On Feb. 9, Peter Kaestner stood in the shadow of majestic Tinuy-an Falls on the Philippine island of Mindanao, on the cusp of a record he’d spent seven decades chasing and worried that he’d arrived too late. For years, nobody alive had seen and identified more bird species than Mr. Kaestner. A retired American diplomat, […]
Read MoreTag: your-feed-animals
Could Your Cat Give You the Plague?
Officials in Deschutes County, Ore., announced last week that a local resident had been diagnosed with the plague — and that the resident had probably been infected by a pet cat. The cat, which was symptomatic, died from the infection, but the human patient is currently recovering, said Emily Horton, a public health program manager […]
Read MoreThe Dogs That Live Longest, by a Nose
All dogs go to heaven. But a bulldog might find itself headed there years before a Border terrier, according to a new study of nearly 600,000 British dogs from more than 150 breeds. Large breeds and breeds with flattened faces had shorter average life spans than smaller dogs and those with elongated snouts, the researchers […]
Read MoreEven Rats Are Taking Selfies Now (and Enjoying It)
When Augustin Lignier, a professional photographer in Paris, was in graduate school, he began to ponder the point of picture-taking in the modern world: Why did so many of us feel compelled to photograph our lives and share those images online? It was not a novel question, but it led Mr. Lignier to a surprising […]
Read MoreThe Ancient Back Story of the Slimiest Animal in the Sea
The hagfish, a deep-sea scavenger about the size and shape of a tube sock, has the curious ability to smother itself in its own snot. The mucus is a defense mechanism, released into the water (or in one unfortunate incident, all over an Oregon highway) when the fish feels threatened. Once it hits seawater, a […]
Read MoreIn Colombia, a Park for Anacondas and Anteaters, Where Ranchers Are Now Rangers
Already, though, the rangers had made a difference. They had established the government’s presence in a formerly anything-goes region. Thanks to their outreach in San Martín, they had been invited in November to march in the annual parade celebrating the cuadrillas. Mr. Zorro thought that the invitation was a turning point for the park, a […]
Read MoreWhat to Do With a Bug Named Hitler?
Anophthalmus hitleri was discovered in the former Yugoslavia on June 20, 1932, four months after the Austrian-born Hitler became a German citizen and four days before he demanded, as leader of the Nazi Party, that the government declare martial law throughout the country. The discoverer, a naturalist named Vladimir Kodric, stumbled on the insect in […]
Read MoreBird Flu Is Still Causing Havoc. Here’s The Latest.
Over the last three years, a highly contagious, often deadly form of bird flu has taken a staggering toll on animals around the globe. The virus, known as H5N1, has infected birds in more than 80 countries. It has infiltrated big commercial poultry farms and tiny backyard henhouses, affecting 72 million farmed birds in the […]
Read MoreWhat It Takes to Save the Axolotl
Xochimilco is a large, semirural district in the south of Mexico City, home to a vast network of canals surrounding farming plots called chinampas. Starting around A.D. 900, this maze of earth and water produced food for the Xochimilcas, a Náhuatl speaking people who were among the first to populate the region and engineer its […]
Read MoreCould Longevity Drugs for Dogs Extend Your Pet’s Life?
Longevity drugs are intended for healthy dogs, which changes the risk-benefit calculus. “It’s one thing if a dog is on death’s door and you’re giving them some late-breaking treatment,” said Bev Klingensmith, a Great Dane breeder in Iowa who also has a Great Dane and a golden retriever of her own. “Giving my young, healthy […]
Read MoreMucus-Covered Jellyfish Hint at Dangers of Deep-Sea Mining
A treasure trove of metal is hiding at the bottom of the ocean. Potato-size nodules of iron and manganese litter the seafloor, and metal-rich crusts cover underwater mountains and chimneys along hydrothermal vents. Deep-sea mining companies have set their sights on these minerals, aiming to use them in batteries and electronics. Environmentalists warn that the […]
Read MoreWhy Warblers Flock to Tonier Neighborhoods
At a meeting of urban wildlife researchers in Washington, D.C., in June, one diagram made it into so many PowerPoint presentations that its recurrence became a running joke. The subject, though, was serious: The diagram illustrated the links between structural racism, pernicious landscape features such as urban heat islands, and impacts to biodiversity, and it […]
Read MoreBats Discovered to Have Sex in a Way That’s Similar to Birds
A few years ago, Nicolas Fasel, a biologist at the University of Lausanne in Switzerland, and his colleagues developed a fascination with the penises of serotine bats, a species found in woodlands and the attics of old buildings across Europe and Asia. Serotine bats sport abnormally long penises with wide, heart-shaped heads. When erect, the […]
Read MoreDo Roosters Recognize Themselves in a Mirror? Yes, They Cock-a-Doodle-Doo.
