False Aardvark The body of a pig, ears of a rabbit, tail of a kangaroo and nose of an ant-eater – plus spade- like claws that can excavate a 13m tunnel and a 30cm- long tongue that can lap up 50,000 termites in a night. Weird or what? Naked mole rat This peculiar rodent has a naked, wrinkled body and huge incisor teeth. It lives in ‘ ant- like’ colonies, with ‘ workers’ tending a ‘ queen’. Mandrill A male mandrill’s red nose and blue cheeks resemble the colour scheme of his rear quar-ters, providing a sexual come- on to females and a warning flag to rival males. African skimmer The bizarre bill of this tern- like bird has a lower mandible longer than the upper – perfect for trawling the water for titbits as the bird flies above. Chameleon With a tongue the length of its body, eyes that rotate 360 degrees, a prehensile tail, toes fused into tongs and a skin that changes colour with mood. Chameleons are champions of weird. Ground hornbill There is a beauty- and- the- beast feel to this big bird, with its odd combination of elegant eyelashes and grotesque throat sac. Add to that a huge hatchet bill and weird booming call and you have one of the true characters of the bush. Hammerhead bat The huge hooter on Africa’s larg-est fruit bat acts as a loudspeaker. Males perform in special arboreal arenas called leks, while watching females select those that most impress them. WILDLIFE 114 msafiri Fiddler crab Check out a movement in the mangroves and you might spot this eccentric crustacean waving his single, outsized claw like a giant baseball mitt. Well, it works for the females. Many African animals are celebrated for their elegance or beauty. But it’s often the truly bizarre-looking that deserve the most attention. THE ODDBALL Owen Newman/ NATUREPL. COMNeil Bromhall/ NATUREPL. COM Karl Amman/ NATUREPL. COM Kim Taylor/ NATUREPL. COMTony Heald/ NATUREPL. COM Michael D. Kern/ NATUREPL. COMPeter Blackwell/ NATUREPL. COM HUGH MAYNARD/ NATUREPL. COM

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