Wild Biology Research
 | A remarkable new species of bright green palm-viper has been discovered in a threatened cloud forest in Honduras, and is named to honor grassroots conservationist Mario Guifarro, who was assassinated in 2007. Despite being superficially similar to other Honduran palm pitvipers, the closest relative to the new species lives over 600 km to the south in Costa Rica. The study was published in the open access journal Zookeys. ...> Full Article |
Microscopic algae that live within reef-forming corals scoop up available nitrogen, store the excess in crystal form, and slowly feed it to the coral as needed, according to a study published in mBio.
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Is it possible that mammals have the ability to recognize individuals of the same species, whom they know well, by their voice? A new study has found that even in nocturnal, fast-moving animals such as bats, there is an ability to recognize certain vocal aspects of other bats. The study by Hanna Kastein from the University of Veterinary Medicine in Hannover, Germany, and her colleagues is published in the Springer journal Animal Cognition.
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 | Researchers at the University of Strathclyde have discovered that the greater wax moth is capable of sensing sound frequencies of up to 300kHz -- the highest recorded frequency sensitivity of any animal in the natural world. ...> Full Article |
At the current temperatures, all hibernators have probably emerged from their winter hibernation and are enjoying the warm weather. However, this is quite different during the cold season. Many small mammals such as marmots, hedgehogs, bats and some hamsters, and even some birds have a particular skill: they can induce a state of inactivity and reduced metabolic rate to significantly lower their energy consumption when food becomes limited and ambient temperatures drop.
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 | Opposing thumbs, expressive faces, complex social systems: it's hard to miss the similarities between apes and humans. Now a new study with a troop of zoo baboons and lots of peanuts shows that a less obvious trait -- the ability to understand numbers -- also is shared by man and his primate cousins. ...> Full Article |
The Black Widow spider gets its name from the popular belief that female spiders eat their male suitors after mating. A new study by Lenka Sentenska and Stano Pekar from Masaryk University in the Czech Republic finds that male spiders of the Micaria sociabilis species are more likely to eat the females than be eaten. The paper, published in Springer's journal Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology, outlines possible reasons for this behavior.
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Until recently, the only primate known to hibernate as a survival strategy was a creature called the western fat-tailed dwarf lemur, a tropical tree-dweller from the African island of Madagascar. But it turns out this hibernating lemur isn't alone.
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The behavior of seabirds during migration -- including patterns of foraging, rest and flight -- has been revealed in new detail using novel computational analyses and tracking technologies.
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Only within the past 12 years have marine biologists come to learn about the eye-opening characteristics of mystifying sea worms that live and thrive on the skeletons of whale carcasses. Now, scientists at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego describe how Osedax, mouthless and gutless "bone worms," excrete a bone-melting acid to gain entry to the nutrients within whale bones.
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 | Males that spend all their time reacting to their rivals die earlier and are less able to mate later in life according to new research from the University of East Anglia. The research is the first study to quantify the consequences of lifetime exposure to rivals. Scientists looked at fruit flies, however "trade-offs" between reproduction and lifespan are common across the whole animal kingdom. ...> Full Article |
 | As cicadas on the East Coast begin emerging from their 17-year slumber, a spritz of dew drops is all they need to keep their wings fresh and clean. ...> Full Article |
Male humpback whales sing complex songs in tropical waters during the winter breeding season, but they also sing at higher latitudes at other times of the year. NOAA researchers have provided the first detailed description linking humpback whale movements to acoustic behavior on a feeding ground in the Northwest Atlantic.
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Who would have thought that two very different species, a small insect and a furry alpine mammal, would develop a shared food arrangement in the far North?
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Humpback whales are able to pass on hunting techniques to each other, just as humans do, new research has found.
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