Animals
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Health & Medicine
Pigs use mirrors
After some time to play around with a mirror, pigs figure out what to do when they glimpse a reflection of food.
By Susan Milius -
Animals
Spider men weave silken tapestry
It took herculean effort, but Madagascar crafters created an extraordinary piece of woven art from spider silk.
By Janet Raloff -
Animals
Ants in the pants drive away birds
Yellow crazy ants can get so annoying that birds don’t eat their normal fruits, a new study finds.
By Susan Milius -
Animals
Play that monkey music
Man-made music inspired by tamarin calls seems to alter the primates’ emotions, a new study suggests.
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Earth
Oh, rats — there go the snails
A food fad among introduced rats has apparently crashed a once-thriving population of Hawaii’s famed endemic tree snails.
By Susan Milius -
Animals
Oops, missed that fossil iridescence
Nanostructures on a preserved feather offer the first fossil evidence of bird colors not from pigments, a new study says.
By Susan Milius -
Animals
Fruity whiff may inspire new mosquito repellents
Odors from ripening bananas can jam fruit flies’ and mosquitoes’ power to detect carbon dioxide, a new study finds.
By Susan Milius -
Animals
Back off, extinct moa
A New Zealand tree’s peculiar leaves may have served as defenses against long-gone giant birds.
By Susan Milius -
Animals
Vocal abilities lost, found and drowned out
Reports from the meeting of the American Ornithologists' Union
By Susan Milius -
Earth
Rapid evolution may be reshaping forest birds’ wings
Logging during the last century might have driven birds in mature boreal forests toward pointier wings while reforestation in New England led to rounder wings.
By Susan Milius -
Animals
SOS: Call the ants
Emergency ant workers bite at snares, dig and tug to free trapped sisters
By Susan Milius