FRASS FLiCKeRS

Muse, Jan 2004

The silver-spotted skipper caterpillar shoots its poo (technically called frass) through a hatch on its backside. It's pretty good at shooting, flinging the frass as far as 153 centimeters. But why does it fling frass in the first place? No, it's not trying to stay healthy by staying clean. Caterpillars in small boxes that contained their waste lived to old age.

Instead it seems the smell of the frass attracts predators that eat the untidier caterpillars. So sensible silver-spotted skippers flick frass fast.