Ever since I read ‘Seven deadly colours’ I have been fascinated by colour presentation of the multitude of fauna that exists.
Often, the colour of an animal is not actually a pigment, but a sophisticated means of tricking the viewers brain into registering something very different to reality, a means of disguise.
Then there are species with elaborate structural colours (one of the 7 colour strategies) that have no apparent function. Like this spider (which I still need to confirm it’s identity) which has the iridescence typical of a nano lattice.
What is amazing it that there is no apparent need for elaborate colours in this species which lives in a silk cocoon under decaying wood and leaf litter.
Typically it wouldn’t see the light of day and all that I can deduce is that the natural selection process was non functional, instead a genetic trait which merely persisted because there was not predation selection against such colour.
Garden Route Trail 