Birbla

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  • Hacker News
  • It took me quite a while to figure out what the article is about. These don’t seem to exist over here.
    by Toutouxc
  • They're the American (perhaps other places) equivalent of the little wire ties, almost exclusively used for bread. They're supposed to be quick to close the bread bag back up but in my experience they're I'll equipped for that purpose as they either break or maul the plastic.

    I thought they were commonplace until I moved outside the US; at least here in Germany I never see them.

    As kids you'd break off one of the half-circle parts, stick it on your finger and flick it to make a makeshift ninja star.

    by junon
  • Perhaps the species hasn't spread to your area of the world yet - where are you?

    I'm familiar with them from Australia, where Orthogonidectes seems the most common, and was a helpful addition to our bread freshness as a child. However in northern Europe these days the same niche is occupied by an entirely different variant not present on this page, more akin to a twist-tie (metal covered in plastic, which bends.) Both kinds attach to the same location on the host bread bag, enclosing the mouth of the bag and helpfully holding bread in while preventing airflow. How fascinating to see the same niche, with a different alternative.

    by vintagedave
  • My grandma had a Paraguayan snuffler (specifically Emunctator sorbens), these parasitoids were his absolute favorite snack.
    by usagisushi
  • This is the work of a mad genus.
    by yawpitch
  • The sort of general malaise that only the genius possess, and the insane lament.
    by Rooster61
  • I've been getting listicle spam/ads with a CTA promising to reveal why you should always carry one of these in your wallet. To this day I never found out why that is!
    by foobarian
  • In Australia they are occasionally used as a temporary fix for plastic sandals when the piece between your toes pulls through the base you can push it back through attach one of these around it on the bottom and it will hold long enough for you to get new ones.
    by sanswork
  • Well, if the ecological niches are the same there could be analogous developments that are not homologies. So I without a reconstruction of the environment I'm not certain that the proposed tree is valid.
    by ndr42
  • I distinctly remember seeing an exhibition of this work in Los Angeles in the early aughts. For the life of me I can't remember where. The photos were shot with a macro lens and blown up so that each specimen was ... 12" square? maybe bigger?

    Even then there were dozens upon dozens of them on display. It was mind bending.

    by Duanemclemore
  • If you're into this sort of thing I can highly recommend the parasite museum in Tokyo https://www.kiseichu.org/e-top
    by rwmj
  • This is the sort of top quality nonsense the Internet used to be good at.

    We need to go back there.

    by ErroneousBosh
  • When I was a child, I remember going to the nearby children's museum and seeing an exhibit with 1 million bread tags. It was supposed to help conceptualize the number.
    by abnry
  • please tell us about potential competition between Occlupanida sp. , and members of the Torqueroligiverasacculum Genera [least spotted twist tie]
    by rolph
  • In my experience, in natural environments that contain a vertical paper towel holder, Torqueroligiverasacculum Genera finds a nest and potential mating area underneath.
    by mrtomservo
  • At first , by the title, I thought there were parasites growing on these clips. Anyone else?
    by stogot
  • The link is neat, but that would have been much cooler IMO.
    by tennfown
  • Same here heh
    by loloquwowndueo
  • Not seeing the forest for the trees
    by boomlinde
  • Yes, same. I am now really curious for someone to culture bread tags, milk tops and fruit stickers.
    by ccamrobertson
  • Same initial thought. Took me a solid 10 seconds for orient myself, not usually finding HN as a source of comedy so my context was polluted
    by conductr
  • It's the only correct take, since the title atop literally says "parasitoids on bread bag tags".
    by BretonForearm
  • https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...

    Must be one of the most submitted pages. Is there a list?

    by Kaibeezy
  • Another mainstay is Ian’s shoelace site: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...
    by QuinnG
  • > The outside (or ‘edge’) of the occlupanid is often smooth, but many species sport palps, or tabs. These have unguessable purposes for mating, locomotion, defense, take your pick.

    I propose that these palps or tabs are remnants of the reproductive cycle, vestigial points of contact in the budding process. This phenomenon can be observed in some other classes within phylum Plasticae, and I see no reason to assume it is not happening here.

    by Terr_
  • It's like a bellybutton!
    by beAbU
  • The gunpla family has especially prominent ones, apparently used in mating displays.
    by Groxx
  • This is where the morphological approach falls down. This is an "analogous trait", i.e. something that's arrived at through two independent evolutionary pathways.

    These palps are due to a reproduction process called "stamping". Sounds violent, but that's nature for you. This is an asexual process. The tabs give an advantage to the overall clutch of young, not individuals.

    There's a morphologically similar trait in other Plasticae that's the result of "injection moulding". This involves the mating of two (or sometimes more) parents. This method allows for the evolution of more complex features.

    Overmoulding is also possible, which produces symbiotic organisms.

    by afandian