All Stories by Susan Milius
- Animals
Plain ol’ Texas rat snakes basically match vipers for speed
Rattlesnakes and other vipers are not the fastest fangs in the West.
- Ecosystems
Australian fairy circles first to be found outside Africa
Strange patterns of grassland bald spots called fairy circles show up in Western Australia.
- Ecosystems
FDA predicts no significant environmental impact from GM mosquitoes
The FDA has taken a step in the process of deciding whether to allow the first test release in the United States of genetically modified mosquitoes to fight diseases such as Zika.
- Plants
How to keep seagrasses as happy as a clam
Drought can do more damage to seagrass meadows if their partnership with clams break down.
- Animals
New chameleon has strange snout, odd distribution
A new species of chameleon from Tanzania echoes the unusual range of the kipunji monkey.
- Animals
Is Amy Tan actually ‘thrilled’ a leech is named after her?
Novelist Amy Tan answers a lingering question about celebrities honored in scientific names of new species — her namesake is a leech.
- Animals
Rock ant decisions swayed by six-legged social media
When rock ants start influencing each other with one-on-one social contact, a colony’s collective decisions can change.
- Animals
Saving salamanders from amphibian killer may take extreme measures
Experience from lethal Bd fungus outbreak is helping researchers defend North America’s salamander paradise from new Bsal threat.
- Microbes
Cyanobacteria use their whole bodies as eyeballs
Little spheres of cyanobacteria cells roughly focus light on sensitive compounds that let them walk in the right direction.
- Animals
White-tailed deer have their own form of malaria
The otherwise well-studied white-tailed deer turns out to carry the first malaria parasite discovered in any deer.
- Animals
Harvester ants are restless, enigmatic architects
Florida harvester ants dig complex, curly nests over, then leave and do it again.
- Animals
Why some birds sing elaborate songs in the winter
Several obvious hypotheses fail to explain why great reed warblers sing in winter.
