

Tardigrades - acak
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tardigrade

======
jtheory
AKA waterbears, moss piglets, or elephant worms.

Pretty cool wee beasties; lots of photos and videos just a google away.

My daughter likes looking at these as well, though we haven't ever looked at
real ones -- that's a project worth trying!

Currently we're growing butterflies (got 5 little caterpillars delivered by
post in a jar with food for them -- they wandered around and got fat in there,
then made chrysalises which we transferred to a big mesh cage (where we now
have 1 chrysalis left and 4 butterflies; we're feeding them mashed ripe banana
and flowers with sugar water dripped on them).

One of the caterpillars left his head out of the chrysalis... and we were
startled to notice that the old head was left behind when the butterfly
hatched out. They basically liquify in there and grow entirely new bodies from
a new set of stem cells.

------
tonypace
If you are interested in seeing them for yourself, it is quite simple given a
small amount of luck.

First, collect dry moss. Soak it in warm for 30 minutes. Squeeze out the moss,
and examine the collected liquid closely under magnification, searching for
localized motion. Even a 10x hand lens or loupe will be fine for
identification, although a microscope would of course be better.

