All Stories by Susan Milius
- Life
Archaeopteryx wore black
Microscopic structures in an iconic fossil feather suggest that it was the color of a crow.
- Life
Boxwood blight invades North America
The devastating fungus has already stripped shrubbery down to sticks in Europe and New Zealand.
- Life
Green gleam helps fish see violet
A deep-sea fish's eyes apparently use fluorescence to pick up hard-to-detect hues, researchers conclude.
- Life
Rhino beetle’s horn may be cheap
Outrageous-looking head spikes on the male of the species may not cost much in evolutionary terms.
- Humans
Botanists et al freed from Latin, paper
As of January 1, people who classify new plant, algae and fungus species can do it in English and online.
- Life
Sun-oil mix deadly for young herring
Fish embryos proved surprisingly vulnerable to a 2007 spill in San Francisco Bay.
- Life
Pigeons rival primates in number task
Trained on one-two-three, the birds can apply the rule of numerical order to such lofty figures as five and nine.
- Humans
Uncommitted newbies can foil forceful few
Decisions more democratic when individuals with no preset preference join a group.
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- Life
Mere fear shrinks bird families
Just hearing recordings of predators, in the absence of any real danger, caused sparrows to raise fewer babies.
- Life
Biology’s big bang had a long fuse
The fossil record’s earliest troves of animal life are the result of more than 200 million years of evolution.
- Life
Cretaceous Thanksgiving
A fossilized feathered dinosaur dined on bird not long before its own demise.
