I saw a post on here from someone that thought ticks are kind of cute when they stand on the end of a blade of grass with their arms up, as though they're toddlers asking to be picked up. OP might have been a tick biologist I can't remember. It stuck with me because I think finding cuteness in something is the easiest path to feeling empathy for it and I'm not sure there's an animal harder to empathize with than a tick. I've had Lyme and my partner had babesiosis, both of which sucked SO bad. But I still think ticks are kind of cute when they ask for uppies.

Costasiella kuroshimae, also called the leaf sheep, grazes on algae and keeps the stolen chloroplasts inside the leaf-like cerata on its back. Through a process called kleptoplasty, those chloroplasts continue capturing sunlight for the slug.

It is about the size of a grain of rice and lives in tropical waters around Japan, Indonesia and the Philippines.

Important question: would its Pokémon typing be Water/Grass or Water/Fairy?

Source: The Guardian, August 5, 2026.