Animals

Animals

Orangutans take motherhood to extremes, nursing young for more than eight years

Weaning in orangutans has been tricky to see in the wild, so researchers turned to dental tests to reveal long nursing period.

Climate

Higher temperatures could trigger an uptick in damselfly cannibalism

Experiments in the lab suggest that increases in temperature could indirectly lead to an increase in cannibalistic damselfly nymphs.

Animals

Blennies have a lot of fang for such little fishes

Unlike snakes, blennies evolved fangs before venom, through probably not because of any need to hunt big prey.

Animals

Watch male cuttlefish fight over a female in the wild

For the first time, researchers have observed the competitive mating behaviors of the European cuttlefish in the field.

Genetics

Selfish genes hide for decades in plain sight of worm geneticists

Crossing wild Hawaiian C. elegans with the familiar lab strain reveals genes that benefit themselves by making mother worms poison offspring who haven’t inherited the right stuff.

Paleontology

Ancient whale tells tale of when baleen whales had teeth

A 36 million-year-old whale fossil bridges the gap between ancient toothy predators and modern filter-feeding baleen whales.

Animals

Why create a model of mammal defecation? Because everyone poops

Mammals that defecate in the same fashion as humans all excrete waste within the same time frame, no matter their size, a new study finds.

Animals

Seabirds use preening to decide how to divvy up parenting duties

Seabirds in poor condition may communicate this information to their partner by delaying or withholding preening.

Animals

In Florida, they’re fighting mosquitoes by meddling with their sex lives

As an alternative to genetically modified mosquitoes, Florida skeeter police are testing one of two strategies that use bacteria to meddle with insect sex lives.

Animals

Trackers may tip a warbler’s odds of returning to its nest

Geolocator devices that help track migrating birds could also hamper migration survival or timing.

Neuroscience

Internal compass guides fruit fly navigation

Experiments show how flies navigate — and why this might be important for humans.

Animals

Sea creatures’ sticky ‘mucus houses’ catch ocean carbon really fast

A new deepwater laser tool measures the carbon-filtering power of snot nets created by little-known sea animals called giant larvaceans.