It's got eight legs.
It looks like a lobster.
And if you get too close,
you'll probably notice the smell of vinegar.
Oh. I just got sprayed.
Ah. I smell it.
Don't run just yet though.
There's more to these creatures
than you might think.
Feast your eyes on the vinegaroon, aka
Let me clear a few things up.
A vinegaroon is not a lobster.
But it's closely related to scorpions
and is part of the arachnid class.
If you look closer, it doesn't have a stinger like a scorpion.
Instead, it has a whiptail.
And its unusual tail
can spray acid to help defend itself.
That's pretty cool.
And you may have guessed what vinegaroons
spray from their tails.
There's a hint in their name.
It tastes great on fries.
If you're Canadian or British.
Yep, it's vinegar.
Yummy.
Vinegaroons can spray the liquid up
to 61 cm (2 ft) to ward
off predators like armadillos and raccoons.
The acid is produced and stored in the pygidial glands,
which are between the abdomen and tail.
The glands are made of special cells
to protect the vinegaroon from its own acid.
Smart move.
One thing that we don't fully understand
is how it shoots the liquid out of its tail.
One theory suggests that vinegaroons keep the liquid
under pressure to eject it far and fast.
But the actual mechanism that explains this is still a mystery.
But this slightly stinky tactic
isn't how the vinegaroon hunts.
As an arachnid, it's got eight legs.
But they only use six of them for walking.
It uses the front pair for feeling around in the dark
since they have poor eyesight.
These legs also help detect prey
by sensing vibrations from any movement nearby.
Once they detect something edible,
vinegaroons use extended
mouthparts called pedipalps
to catch and hold their prey.
They like to munch on scorpions,
cockroaches and millipedes.
And they sometimes feed on small lizards.
The breakfast of champions.
But should you be scared of a vinegaroon?
Even though they have lobster-like pincers
that can grab you,
and they can shoot their acid spray,
it’s unlikely they would get aggressive
unless you provoke them.
So don't politics with it.
But since their acid is mostly vinegar,
you shouldn't have too many problems if you get sprayed.
Just have some fries at hand.
And you wouldn't want to disturb them,
as they are so important in the ecosystem.
They are both prey and predators,
so they decrease the number of pests
in tropical environments
and drier areas.
Unfortunately, we have inadvertently
harmed vinegaroons
in our search for insect repellent.
Azadirachtin, which comes from the neem tree,
is great at repelling mosquitoes without affecting
bees and spiders.
But these arachnids aren't so lucky.
The insecticide causes underdeveloped pedipalps,
makes it harder to molt,
and causes premature deaths in vinegaroons.
And since we've been talking about
creatures of the eight-legged variety,
why not check out our World's Biggest Spider episode?
They spray vinegar as a defense,
and have pincer-like pedipalps.
That's what vinegaroons do.
And that's what makes them
Crazy Creatures.