The cinnabar moth caterpillar's coloration pattern warns predators close up, but camouflages the critter from a distance.

朱砂蛾毛虫色彩鲜艳，它身上的图案不仅能够威慑捕食者，让其不要靠近；也可以伪装自身，保证生命安全。

翻译：曲荟龙

审校：郭晓

Nature may be red in tooth and claw. But one plucky caterpillar dresses in orange and black to avoid becoming somebody’s lunch. What’s really surprising, though, is that this distinctive set of stripes can serve as both a warning or as camouflage, depending on how far away it is from the viewer.

大自然的生存法则十分残酷。但是一只黑橙相间的蛾毛虫可以凭借自己的“外衣”吓退敌人，避免成为其捕食者的午餐。但真正令人感到惊讶的是，蛾毛虫这种独特的条纹既可以作为对其他生物的警告，也可以作为保护自身的伪装——这取决于它与捕食者的距离有多远。

Animals can deploy color as a defense mechanism in a couple of ways. Some shades and patterns help potential prey blend into the background. Whereas bold markings often serve as a signal that an animal is unpalatable—for example, chock full o’ toxins.

动物们可以通过多种方式将颜色应用于自身防御。一些阴影和图案可以帮助潜在的被捕食者融入所处环境。然而，一些醒目的标记则通常散发着另一种信号——这个动物并不好吃，比如其体内充斥着毒素。

“So, these two strategies have often been considered in isolation and often seen as mutually exclusive and alternative mechanisms. But under natural conditions you find this distinction is less clear cut.”

“因此，这两种策略经常被分开考虑，而且常常被视作两种相互排斥和替代的机制。但在自然条件下，你会发现这两种机制间的区别并非那样明显。”

Jim Barnett of the University of Bristol, who led the study to explore whether the same coloration might do double duty, allowing an animal to be obvious under some conditions but unseen in others.

布里斯托尔大学的Jim Barnett是相关研究的领导者，他的课题是探索同样的颜色是否可以起到双重作用——让动物在某些条件下变得看上去“不可侵犯”，而在另一些情况下却又不易被发现。

They focused their attention on the caterpillars of cinnabar moths. These larvae sport bright orange and black stripes. Their vivid appearance was believed to remind the birds who may have eaten others of their kind that they are none too tasty, thanks to their diet of alkaloid-rich ragwort plants.

他们主要的研究对象是朱砂蛾的毛虫。这些幼虫周身布满明亮的橙黑相间的条纹。他们认为毛虫鲜艳的外表可以提醒那些吃过其同类的鸟类：它们并不可口，因为朱砂蛾的毛虫主要以富含生物碱的豚草植物为食。

The researchers snapped photos of the caterpillars in suburban green spaces around Bristol. And they used a visual modeling program to give them a “bird’s-eye view” of what the caterpillars look like, either close-up or from farther away.

研究人员拍下了布里斯托尔郊区绿地上的毛虫的照片。他们用一个可视化的建模程序为自己提供了一个“鸟瞰”的视角来观察毛虫，要么是特写，要么是从远距离观察。

“And what we found is that although at close range the caterpillar’s stripes are highly conspicuous—these bright colors distinguish it quite easily from its ragwort background—but when viewed from a distance they blend together to form a color which is actually quite difficult to discern from the background color. So, what we think is going on is that the caterpillar is getting the best of both worlds.”

“我们发现，尽管近距离观察时，毛虫的条纹非常显眼——这些明亮的颜色在美狗舌草背景中十分显眼——但从远处看，它们混合在一起形成了一种新的颜色，实际上我们很难将它们从背景颜色中辨别出来。所以，我们认为毛虫做到了两全其美，。”

Close up, the stripes say keep your distance. But from a distance, they allow the caterpillars to hide in plain sight. The results can be seen in the journal Royal Society Open Science. [James B. Barnett, Innes C. Cuthill, Nicholas E. Scott-Samuel, Distance-dependent aposematism and camouflage in the cinnabar moth caterpillar (Tyria jacobaeae, Erebidae)]

近距离观看时，毛虫的条纹警示你要保持距离。但从远处看，它们又能让毛虫在视线中得以隐蔽。研究结果发表在《英国皇家学会开放科学》杂志上。[James B. Barnett, Innes C. Cuthill, Nicholas E. Scott-Samuel, Distance-dependent aposematism and camouflage in the cinnabar moth caterpillar (Tyria jacobaeae, Erebidae)]

The finding is a reminder: Don’t forget to step back and see things from a different perspective.

这一发现提醒我们：凡事别忘了退后一步，从不同的角度看问题。