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.
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All Stories by Susan Milius
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AnimalsAlpine bee tongues shorten as climate warms
Pollinators’ match with certain alpine flowers erodes as climate change pushes fast evolution.
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AnimalsThese fish would rather walk
Slowpokes of the sea, frogfish and handfish creep along the ocean bottom.
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AnimalsDogs flub problem-solving test
Confronting a tough task, dogs are more likely than wolves to give up and gaze at a human
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AnimalsLoss of vision meant energy savings for cavefish
Novel measurement feeds idea that tight energy budgets favored vision loss in cavefish.
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AnimalsInvading Argentine ants carry virus that attacks bees
The first survey of viruses in the globally invasive Argentine ant brings both potentially bad and good news.
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AnimalsInvading Argentine ant hordes carry a virus that attacks bees
Invasive Argentine ants may be reservoirs for a virus menacing honeybees — and for previously unknown virus.
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AnimalsWhen octopuses dance beak to beak
The larger Pacific striped octopus does sex, motherhood and shrimp pranks like nobody else.
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AnimalsSame 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.
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AnimalsLong-tongued fly sips from afar
Long-tongued flies can dabble in shallow blossoms or reach into flowers with roomier nectar tubes.
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AnimalsSeeing humans as superpredators
People have become a unique predator, hunting mostly adults of other species.
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AnimalsHummingbird 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.
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AnimalsLight pollution may disrupt firefly sex
Females of a common big dipper firefly weren’t as flashy when forced to flirt in LED light pollution.