#occlupanidae

[teethburglar]

Just updated my specimen board!

[fivetrench]

Every color of occlupanid I’ve found so far :33

[cosmicyeen]

OCCLUPANIDS!!!!

Occlu: to block; Pan: Bread

My collection features five "families," seven "genuses," and fifteen "species."

The identification is based off of the overall shape, but the inner mouth is what drives most family distinctions. Colors and markings are varied, but display little species boundaries and are likely for identification of groups and/or relatives.

Specimens are defaultly displayed with greater distal palp facing right, unless markings are present, which then gives the markings priority. (Ignore the one that's upside down and the one that's facing backwards, oops.)

I also ran out of room on the board for the last species, sadly.

But! nonetheless very fun to sort them. I've been gathering them from plastic bags, of which they're a parasite. A common misconception is that they parasitize the bread itself, but they actually go after the bag! There is also evidence that the bread will symbiotically benefit from an occlupanid, since they are one of the most common seals of the bread's protective membrane.

The original research into these strange creatures was prompted by assessing the suffocation risk they pose to children and animals who hope to eat the bread (a defensive symbiosis, perhaps?) but soon developed into the rich world of occlupanid research we see today.

I hope to find more genuses/species and rarer colors!

On that note, i have been isolated from other humans for too long and I'm now fully nocturnal. Check out the helpful folks at the Holotypic Occlupanid Research Group for more info!

[mostlyvoidpartiallyjims]

By the way, here it is!

I'm pretty novice, so if anyone wanted to help identify it would be much appreciated!

[anatomicult]

occlupanids

HORG: Holotypic Occlupanid Research Group was founded in 1994 by John Daniel

the initial intention for founding HORG was a tongue-in-cheek attempt to poke fun at the politics of classification, a parody by a taxonomy-lover for taxonomy-lovers [here]

and it has a subreddit and discord, too

[tupandactylus]

Met one of the authors of the occlupanid paper today

He signed a bread clip for me

[themansquito]

Palpataphora utiliformis grandis

[meganwinchester1999]

Okay that emoji one was me, guilty as charged ✋ haha. Also I love Megan's blog!!

(Hey it’s alright at least I now get to see your beautiful and gorgeous face 😊 Also, you should see Megan’s face right now she is grinning and still laughing)

Thank you so so much and Gabe is right I’m in the middle of grinning and laughing right now