The creature with this talent is the horned toad, a reptile that isn’t a toad at all, but rather a type of lizard that lives in the deserts of the western United States and Mexico.
Most horned toads are from three to six inches long, with sharp hornlike spikes on their head. When one of these creatures is frightened or angry, its eyes puff up until they bulge out of the lizard’s head. Then a fine jet of blood squirts from blood vessels in the corners of the lizard’s eyes. The squirt may travel up to five feet! No other creature can squirt blood out of its eyes.
We know that the horned toad squirts blood only when it is frightened or angry, but no one knows what purpose the blood-squirting serves.
Perhaps the horned toad squirts blood to scare away its enemies, or maybe the strange discharge is meant to lower its blood pressure.
