#5.
Having just a layman's knowledge of ants, what would you guess is the biggest ant colony in the world? Maybe there's some mega-colony somewhere that's, say, as big as a football field, right? Or a city block?
How about an ant colony that spans four fucking continents? Well say hello to Argentina's biggest export.
It's just a regular-sized ant; it does ant things. It carries bundles to and fro, it frantically scrambles across logs and it colonizes the pants of liars. It doesn't spit acid, it doesn't fly and it doesn't eat people. But by God it has a colony that experts say spans across the Americas, Europe, Australia and Asia (what, do they get back and forth by boat?).
Scientists have dubbed this group a "global mega-colony," and estimate it's comprised of over 22 million anthills, each teeming with upwards of 10,000 members. That's more than 200 billion ants, by the way. Their mega-colony outnumbers humans 35 to one.
It's like a mind-bogglingly huge ant-party! And if you like living on those continents, then you're invited! Whether you fucking like it or not!
This revelation came as quite a surprise to entomology experts, seeing as how ants from different colonies or geographic locations will typically fight for territory if brought together. But grab a couple of these guys from the coast of Japan, and a couple more from the coast of California, and it's nothing but good times. They're all on the same team. For a sober and rational perspective on all of this, please consider this quote from the BBC:
"The colony may be the largest of its type ever known for any insect species, and could rival humans in the scale of its world domination."
That emphasis wasn't even ours; it bolded itself
Hey, did we mention that ants are one of the only other species known to capture and use slaves? Nowwho's crazy for building an anti-ant-overlord bunker behind the Stop 'N Save, County Sherriff's Office?!
This is going to happen.
You know what's worse than a jellyfish? A gigantic jellyfish.
You know what's worse than a gigantic jellyfish? Huge swarms of gigantic jellyfish attacking people off the coast of Japan. There are thousands of these things floating together, weighing up to 440-pounds each. That's when it becomes less of a "bad day at the beach" situation and more of a "first sign of the coming of the Old Ones" kind of deal.
The good news is that, although they will sting anything that gets near them, the jellyfish aren't always aggressive toward humans; it's just a case of the wrong place at the wrong time. The bad news is that they are devouring all of the fish supplies, and clogging up the fisherman's nets so badly that they've resorted to trying to sell them as food in an effort to recoup their losses. So if your Fillet O' Fish tastes a little more slippery and poisonous than usual, thank Japan.
Scientists don't actually know very much about these monsters yet, like why there are suddenly a thousand times more of them than ever before, how to stop them or pretty much anything else useful; but then again, it must take a special kind of scientist to want to get up close and personal with the world's densest population of gargantuan venomous shredded eyeballs.
According to a leading nomura expert, Shiniche Uye, they are "like typhoons - they can't be controlled, but they can be predicted." You read that right: the world's leading nomura scientist just said that theycannot be stopped. But more surreal and terrifying is the reason why: when you try to kill one, it literally gives birth to millions of offspring first. There's no word on whether or not they all hunger for vengeance toward the man who killed their parents, so we're forced to assume that they do.
The mountain pine beetle has been native to North America for as long as there's been a North America, but we never really had cause to notice them until they started pulling some Captain Planet villain shit and turned all of this:
Into this:
They've swept across parts of Canada, killing half of the lodge pole pine trees, and are marching toward the U.S. as we speak. Various attempts to stop or even slow the scourge were basically met with a hearty "fuck you" by the swarm, who continue to devour forests while laughing maniacally and proclaiming all that stand against them to be "fools!"
Hey are pine trees supposed to be orange?
Their biggest natural enemy is the cold, but thanks to global climate change, warmer winters means they can now survive year-round; exponentially increasing their food intake. Farmers in Alberta report what they call "beetle rain," where they hear what sounds like a heavy storm spattering off their rooftops, only to go outside and see millions upon millions of beetles landing in an apocalyptic swarm.
So... can we just poison all of the trees up there? Or do we have to nuke Canada?
If you responded to the idea of a dolphin onslaught by clapping your hands together and squealing "more aquatic hugs for everybody!" then you have a shocking revelation coming: dolphins are jerks.
Seriously.
As we have pointed out previously, dolphins are one of the few species on earth that appears to kill purely for fun. Gangs of males sometimes even kidnap and hold captive females for months on end, and dolphin attacks on humans are not at all uncommon.
Basically, we only think they're cute and friendly because their perpetually smirking expression makes them look like marginally retarded sharks and we just want to see the lil' fellas do their best.
"Hewwo!"
What is new about dolphins, however, is that suddenly they've started forming "superpods," grouping by the thousand in places never before seen: Yes, these graceful animals tattooed on roughly half the ankles of the mall-skank population are, in fact, child-murdering gang-rapists with a hunger for human flesh. And now they're gathering in armies that stretch over a mile long and number in the tens of thousands. And just exactly what are you supposed to do when confronted with one solid mile of what are essentially the ocean's most playful Viking hordes? How do you survive that? Play dead? Swim? Politely ask them to balance colorful balls on their noses? No, your most likely option is to simply get raped and die. But hey, if you stay out of the ocean you should be fine, unless...
Right now, huge chunks of the Southeastern U.S. pretty much look like the above picture. That stuff that makes it look like God threw a big leafy blanket over everything, is the Kudzu vine.
It dominates the landscape because it is simply the best at what it does, and what it does is grow. Seriously, at a rate of about a foot a day it's like watching time-lapse in real life. Go on vacation for a week, and when you come back you'll find this shit has eaten your car.
They've given Kudzu the nickname "the vine that ate the South." Nicknames are typically shorter than the original name, but considering as how the South is breathing plants instead of air right now, we'll cut them some slack on that one.
And that's not to say it's limited to the South: although it isn't supposed to be able to survive sub-zero weather, new "pods" of Kudzu have even been discovered as far north as New Jersey and Oregon. And as usual, scientists don't know how or why this is happening, but we sincerely hope they're having fun documenting the mating habits of slime molds (or whatever it is they're spending their research time on) while Mother Nature is growing herself a race of giant plant-men who attack our power lines with their enormous golf clubs.
But there is hope! Unlike the rest of the entries on this list, someone is actually doing something about the Kudzu. In a rare show of common sense by the local government, the city of Chattanooga has successfully controlled an outbreak of Kudzu by releasing goats and llamas into their wilds to graze on it. However, presumably unsatisfied with the level of insanity present in this plan, the U.S. Department of Agriculture is instead proposing a more pants-shittingly crazy idea for national containment: they want to introduce a dead fungus called Myrothecium Verrucaria into the environment to combat the intrusion of Kudzu instead.
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