Ecology & Zoology

There is lots of speculation about the impact of climate change on polar bears but little data. Society needs to understand the potential impact of sea ice retreats but polar bears are difficult…

The sleeping patterns of baby birds are similar to that of baby mammals they even appear to change in the same way as it does in humans. Studying barn owls in the wild, researchers from the Max…

Raising fish in tanks  doesn't help them all that much when they are released into the wild - but there may be an easy fix: put in hiding places and obstacles. It makes fish smarter and improves…

In what the authors are calling perhaps the most comprehensive and definitive effort to date, zoologists say they have explained the processes that drove male mammals to adopt social monogamy as a…

2 000 years ago, Roman fishermen knew that some species of fish liked to gather under floating objects. No one knew why and it didn't matter, that behavioral mechanism was just used to catch more…

In J.R.R. Tolkeins's fantasy epic "The Lord of the Rings", a hobbit discovers a giant in the caves under Mt. Doom. More recently, another famous hobbit helped discover a much smaller kind of spider.…

When we want to blow our minds with the sheer vastness of nature, we often turn to astronomy. In fact, we use the word astronomical to mean really a whole lot. But today, I'd like to make a case…

Insect limbs can move without muscles – and a new study helps to explain how insects control their movements using a close interplay of neuronal control and 'clever biomechanical tricks', which…

The ancient Romans were the first to officially discovered that rotating crops improves plant nutrition and inhibits the spread of disease. While it's common wisdom today, science is often about…

Fish is good for you so health advocates would prefer that people eat more of it. Environmentalists don't want fish to be depleted while natural food advocates don't want food that isn't free-range.…