The idea of a chicken running around with its head cut off, inspired by a real-life story, may make it seem like the bird doesn’t have much going on upstairs. But Sonja Hillemacher, an animal behavior researcher at the University of Bonn in Germany, always knew that chickens were more than mindless sources of wings […]
Read MoreScientists Use CRISPR to Make Chickens More Resistant to Bird Flu
Scientists have used the gene-editing technology known as CRISPR to create chickens that have some resistance to avian influenza, according to a new study that was published in the journal Nature Communications on Tuesday. The study suggests that genetic engineering could potentially be one tool for reducing the toll of bird flu, a group of […]
Read MoreIn the Big City, Wildlife Researchers Are On the Prowl
Early one morning last month, Laura Dudley Plimpton found herself in Forest Park, in Queens, staring at a pair of captured raccoons. It was not the first time that Ms. Plimpton, an ecologist at Columbia University, had caught two of them in a cage trap designed for one. But typically when that happened, she would […]
Read MoreTo Knock an Elephant Off Balance, Bring Out a Giant Blindfold
For a 7,600-pound Asian elephant, simply putting one foot in front of the other can be a high-stakes proposition: A trip or tumble can result in grievous injury. “The bigger you are, the harder you fall,” said John Hutchinson, an expert on large animal locomotion at the Royal Veterinary College in Britain. “If an elephant […]
Read MoreIn Peru, a Fossil-Rich Desert Faces Unruly Development
Millions of years ago, this desert in Peru was a gathering place for fantastical sea creatures: whales that walked, dolphins with walrus faces, sharks with teeth as large as a human face, red-feathered penguins, aquatic sloths. They reproduced in the gentle waters of a shallow lagoon buffered by hills that still wrap across the landscape […]
Read MoreIn Peru, a Fossil-Rich Desert Faces Unruly Development
Millions of years ago, this desert in Peru was a gathering place for fantastical sea creatures: whales that walked, dolphins with walrus faces, sharks with teeth as large as a human face, red-feathered penguins, aquatic sloths. They reproduced in the gentle waters of a shallow lagoon buffered by hills that still wrap across the landscape […]
Read MoreA Mystery Species Was Discovered in Trafficked Pangolin Scales
The pangolin is an absurd animal, a mammal that’s dressed up as a reptile with a coat of scales, sharp claws and sticky saliva. Wildlife experts often say they are the most trafficked mammals in the world as poachers target pangolins for their meat and their scales, which are used in traditional medicines. There are […]
Read MoreArsenic Preserved the Animals, But Killed the Museum
Usually, you go to the zoo to look at live animals. But at the Great Plains Zoo in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, people also went to see the dead ones. The attraction, called the Delbridge Museum of Natural History, hosted one of the most impressive taxidermy collections in the country, with some 150 animals from […]
Read MoreThis Tiny Parasitic Wasp Can Drill Through Plastic
By the time Matvey Nikelshparg was 13, he was obsessed with parasitoid wasps, tiny insects that lay their eggs on or inside other bugs. Under a microscope in a lab he had assembled at home, he discovered that one species had a startling superpower: It could use an organ that protrudes from its abdomen to […]
Read MoreYou May Have This Blobby Animal to Thank for Your Nervous System
For hundreds of millions of years, pancake-shaped animals the size of a needle tip have been roving the seas with an appetite for tasty microbes and algae. They’re called placozoans, and are among the simplest of the major animal lineages. As simple as they are, a team of researchers has found compelling evidence of neuron-like […]
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