Bombardier beetle escapes from a toad’s stomach after launching a chemical attack

A hot chemical spray causes the predator to vomit. And the beetles walked away unscathed, some after bathing in the toad’s stomach juices for over an hour. Learn more:

producer
Sarah Crespi

citation
S. Sugiura and T. Sato
Biology Letters 2018
DOI: 10.1098/rsbl.2017.0647

photos and video
Shinji Sugiura

music
"True Entity of Life"
Daniel Birch and Ben Pegley

[maxyoung]

"The Toad and Beetle both part ways *unharmed*"
Beetle: *Literally clinging onto life crawling awake*
Frog: *Vomitting from mouth horribly*

[brenddevries]

both unharmed... as the beatle is crawling the warzone like in saving private ryan

[lohphat]

I don’t think you asked the beetle if it was unharmed.

Covered in digestive juices hardly seems trivial.

[adamstern]

"Both come out unharmed"
*beetle dragging itself across floor trying to hold on to dear life*

[sman]

I love how the toad sits there with a straight face while his insides feel like a radioactive wasteland

[MOLANOIX]

Probably the toad's stomach also had ulcerative injuries due to the chemicals released by the bombardier beetle

[grumpytoadgaming]

They part ways, both unharmed

**Beetle covered in stomach acid**

**Toad's innards sprayed with burning toxin**



Toad: Alright, I feel good

[keithhickson]

"Mamma mia! That's a spicy meatball!"

[quinnporter]

"Unharmed" that beetle looks like its crawling away on one elbow because every other limb has been powderized

[jakubk.]

*gets touched*

*angrily craps himself*

[pipenquista]

As far as I know the chemical reactant produced by that beetle is fairly corrosive, so it's hard to believe the frog were unharmed after that encounter.

[RS-pewn]

"Both unharmed" the toad had toxic chemicals blow up in his stomach and the beetle sat in stomach acid and had to endure the same explosion in the toads fucking stomach something tells me they aint all fine

[thedevilyouknow]

0:48 I can just imagine the beetle walking away swearing and groaning after getting thrown up

[southhoney]

"Both unharmed"

The aggressively army crawling a beetle: say sike right now

[jo-han]

The beetle also has to have adapted breathing systems. Because there are lots of beetles / insects that drown when submerged for just 3 minutes.

[Jeremy_Watson]

Both unharmed. They each have PTSD that they didn't have before this event. Still that is one amazing beetle.

[bluebowser]

That beetle spent 88 minutes inside the toads stomach. he was probably kicking, biting and spraying chemicals throughout.

[TheMeximerican]

I didn't know they were able to talk to beetle and toad! That's good because they were able to talk to them and find out they were both unharmed.

[googane]

Imagine getting eaten by a frog and spending the next hour and a half covered in stomach acid and then spitted out. Then crawl out like you survived a war

[adevta]

So it's acceptable for them to shit all over the place when they're scared? But when I'm on a rollercoaster it's *"iNdeCeNT!!"*