Biology

May 24th, 2022 - Fossilized remains from a giant flying reptile the size of a bus have been discovered in Argentina. The Dragon of Death, as scientists have dubbed the new species, hunted prey from Earth's skies around 86 million years ago. When fully extended, its wings measured a massive nine metres (30 ft) from one tip to the other. The sheer size of the predator paints a "terrifying vision", the scientist behind the find told the BBC. "This species had a height similar to that of a giraffe," project leader ... [Read More]

May 24th, 2022 - How stress is transmitted from one animal to another is the study topic of behavioral ecologists and collective behavior researchers. "I am stressed!" We have all said this sentence many times. Stress is a widespread phenomenon among humans. It occurs when we feel threatened or overwhelmed, for example, have too much work or are in imminent danger. We communicate to others that we are stressed through our behaviour and physiological changes. Thus, stress can also convey information and even be ... [Read More]

May 24th, 2022 - Axolotls are cute, charismatic salamanders that have an almost otherworldly ability to regenerate their body parts. But pollution and urbanization critically threaten this species' survival. When the Aztecs settled the Valley of Mexico around what is now Mexico City in the 13th century, they found a large salamander living in the lake surrounding the island where they built their capital, Tenochtitlán. They called the salamander "axolotl" after Xolotl, their god of fire and lightning. ... [Read More]

May 24th, 2022 - SPOKANE, Wash. – Scientists will set about 1,000 traps this year in their quest to wipe out the Asian giant hornet in Washington, the state Department of Agriculture said Tuesday. Scientists believe the hornets, first detected in the Pacific Northwest state in 2019, are confined in Whatcom County, which is located on the Canadian border north of Seattle. "We are doing pretty good right now," said Sven-Erik Spichiger, who is leading the fight to eradicate the hornets for the state ... [Read More]

May 24th, 2022 - We humans like to think our mastery of language sets us apart from the communication abilities of other animals, but an eye-opening new analysis of chimpanzees might force a rethink on just how unique our powers of speech really are.   In a new study , researchers analyzed almost 5,000 recordings of wild adult chimpanzee calls in Taï National Park in Côte d'Ivoire (aka Ivory Coast). When they examined the structure of the calls captured on the recordings, they were surprised to ... [Read More]

May 23rd, 2022 - It turns out that the African savannah elephant is a fascinating (albeit rather sad) example of fast evolution in large animals. Researchers studied the impact of ivory poaching on these magnificent animals and uncovered some interesting findings. Evolution can be explained as the gradual change in populations through the inheritance of traits and characteristics with their variation and natural selection. Through genes, an organism inherits the hereditary properties and, therefore, ... [Read More]

May 23rd, 2022 - Because of their proximity to the ocean, Californians get to enjoy locally-sourced oysters, mussels, abalone and clams. Most of the shellfish consumed here come from aquaculture farms along the coast—from San Diego to Humboldt County. And because the animals are filter feeders that siphon tiny plankton out of seawater, growing them is environmentally sustainable. But due to rising greenhouse gas emissions , the ocean has become more acidic, conditions hostile to shellfish growth. "There ... [Read More]

May 23rd, 2022 - Some could be lost forever, while others could live in areas difficult to reach Biodiversity is in serious danger in many parts of the world, with more than one million species facing extinction, according to the UN, and projections looking even worse. However, species extinction declarations are still very rare, largely because of uncertainties in knowing if the last individual of a species has actually died. This has led to the growth of a group of "lost" species that haven't been observed in ... [Read More]

May 23rd, 2022 - A curated list of ethical (and magical) experiences viewing wild animals around the world. E ncountering animals in their natural habitat is a sublime and unforgettable experience—and there are so many organizations angling to provide those moments for their guests. For every legitimate, ecofriendly operator, there are untold numbers whose practices are questionable, if not exploitive. AFAR wants to help you find the best international trips to see wildlife in a   ... [Read More]

May 22nd, 2022 - 10 Facts About the Velociraptor Dinosaur  Thanks to the "Jurassic Park" and "Jurassic World" movies, the  Velociraptor  is one of the world's most well-known dinosaurs. However, there's a huge difference between the Hollywood version of the  Velociraptor  and the less imposing one familiar to paleontologists. How much do you  really  know about this surprisingly small, vicious predator? It's a sad fact that the  s claim to pop-culture fame in "Jurassic ... [Read More]

May 22nd, 2022 - When something's messing with your insides and you feel like you're going to hurl, the last thing you probably want to do is eat. Deer, caribou, and other ungulates (hoofed animals) experience a similar problem when infected by non-deadly parasites. It utterly sucks for them, but it turns out infections that put them off their food have a wider benefit for the ecosystem.   "Parasites are well known for their negative impacts on the physiology and behavior of individual hosts and host ... [Read More]

May 20th, 2022 - Ural paleontologists discovered the lower jaws of an Etruscan bear from the Early Pleistocene (2–1.5 million years ago) in the Taurida Cave (Crimean Peninsula). Scientists reported the finding in the international journal of paleobiology Historical Biology . Remains of Etruscan bears (which is the ancestor of brown and cave bears ) as part of the fauna of large mammals of the Early Pleistocene were found in Western Europe, in Asia, as well as in North Africa, but not in Russia. The fact is ... [Read More]

May 20th, 2022 - The Amazon is teeming with life. And many of the animals there get caught on camera when they encounter camera traps set up by wildlife researchers eager for a look at their lives. But until now, there hasn't been a central set of information about those images. A massive archive — with records for over 150,000 snapshots taken between 2001 and 2020 — has now been collected in one place. An international team of 120 institutions describes the new data set in an article in the journal ... [Read More]

May 20th, 2022 - Coral reef fish breed more successfully if motorboat noise is reduced, new research shows. Scientists introduced "traffic calming" on three reefs for an entire breeding season—cutting the number of boats within 100m, and reducing the speed of those within that distance. They then tracked the breeding of fish called spiny chromis—and found 65% of nests on quieter reefs still contained offspring at the end of the season, compared to 40% on reefs with busy motorboat traffic. Offspring were ... [Read More]

May 20th, 2022 - Real data gathered by volunteers was combined with new computer models for the first time to reveal which UK moth species are struggling to expand into new regions and the landscape barriers restricting their movement. Farmland and suburban moths were found to be struggling most, with hills or regions with variable temperatures acting as barriers. This has implications for British wildlife being forced to move to adapt to climate change, and habitat restoration in challenging areas could help ... [Read More]

May 19th, 2022 - An international team of scientists from UCL (University College London), the Swedish Museum of Natural History, Natural History Museum (London) and the University of Florence have found a remarkable type of fossilization that has remained almost entirely overlooked until now. The fossils are microscopic imprints, or "ghosts", of single-celled plankton, called coccolithophores, that lived in the seas millions of years ago, and their discovery is changing our understanding of how plankton in the ... [Read More]