https://www.bbc.co.uk/cbbc/watch/extraordinary-animals-with-real-superpowers

The gecko has surprisingly sophisticated toepads that allow it to climb most surfaces – even glass! Each toe is covered in bristles called setae that stick to the surface without liquid. Nightcrawler would be jealous!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/cbbc/watch/extraordinary-animals-with-real-superpowers

The octopus is practically elastic in its ability to stretch and squeeze through tiny openings. It’s a real Houdini act, matched only by the flexibility of Mister Fantastic!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/cbbc/watch/extraordinary-animals-with-real-superpowers

The mantis shrimp is quite possibly the coolest animal on the planet. Not only might it be able to see colours that humans can only dream of, but it can punch with the same velocity as a speeding bullet. Due to the speed of this strike, the water around its punch boils making tiny bubbles. When these bubbles pop they make a shockwave so powerful it creates bursts of light.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/cbbc/watch/extraordinary-animals-with-real-superpowers

The humble sardine may not strike you as particularly super, but it has mastered the art of becoming invisible to predators. By reflecting light using crystals in their skin, they can create an optical illusion, seeming to disappear when threatened. The Invisible Woman apparently bends wavelengths of light in a similar way.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/cbbc/watch/extraordinary-animals-with-real-superpowers

You wouldn’t want to touch a poison dart frog – they secrete toxins through their skin. Their bright colouring advertises their toxicity to potential predators like a neon sign: “Stay away!” Ingestion of these poisons can cause breathing problems, coma or even death, just like Rogue’s touch.

https://www.wired.com/2013/04/animal-superpowers/

Flea (Siphonaptera) Boing! Annoyingly, fleas are the most super-powered of the super jumpers. Their explosive power comes from a coil of energy-storing protein that acts somewhat like a spring. Located in the flea’s thorax, the spring transfers energy down through the flea’s legs, until it reaches and compresses the bug’s toes. Then, boom goes the flea, sometimes traveling roughly 200 times its body length. Other super jumpers include kangaroo rats (able to spring a distance 45 times their body length), jumping spiders (100 times their body length), and tree frogs (150 times). Video: Cambridge University/YouTube

https://www.wired.com/2013/04/animal-superpowers/

Though true invisibility remains the stuff of comics, many creatures have evolved the ability to sneak up on their prey with eerily silent stealth. Among the best known are owls, which can swoop down on field mice with nary a sound fluttering from their wings. Though no one knows exactly how the special shape of their wings and feathers eliminate aerodynamic noise, scientists are studying the ability to better mitigate loud aircraft sounds. Another aerial predator, the Western Barbastelle bat, has also figured out how to remain invisible to the moths it eats: the creatures whisper their echolocation to avoid detection. The species’ echolocation pinging is 10 to 100 times lower in amplitude than their bat-cousins, preventing prey from being alerted to their presence. Underwater, the scariest thing to encounter (if you’re a tiny plankton) is the North American comb jelly. While these squishy ctenophores don’t seem formidable, they voraciously chow down on zooplankton. The comb jelly (below) uses tiny hairs inside its mouth to generate a gentle current that makes it hydrodynamically invisible to zooplankton, which remain completely oblivious until they are devoured.

https://www.wired.com/2013/04/animal-superpowers/

Laysan Albatross (Phoebastria immutabilis) A well-made, conscientiously maintained automobile lasts a few hundred thousand miles. To a Laysan albatross, that's a couple years' travel. Nesting in the mid-Pacific and feeding from the tip of South America all the way to Alaska, the birds can fly 50,000 miles in a single year. Wisdom, a Midway Atoll-dwelling albatross tagged in 1956 and considered the world's oldest bird, has flown between 2 and 3 million miles in her lifetime. Image: Duncan/Flickr

https://www.wired.com/2013/04/animal-superpowers/

Spotted hyena (Crocuta crocuta) Hyenas can eat pretty much anything. Their powerful jaws can crush bone, and they can consume up to a third of their body weight in meat in a single meal. Fresh kills, rotting corpses -- it's all good. They've even been known to consume anthrax-ridden cattle carcasses without ill effects. But even this super stomach has its kryptonite: Hyenas can't digest hair, hooves, and horns. Those bits get barfed up in pellets. Image: lydurs/Flickr

https://www.wired.com/2013/04/animal-superpowers/

Elephant (Loxodonta) Imagine being able to lift a one-ton weight with your face. Well, elephants can easily hoist about that much with their trunks. These long appendages are a combination of nose and mouth. Flexible and boneless, with a prehensile tip, elephant trunks serve many purposes: They can function as snorkels and hoses, forks and fingers, pokers and peanut-crackers. Elephants aren’t alone in their ability to do amazing things with their faces. The trap-jaw ant (Odontomachus bauri) can slam its jaws shut faster than you can drive a car down the freeway – between 75 and 140 miles per hour. In so doing, the ants create enough propulsive force to launch themselves into the air, sometimes landing more than 15 inches away. That’s like an average-size person enthusiastically chomping on a carrot and winding up 100 feet away. Image: Muhammad Mahdi Karim/WikimediaMuhammad Mahdi Karim