All Stories by Susan Milius
- Animals
Oops. Woodpecker raps were actually gunshots
The knock-knock noises recorded last winter that raised hopes for rediscovering the long-lost ivory-billed woodpecker in Louisiana turn out to have been gunshots instead of bird noises.
- Animals
Who’s on first with hummingbird bills
A survey of 166 hummingbird species links sex differences in bill length to sex differences in plumage and to breeding behavior.
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Handsome blue tit dads have more sons
A female blue tit with a particularly dashing mate is more likely to have sons than is a female matched with a ho-hum guy.
- Animals
Marine Mules: Near-sterile hyrids boost coral diversity
Reef corals that spawn in great mixed-up soups of many species may be maintaining their diversity because their hybrids are sterile mules.
- Animals
Bay leaves may make rat nests nicer
Wood rats may be fumigating their nests with bits of California bay leaves, sprigs that killed flea larvae in lab tests.
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Infected butterflies reverse sex roles
In butterfly populations afflicted by male-killing bacteria, females gather in frantic swarms to mate.
- Ecosystems
Plight of the Iguanas: Hidden die-off followed Galápagos spill
Residues of oil spilled in the Galapágos Islands in January 2001 may have caused a 60 percent decline in one island's colony of marine iguanas.
- Ecosystems
Famine reveals incredible shrinking iguanas
Marine iguanas in the Galápagos Islands are the first vertebrates known to reduce their size during a food shortage and then regrow to their original body lengths.
- Animals
Male bats primp daily for odor display
For the first time, scientists have described the daily routine of male sac-winged bats gathering to freshen the odor pouches on their wings.
- Animals
Sniff . . . Pow! Wasps use chemicals to start ant brawls
Wasps sneak around in ant colonies thanks to chemicals that send the ants into a distracting frenzy of fighting among themselves.
- Animals
Walking sticks mimic two leafy looks and split their species
A species of walking stick may be evolving into two species by adapting to different environments.
- Animals
Mole-rats: Kissing but not quite cousins
Damaraland mole-rats live underground in rodent versions of bee hives, but a genetic analysis of these colonies finds that kinship isn't very beelike.
