Could it be a succulent, pink, wiggling worm?
No, it was actually this alligator snapping turtle's blood-engorged tongue appendage acting as a lure.
It's far from the only animal doing tongue trickery.
Fish attracted to prey-like ripples at the water's surface might find themselves in the jaws of water snakes who used their tongues to put those ripples there.
Snowy egrets do the same thing.
And puff adders lingually mimic insect movements to snag amphibians.
Tongues are getting all kinds of busy across the animal kingdom — for many different reasons.
Some are used as murderous missiles in ambush attacks.
Within the chameleon's mouth, a tongue muscle squeezes a series of concentric sheaths around a cartilaginous rod, storing elastic energy.
As the muscle further contracts, the tongue tissues slip over the tip of the rod, releasing their stored energy and accelerating the tongue forward.
