Susan Milius

Susan Milius

Life Sciences Writer

Life sciences writer Susan Milius has been writing about botany, zoology and ecology for Science News since the last millennium. She worked at diverse publications before breaking into science writing and editing. After stints on the staffs of The Scientist, Science, International Wildlife and United Press International, she joined Science News. Three of Susan's articles have been selected to appear in editions of The Best American Science Writing.

All Stories by Susan Milius

  1. Animals

    Same math describes relationship between diverse predators and prey

    From lions to plankton, predators have about the same relationship to the amount of prey, a big-scale ecology study predicts.

  2. Animals

    Long-tongued fly sips from afar

    Long-tongued flies can dabble in shallow blossoms or reach into flowers with roomier nectar tubes.

  3. Animals

    Seeing humans as superpredators

    People have become a unique predator, hunting mostly adults of other species.

  4. Animals

    Hummingbird tongues may work like micropumps

    Hummingbird tongues work as elastic micropumps instead of simple thin tubes, researchers say in latest round of a scientific debate.

  5. Animals

    Light pollution may disrupt firefly sex

    Females of a common big dipper firefly weren’t as flashy when forced to flirt in LED light pollution.

  6. Animals

    Biologists aflutter over just where monarchs are declining

    Citizen science data fuel debate over whether weed control ruined monarch habitat and whether the butterflies are failing to reach their Mexican winter refuge.

  7. Animals

    Boa suffocation is merely myth

    Boa constrictors don’t suffocate prey; they block blood flow, says a new study that shatters a common myth about the snakes.

  8. Animals

    First known venomous frogs stab with toxin-dripping lip spikes

    Two Brazilian frogs jab foes with venoms more deadly than pit vipers'.

  9. Animals

    Where salamanders should be very afraid

    Three zones of North America at high risk if the salamander-killing fungus disease Bsal invades.

  10. Animals

    Caterpillar treats and tricks ants by oozing spiked juice

    Caterpillars ooze droplets that lure ants away from colony duties to instead lick and defend their drug source, new lab tests suggest.

  11. Life

    The tree of life gets a makeover

    Biology’s tree of life has morphed from the familiar classroom version emphasizing kingdoms into a complex depiction of supergroups, in which animals are aligned with a slew of single-celled cousins.

  12. Animals

    Toddler seahorses are bumbling and adorable

    Rice-grain-sized youngsters can’t yet get a grasp with their tails.