Ecology & Zoology

Sloths: A Habitat For Algae, Fungi & Insects

Ever wonder why the slow moving sloth has a slightly greenish hue? Ever consider the sloth at all? Well, perhaps not. Location, location, location, is the mantra for many of us in our macro world, but it is also true for the small world of algae. ...

Article - Heidi Henderson - Aug 11 2019 - 1:27pm

Heracles Inexpectatus- The World's Largest Parrot Has Been Discovered

Palaeontologists have discovered the world's largest parrot, standing up to 1m tall with a massive beak able to crack most food sources, and given it the name Heracles inexpectatus to reflect its Herculean myth-like size and strength and the unexpecte ...

Article - News Staff - Aug 7 2019 - 9:08am

Male Honeybees Inject Toxins During Sex That Cause Temporary Blindness

Though bees can live for years, their mating period is brief so male honeybees use a bee version of Flunitrazepam (Rohypnol- colloquially roofies) to improve their chances of being the successful dad. They inject vision-imparing toxins during sex that caus ...

Article - News Staff - Sep 10 2019 - 10:13am

Ecologists Say Neonicotinoid Seed Treatments Give Birds Anorexia

A team of ecologists exposed Zonotrichia leucophrys (white-crowned sparrows) to the seed treatment known as imidacloprid (in the class of insecticides known as neonicotinoids) and say the measured weight mass declined in just a few hours, which led to the ...

Article - News Staff - Sep 12 2019 - 7:33pm

Palorchestes Azael: Wombat Ancestor Weighed 2,000 Lbs.

When we think of marsupials (carrying young in a pouch) they are small and cute (opossum, wombat) to a little more menacing (kangaroos in boxing gloves) but nothing like  Palorchestid marsupials, an extinct group of Australian megafauna, who were large, ha ...

Article - News Staff - Sep 15 2019 - 1:39pm

How Flawed Is Environmental Law? Ask The Paiute Cutthroat Trout After 8 Years Of Environmental Groups Blocking Its Restoration

Eight years ago I wrote about how environmental lobbyists working for environmental lawyer groups kept the federal government in such a tail-chasing frenzy nothing could ever really get accomplished. My frustration was over the Paiute cutthroat trout, a ra ...

Article - Hank Campbell - Oct 2 2019 - 11:59am

How Varroa Mites Exploit Beekeeping

There has been some ongoing concern about bee colonies, even fears of an impending "colony collapse disorder", but both the fears and the causes have been misplaced, recent studies have shown. Rather than being a mysterious effect due to pesticid ...

Article - News Staff - Oct 2 2019 - 1:39pm

Bee Colony Collapse Disorder Was Caused By Varroa Mites- These Scientists Are Helping Find A Biological Solution

A decade ago there was concern about a mass die-off of bees, and while they rebounded nicely, it shone a light on a problem that has occurred since recordkeeping of bees first began over a thousand years ago. Mass die-offs are common. While it was once bel ...

Article - News Staff - Oct 4 2019 - 4:42pm

Wrangel Island And The Last Of The Woolly Mammoths In 2,000 BC

Global warming did once kill off a once-common species, but it was the transition from the last Ice Age to the current warming period, starting 15,000 years ago. That well-known species was the woolly mammoth but it managed to hang on until 2,000 B.C. Its ...

Article - News Staff - Oct 7 2019 - 10:16am

The Ecology Of Vampire Bats- And Why They Switched From Rainforest Mammals To Cattle

Vampire bats that live in Latin America have switched to blood meals from cattle instead of from rainforest mammals, ecological physiologists report in the Journal of Comparative Physiology B. They say that the conversion of rainforests ecosystems into liv ...

Article - News Staff - Oct 8 2019 - 10:18pm