report that announced its discovery.

Answer: Democratic Republic of Congo

The photo used shows the lesula's eyes, but not its spectacular blue buttocks and testicles. Nor is the racket it creates every morning at dawn apparent from a mere photo. Like all old world monkeys (found in Africa and Asia), its tail is not prehensile, as are those of New World monkeys (found in Central and South America).

The specimen discovered in 2007 was being held in captivity, but more have been sighted roaming in the small region of the Lomami Basin between the Lomami and Tshuapa rivers.

The establishment of a national park to assist in its preservation has been proposed, as its limited range makes it especially vulnerable.

Answer: Frog

This Papua New Guinean frog was discovered in 2009, but only formally described in 2012. An adult is about 7.7 mm (less than a third of an inch) in length, making it a whole 0.2 mm shorter than the previous smallest vertebrate, an Indonesian fish. The species was named for the village near which it was found.

They live on land, and their young are not tadpoles, but are small versions of the adult. The frogs conceal themselves in leaf litter on the ground in the tropical forest, and their mating calls are high-pitched, sounding more like insects than the traditional frog.

Answer: Under the ice of Antarctica's Ross Ice Shelf

The Antarctic Geological Drilling Program (ANDRILL) drilled holes in the Ross Ice Shelf in 2010, and sent an undersea robot down for a test run, only to discover a species of sea anemone that lived down there, totally unsuspected until that moment. These anemones are less than two cm in length when contracted, but can extend to about four times that size when they relax.

They have eight long tentacles on the inside, and between twelve and sixteen shorter ones on their outer ring. There is still a lot to learn about these unusual animals - how they attach themselves to the ice, how they survive in the icy waters without freezing, how they reproduce, and exactly what they eat, among other mysteries.

As of 2016, they have not been found anywhere else on the planet.

Answer: Raccoons, Procyonidae

Formally called Bassaricyon neblina, the olinguito lives in the cloud forests of the Andes mountainsides in Colombia and Ecuador. Its species name is the Spanish word for fog, referring to the region where it is found. They had been known locally for many years, but were not identified as being a distinct species from the other olingos. Possibly the fact that breeding attempts had been unsuccessful might have been a pointer! Olinguitos are the smallest members of the genus, and indeed of the entire procyonid family.

The average weight of an adult is around 900g (2 lb), its body length is approximately 355 mm (14 in) and its tail length between 335 and 424 mm (13-17 in). They live at altitudes between 1500 and 2750 m, making them the highest-living member of their genus.

Their large eyes, small ears and long fur make them look cute and fuzzy, but they are not inclined to cuddles.

Answer: In the Lukina jam-Trojama cave system

Lukina jam is the deepest cave in Croatia, and the 14th deepest cave in the world. As well as being the home of Zospeum tholussum, it hosts the largest known colony of Erpobdella mestrovi, a subterranean leech originally discovered there, which was not only a new species, but a new genus and family.

But right now we are interested in the snail. They are very small - their shell is less than 2mm (0.08 in) high, and about half that in width. It is translucent, with five to six whorls in their shell spiral, the second of which has a distinctive dome shape. Living so far underground (they were discovered at depths between 740 and 1400 metres (2400 - 4500 ft) below the surface during a 2012 caving expedition) in total darkness, they have no use for eyes - which is just as well, as they do not have any!

Answer: Fairy wasps

Tinkerbella nana is the only known species of its genus, whose name derives from the fairy Tinkerbelle in the 1904 J. M. Barrie play 'Peter and Wendy' (commonly called 'Peter Pan'). It's not surprising they remained undiscovered so long - they are only 250 microns long. I won't bother changing that to inches, suffice it to say that it is about twice the width of an average human hair.

They are no longer ranked as the smallest flying insect - that honor has been taken by another wasp that is only 170 microns long. Still, they are pretty small! They were first collected by running a fine-meshed net through the vegetation of the ground of a tropical forest in Costa Rica, and sorting through everything that had been collected back in the lab, using a microscope.

Answer: They are born as live tadpoles after internal fertilization.

Every other known frog species which gives birth to live young (as opposed to having young which develop in eggs that have been externally fertilised) gives birth to froglets. The specific name larvaepartus comes from larvae (a term referring to a juvenile form of an animal which is distinctly different in form from the adult, and which undergoes metamorphosis during development) and the Latin word 'partus', meaning birth. Females produce about 100 eggs at a time, which develop and hatch inside the oviducts, where the tadpoles remain until the run out of nutrients, and emerge into the world to fend for themselves.

Answer: Bone-house wasp

An ossuary is another term for a bone-house, a place where the remains of the dead are stored. The dead ants are placed in a vestibule, a chamber that blocks off the entrance to the part of the nest where the larva are developing. It is thought that the scent of the dead ants masks the scent of the larvae, providing protection from predators.

At the time when this defensive nesting behavior was reported, it was the only known species (of any sort of animal, not just wasps) to utilise it.

Answer: Ruby seadragon

The ruby seadragon sample was originally thought to be either a common seadragon or a leafy seadragon, but when Josefin Stiller ran a genetic analysis (as part of a research project into genetic diversity in the genus, he discovered that it was very different. A search of Australian museums revealed that three other specimens had been collected, but not identified as being a new species, one as early as 1919.

An expedition in April of 2016, including Josefin Stiller and Mary (Dewy) White (a long-time researcher into seadragons in whose honor the new species was named) took photographs of several ruby seadragons in the waters of the Recherche Archipelago, east of Middle Island.