One of the most incredible things about the Amazon is the idea that you could walk across 5,500,000 square km without stumbling into a fence.

Yet according to The National Geographic, this is no longer true after a Georgia Tech student stumbled across a white picket fence while volunteering at the Tambopata Research Centre.

Unlike a white picket fence you may find on the boundaries of a home, the fence Troy Alexander discovered was just 2 cm long and growing on trees in Peru.

Intrigued by what he found, Alexander snapped a few photos to show to an entomologist he hoped would give him the answers, but the expert had never seen anything like it. Nor had anyone on the What’s This Bug group where Alexander also posted the photo.

Since then, Alexander has posted more images of almost identical structures, all of which consist of a tall, white conical post in the middle of a small, circular picket fence. His discovery has scientists from all over the world baffled as to what kind of insect might be making these unique structures.

The leading hypothesis is that the tiny fences could be the result of a spider.

Source:

http://newswatch.nationalgeographic.com/2013/09/06/what-created-this-mysterious-picket-fence-in-the-amazon/