All Stories by Susan Milius
- Neuroscience
Chicks show left-to-right number bias
Recently hatched chicks may have their own version of the left-to-right mental number line.
- Animals
Highway bridge noise disturbs fish’s hearing
In the lab, blacktail shiners had trouble hearing courtship growls over Alabama bridge traffic recordings.
- Animals
Chameleon tongue power underestimated
A South African chameleon species can shoot its tongue with up to 41,000 watts of power per kilogram of muscle involved, a new study finds.
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- Animals
Cone snail deploys insulin to slow speedy prey
Fish-hunting cone snails turns insulin into a weapon that drops their prey’s blood sugar and eases capture.
- Plants
Tricky pitcher plants lure ants into a false sense of security
Carnivorous pitcher plants exploit social lives of ants as scouts escape and inadvertently lead nest mates to death trap.
- Animals
Amazonian bird may act the part of its hairy caterpillar disguise
A rare view of a baby cinereous mourner feeds debate over whether the bird both looks and acts the part of a toxic hairy caterpillar as defense against predators.
- Animals
Disco clams may flash chemical-weapons warning
Puzzling disco clam light show might warn predators not to bite.
- Animals
Why ground squirrels go ninja over nothing
Ground squirrels twist and dodge fast enough to have a decent chance of escaping rattlesnake attacks.
- Animals
Bees, up close and personal
A photo archive from the U.S. Geological Survey's Bee Inventory and Monitoring Lab offers detailed photos of bee species.
- Animals
Rock ants favor left turns in unfamiliar crevices
Rock ants’ bias for turning left in mazes, a bit like handedness in people, may reflect different specializations in the halves of their nervous system.
- Animals
It’s bat vs. bat in aerial jamming wars
In nighttime flying duels, Mexican free-tailed bats make short, wavering sirenlike sounds that jam each other’s sonar.
