All Stories by Susan Milius
- Ecosystems
Bluebird moms inadvertently fuel wars between species
Extra hormones delivered to eggs holding sons in tough times end up driving one bluebird species to chase off another
- Ecosystems
Fooled you! Whirling tails of luna moths deflect bat attacks
Luna moths can use their tails to reflect the echolocation pings of bats, tricking the predators into striking the tails instead of less expendable body parts.
- Environment
A coast-to-coast picture of America’s cacophony of sounds
The National Park Service mapped noise across the United States.
- Paleontology
Earliest tree-dweller, burrower join mammal tree of life
Fossils show mammal ancestors did a lot more than cower in dinosaurs’ shadows.
- Animals
When you’re happy and you show it, dogs know it
A new test using pictures of halves of human faces challenges dogs’ abilities to read people’s emotions.
- Ecosystems
Noise made by humans can be bad news for animals
Animals live in a world of sounds. Clever experiments are finally teasing out how human-made noise can cause dangerous distractions.
- Plants
Fairly bad pitcher traps triumph in the end
Carnivorous pitcher plant traps rarely catch much, but their lackadaisical hunting turns out not to be so lame after all.
- Ecosystems
Termite mound paradises help buffer dry land against climate change
Landscapes dotted by Africa’s great termite mounds look on the verge of turning into desert but are, in fact, more resilient.
- Animals
Cockroach personalities can speed or slow group decisions
The mix of temperaments in an alarmed cluster of cockroaches changes how quickly they make group decisions.
- 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.
