Nature
PUBLISHED
5
Hi everybody, as is traditional, IFLScience is here to ruin a fun Internet post with a spot of science.
Not that long ago we ruined a lovely photo of a heart-shaped honeycomb that keeps going viral, despite the fact that there was clearly something suspect about it. Everybody shuts down their skepticism when they see a fun bee tweet, apparently.
Today, we turn to hornets and another tweet that has garnered big numbers over the last few days for reasons that are immediately obvious. I mean, look at it.
Thousands have retweeted it, with many people making jokes about how it makes them feel.
OK, you've had your fun, now it's time to ruin it. [Rolls up newspaper to hit the Internet on the nose] no, hornets do not have breasts. Bad Internet.
Insects, reptiles, and amphibians do not have breasts, which are sort of a mammal exclusive, as many mammals nurse their young. Other animals do not, hence why you've never seen an alligator with a nipple. There's a reason why they're called "mammary" glands after all.
In fact, despite what cartoons have implied over the years, humans are the only animal on Earth that has developed breasts that remain there permanently. All other mammals temporarily develop breasts while nursing or ovulating, before they disappear again.
Which leads neatly onto another photo that occassionally does the rounds on the Internet, a particularly voluptuous looking squirrel.
Squirrels have many nipples, with some species having up to 10. Rather than developing breasts though, their nipples become elongated and the fur surrounding them falls out, exposing them to their young. This squirrel, it appears, is just a little on the larger side, and the fat has been pushed up in a way that the Internet has deemed "hot".
As for the "Asian Magumbo Hornet", there's a far simpler explanation: It's a photoshop job that originated from a photoshop battle on Reddit. Someone saw it and thought "that could use some boobs". Voila, after being shared without context for several years, people now believe it to be a type of hornet that has breasts.
Add in a lot of people who have spent lockdown without human contact and suddenly it's not only a hornet with breasts, it's a hornet that has breasts that people are declaring is hot.
