Animals
- Animals
Whale hunts: Discussions on lifting the ‘ban’
The International Whaling Commission will formally address its future, next week, at a meeting in St. Petersburg, Fla. Once comprised of whaling nations, the IWC now includes member states just as likely to condemn any hunting of cetaceans. That internal tension is guiding the meeting’s agenda. On it’s plate: whether to overturn the organization’s long-standing moratorium on commercial whaling.
- Earth
Florida’s big chill may have hammered corals near shore
January cold snap caused rare wintertime coral bleaching and die-offs for Florida’s coral reefs.
- Humans
Pet tarantulas can pose a hairy threat
A new medical case report reaffirms why even largely non-venomous tarantulas can make questionable pets. Some respond to stress by expelling a cloud of barbed hairs that can lodge in especially vulnerable tissues. Like your eyeball.
- Earth
For coots, hatching order is crucial ID
When birds sneak eggs into others' nest, mom and dad can learn to find their own.
- Life
Bird feeding, migration could be splitting a species
German birds that spend the off-season at U.K. birdfeeders now look slightly different from neighbors that migrate to Spain
- Animals
Little push turns snail lefties to righties
Bumping an early embryo’s cells can switch the direction of its spiral.
- Life
Fecal architecture is beetle armor
Predators have a hard time getting through the layers of excrement some beetle moms give their young.
- Animals
Classic view of leaf-cutter ants overlooked nitrogen-fixing partner
A fresh look at a fungus-insect partnership that biologists have studied for more than a century uncovers a role for bacteria.
- Life
Killer bees aren’t so smart
Brains are probably not what powers the invasive bee’s takeover from European honeybees
- Health & Medicine
Genome 10K: A new ark
Featured blog: Researchers are working to catalog the DNA sequences of just about every vertebrate genus.
- Animals
Textbook case of color-changing spider reopened
Female crab spiders switch colors to match flowers but may not fool their prey
- Animals
Scent of alarm identifies male bed bugs
When mistaken for females, the guys release an alarming pheromone.
