Frequency signatures: Cape Ground Squirrel to Central American Agouti
Each card gives a species’ behavioural archetype, its frequency — how often it commits effort and how long each commitment lasts — and a waveform tracing that rhythm.
Frequency signatures
Each waveform traces one species’ working rhythm — where it spends effort, and where it waits. 2,327 species, A–Z; showing 385–408.
Cape Ground Squirrel
A Tail Held Up as a Parasol
Foraging • Tail-shaded • Social
That makes it a bimodal system: long periods of shaded, social foraging and short sprints to cover.
Cape Teal
Drinking Water That Kills
Supraorbital salt glands excreting concentrated brine through the nostrils • Feeding on brine shrimp and invertebrates in saline and alkaline pans other ducks avoid • Moving between scattered temporary pans as they fill and dry across the interior
Because feeding and movement are continuous, it operates as a mid-frequency system.
Capuchin Monkey
Learning by Watching Someone Work
Juveniles sitting close to adults cracking nuts and watching the whole sequence repeatedly • Handling the discarded hammers and anvils afterwards without producing a strike • Acquiring a technique over years that no individual works out alone
Because learning and use are continuous, it operates as a mid-frequency system.
Capuchinbird
Resonant Lek Broadcast
Rhythmic • Projected • Display
This creates a system built around rhythmic, high-impact signaling at regular intervals, which makes the capuchinbird a mid-frequency system organized around repeated broadcast rather than continuous output or single bursts.
Capybara
Water at the Edge of the Grass
Grazing • Grouped • Water-backed
That makes it a low-frequency system: unhurried, tolerant and dependent on position rather than on speed.
Caracal
Swatting at the Top of the Jump
Creeping in • Launching vertically • Batting birds down
Volatile, explosive and short-horizon, this is a high-frequency system.
Caribbean Cleaner Goby
Reef Niche Service Post
Rhythmic • Posted • Reliant
This creates a mid-frequency system built on steady, rhythmic service at a stable location rather than slow reserve hoarding or short, explosive bursts.
Caribbean Spiny Lobster
Smelling a Sick Lobster
Sheltering communally in crevices with others • Detecting a chemical cue from an infected individual in the urine • Refusing to share a den with it and moving elsewhere
Since encounters recur constantly, it operates as a mid-frequency system.
Carmine Bee-eater
Riding Whatever Flushes the Insects
Following • Perching-on • Flocked
That makes it a mid-frequency system: continuously active and organised entirely around somebody else's movement.
Carolina Wolf Spider
Carrying the Whole Brood Around
A female attaching the egg sac to her spinnerets and dragging it everywhere she goes • Opening it when the spiderlings are ready and letting them climb onto her abdomen • Carrying dozens of young on her back for days while continuing to hunt
Because the cycle is annual, it operates as a low-frequency system.
Carp
turbidity feedback engine
Sifting • Quiet • Bottom
Quiet sifting and turbidity pulses are one engine with two tempos, not separate strategies.
Carpenter Ant
Tunnelling Wood It Cannot Digest
Cutting galleries through dead and damp wood with the mandibles • Carrying the shavings out and discarding them rather than eating them • Feeding instead on honeydew from sap-feeding insects and on other insects entirely outside the nest
Because colony cycles run across seasons, it operates as a low-frequency system.
Carpenter Bee
Cutting Into a Flower
Landing on the outside of a long tubular flower rather than at its opening • Slitting the base of the corolla with sharp mandibles • Drinking nectar directly through that hole without contacting the anthers or stigma at all
Because visits are continuous, it operates as a mid-frequency system.
Carpet Chameleon
Barred Outline, Compressed Life
Still • Barred • Outline-breaking
Defence that costs nothing but stillness runs alongside a breeding effort crammed into one short year, and those two opposite paces make the system bimodal, a low-frequency body plan carrying a high-frequency life history.
Carrion Beetle
Sulphide-Tuned Antennal Club
Downwind • Scanning • Converging
The searching never stops and rarely pays, which makes this a mid-frequency system whose entire return is concentrated into a handful of finds.
Carrion Crow
Corvid Memory Cache
Caching • Remembering • Reusing
Because their biology is organized around long-horizon storage and memory with intermittent, opportunistic tool-use bursts, this is a bimodal system with a low-frequency caching base and a high-frequency problem-solving spike.
Cattle Egret
Hoof-Flush Interception
Following • Flush-fed • Steady
That makes it a mid-frequency system: rhythmic and continuous, built on many small captures created by something else's movement.
Cayenne Caecilian
Tentacle-Guided Mud Push
Buried • Chemosensing • Slow
Because the whole system runs on low expenditure inside a medium nothing else exploits, it is a low-frequency system.
Cayenne Tick
Holding a Pose for Months
The tick climbing a grass stem and holding position with the front pair of legs extended into the air • Haller's organ on those forelegs detecting carbon dioxide, heat, vibration and odour from a passing animal • That pose held for weeks or months without feeding, until something brushes past and is grasped
Because the wait runs across months, it operates as a low-frequency system.
Cecropia Moth
Antennae That Detect a Few Molecules
Calling • Stationary • Female
That makes it a bimodal system: a stationary signalling half and a searching half.
Cedar Waxwing
Flocks Wandering After Ripe Fruit
Flocking • Fruit-tracking • Nomadic
It is a mid-frequency system: steady, social and governed by where the fruit is.
Celebes Crested Macaque
Tolerant-Society Close Watching
Crowding in close • Bared teeth as greeting • Copying what worked
Because the watching and copying run continuously, it operates as a mid-frequency system.
Centipede
First Legs Made Venom Claws
Running down prey on many pairs of legs • Seizing it with the first pair of legs converted into hollow fangs • Injecting venom through them before anything can be lost
Since strikes occur in a fraction of a second, it operates as a high-frequency system.
Central American Agouti
Seeds Re-Buried by Successive Thieves
Burying • Stolen • Re-buried
That makes it a mid-frequency system: steady repeated burying in which the losses do the work.