Comments on Ant Parasite Turns Host Into Ripe Red Berry

I too can turn your rear end bright red, for a fee.

Parasites are the best, particularly insect parasites!

Here's a fun one: rats infected with toxoplasma lose their fear of cats, easing their way to being eaten. Human males infected with toxo are more aggressive. Human females, slightly more promiscuous.

A great book on the subject? Parasites Rex by Carl Zimmer.

Blahblahblah

This is the coolest thing posted on Slog this year.

Also, 3, STFU.

http://www.boingboing.net/2007/01/03/video-of-fungus-that.html

A Rainforest fungus devours insides and leaves a spike like growth jutting from the head.

The fungus, for its part, lives on. It continues to consume the brain, moving on through the rest of the nervous system and, eventually, through all the soft tissue that remains of the ant. After approximately two weeks, a spikelike protrusion erupts from out of what had once been the ant’s head. Growing to a length of about an inch and a half, the spike features a bright orange tip, heavy-laden with spores, which now begin to rain down onto the forest floor for other unsuspecting ants to inhale.

Sadly, the video link is broken :-/

That's cute.