the.com/molting
the periodic act of outgrowing your own skin and walking away from it
means The natural process by which an animal sheds an outer layer — feathers, skin, shell, or hair — to make way for new growth.
from From Middle English 'mouten,' itself from Old English 'mūtian,' meaning to change or exchange — borrowed from Latin 'mūtāre,' 'to change' (the same root that gives us 'mutate' and 'mutation'). The intrusive 'l' is a later spelling quirk, slipped in by writers who mistakenly thought it belonged there, much like the 'l' that crept into 'fault' and 'could.' So at heart, to molt is simply to change — the creature trading an old self for a new one.
- soft window
- Freshly molted crabs are defenseless until shells harden
- snake trick
- They shed eye caps too, briefly going blind
- feather cost
- Many birds can't fly mid-molt
- eat it
- Some insects devour their old skin for nutrients
- growth lock
- Hard exoskeletons force molting to get bigger
arctic tern molt — migrates 44,000 miles annually and molts twice per year, more than most birds
deer antler shedding — white-tailed deer drop antlers each winter in north america, regrowing them by summer
horseshoe crab molting — sheds exoskeleton up to 17 times in delaware bay during breeding season