A unique experiment in a Canadian lake has found that the timing of when ice forms can have a big impact on the organisms that live in it the following year. The timing of when ice forms on lakes in the winter can have big knock-on effects on life in the water the next spring […]
New Scientist
‘Rediscovered’ toad was known to Colombian locals for decades
A critically endangered harlequin toad, known as the starry night toad, has been documented by biologists for the first time since 1991 in the mountains of Colombia. But unlike other such stories of “rediscovered” species, this one was never really lost – the local Arhuaco people knew exactly where the toad, which they call “gouna”, […]
People are using mosquito nets for fishing – and it works too well
Mosquito nets designed to help stop the transmission of malaria are finding a new use – fishing. However, the way they are used could have destructive consequences for both food security and coastal ecosystems. Read more in New Scientist.
Wise elk learn to outsmart hunters and tell apart their weapons
As female elk get older, they also get wiser: they learn how to avoid getting shot by hunters, and appear to adapt their behaviour to the types of weapon the hunters carry. Hunting by humans is known to affect how elk behave, selecting for more cautious behaviours by killing more of the bolder animals. But […]
Monkey mafia steal your stuff, then sell it back for a cracker
Long-tailed macaques living near an Indonesian temple have figured out how to run a ransom racket on visiting tourists. The monkeys grab valuables, such as glasses, hats, cameras or, in one case, a wad of cash from the ticket booth, then wait for temple staff to offer them food before dropping their ill-gotten gains and […]
Snowball Earth melting led to freshwater ocean 2 kilometres deep
A little more than 600 million years ago, you could have drunk from the ocean. After an extreme ice age known as snowball Earth, in which glaciers extended to the tropics and ice up to a kilometre thick covered the oceans, the melt formed a thick freshwater layer that floated on the super-salty oceans. Read more […]
Isolated crayfish are more resistant to the effects of alcohol
For crayfish at least, a more sociable life makes booze work quicker. When crayfish were put in water containing a little alcohol, the ones who had been kept on their own over the preceding week took longer to show signs of alcohol exposure – such as tail flips – than those who had been living […]
Oldest tooth filling was made by an Ice Age dentist in Italy
Scared of the dentist? Be glad you don’t live in the Ice Age. A pair of 13,000-year-old front teeth found in Italy contain the earliest known use of fillings – made out of bitumen. The teeth, two upper central incisors belonging to one person, were discovered at the Riparo Fredian site near Lucca in northern […]
US bill restricts use of science in environmental policymaking
The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is facing a future in which its hands will be tied on making many policies if a new bill becomes law. Last week the US House of Representatives passed a bill, the HONEST Act, that would prevent the EPA from basing any of its regulations on science that is […]
Flying foxes are facing extinction on islands across the world
Flying foxes are in deep trouble. Almost half the species of this type of fruit bat are now threatened with extinction. The bats face a variety of threats, including deforestation and invasive species, but the main one is hunting by humans, says Christian Vincenot, an ecological modeller at Kyoto University in Japan, who highlights their […]