Animals

The wild denizens that share our planet, including videos, photo essays, and news on recently discovered—or increasingly rare—species.

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Using rodenticides is projected to increase and may be contributing to declines in many carnivore species around the world.
Environment

Rat poison is moving up through food chains, threatening carnivores around the world

By Meghan P. Keating / The Conversation

Ontocetus posti has post-canine teeth, a larger lower canine, and a fused and short mandibular symphysis.
Environment

New species of extinct walrus discovered

By Laura Baisas

Colorful atlantic puffin sitting on a cliff
Environment

In Iceland, humans throwing baby puffins is a good thing

By Alisha McDarris

Chrysalis attached to tree branch with silk
Animals

Butterflies anchor cocoons with silk Velcro and seat-belts

By Andrew Paul

a close up of a burmese python.
Animals

The 2024 Florida Python Challenge begins

By Laura Baisas

a lemur in an enclosure stares into a takeout container
Animals

Lemurs use smell, social cues, and superior memories to find treats

By Laura Baisas

A deceased blue tit is being held in a womans hand
Environment

More than a billion birds could be dying from flying into buildings each year in US

By Lauren Leffer

The newly discovered Paragonaster hoeimaruae. There are many types of starfish and this one is particularly adapted to living in sandy, muddy waters, a feature the researchers want to learn more about.
Environment

New, vibrant starfish discovered in Japan

By Laura Baisas

two sea lions swim in blue water, with their heads above the water
Animals

Sea lion camera crews help scientists map unexplored seabeds

By Laura Baisas

bee on dandelion
Environment

Air pollution makes it harder for bees to smell flowers

By Katarina Zimmer / Knowable Magazine

an illustration of a small penguin with light black, yellow, and white feathers on a new zealand beach
Animals

Tiny fossil reveals when penguins evolved their surprisingly useful wings

By Laura Baisas

An artist’s reconstruction of Shishania aculeata as it would have appeared in life as viewed from the top, side and bottom (left to right). This early mollusk lived about 514 million years ago.
Animals

A ‘rotting little plastic bag’ was actually a 514 million-year-old fossil

By Laura Baisas

a fruit fly intestine. it is a long and narrow coiled tube with green coloration from dye
Animals

Swapping genes can help fruit flies regenerate cells

By Laura Baisas

A pair of tigers rescued from Joe Exotic’s G.W. Exotic Animal Park, popularized by Netflix’s “Tiger King,” relax at the Wild Animal Sanctuary in Keenesburg, Colorado.
Environment

After ‘Tiger King’: Are 20,000 big cats caged in the U.S.? Highly unlikely.

By Peter Andrew Smith / Undark

A rare visitor, a Mandarin Duck, showed up in Central Park, New York City in 2018.
Environment

Why are there so many birds?

By Lauren Leffer

a lobster with blue, pink, and purple coloring on a white tray
Animals

One in 100 million cotton candy lobster caught in New Hampshire

By Laura Baisas

Wound care and amputation in a Camponotus maculatus ant.
Science

Ants perform teeny tiny operations to save their injured comrades

By Popular Science Team

an orange, black, and white monarch butterfly on a pink milkweed flower
Animals

How everyone can help monarch butterflies

By Laura Baisas

Artist’s impression of the lobate macrofossils living 2.1 billion years ago in a shallow marine inland sea created by the collision of two continents.
Animals

Study claims life tried to evolve 1.5 billion years earlier than we thought

By Andrew Paul

a pair of brown frogs mating, with the male on the female's back
Animals

The upside-down sex lives of Charles Darwin’s frogs

By Laura Baisas

a firefly with its bottom half illuminated
Environment

A new theory on why fireflies glow—and why they need help

By Laura Baisas

Nine-banded Armadillo, Dasypus novemcinctus, in water, Santa Clara Ranch, southern Texas, United States.
Environment

‘Chaos is the norm now:’ The blurry line between invasive and range-expanding species

By Lauren Leffer

a walrus calf with a cut on its right eye is cared for by two technicians
Animals

Abandoned Pacific walrus calf rescued in Alaska

By Laura Baisas

dead bird specimens with blue and green plumage in museum storage
Animals

All living birds share an ‘iridescent’ ancestor

By Laura Baisas

an illustration of an long cylindrical arthropod. it has big blue eyes, a body that looks like a taco shell, several short red legs, and a tail
Animals

This taco-shaped critter is a big (evolutionary) deal

By Laura Baisas

four red hens in a line. two are looking straight ahead, one is looking right, and the other is looking left. they have an expression that reads as suprise
Agriculture

Not to ruffle feathers, but chickens blush

By Laura Baisas

an illustration of two mouse-like animals in a forest, with a stegosaurus walking by and a mosquito flying over them
Animals

Baby teeth reveal surprisingly long lifespans of small Jurassic mammals

By Laura Baisas

a peacock butterfly on a pink plant. its wings are primarily red, with black, yellow, and blue circles
Animals

Butterflies and moths suck up pollen with static electricity

By Laura Baisas

Great White Shark (Carcharodon carcharias) breaching ocean in an attack.
Environment

Sharks are testing positive for cocaine

By Andrew Paul

five chimpanzeess sitting in tall, green grass
Animals

Chimp conversations can take on human-like chaos

By Laura Baisas

a brown dog looks up with a longing expression
Animals

Your dog can probably smell your stress

By Laura Baisas

An old female rhesus macaque eats alone on the island of Cayo Santiago. As female macaques age, the size of their social network shrinks.
Science

It’s not just us: Other animals change their social habits in old age

By Tim Vernimmen / Knowable Magazine

a crocodile, kangaroos, and shark
Environment

15 photographs documenting the silly, serene, and savage side of the animal kingdom

By Popular Science Team

a bear lays flat on its belly on a rocky beach with its legs projected backwards
Environment

It’s sploot season: Animals strike a pose to chill out

By Popular Science Team

This rotifer has just survived a life-threatening infection. When a fungal disease attacked, she switched on hundreds of genes that her ancestors copied from microbes, including antibiotic recipes stolen from bacteria.
Environment

No sex? No problem. These tiny, asexual animals steal genes to make their own medicine 

By Lauren Leffer

a bee kicks away an ant
Animals

Ant gets bee-slapped, and other strange bug moments

By Laura Baisas

a baby crocodile hatches from an egg, surrounded by other eggs.
Animals

106 critically endangered Siamese crocodile eggs spotted in Cambodia

By Laura Baisas

dog skull
Environment

What does a pug skull look like? University digitizes skulls of 152 dog breeds.

By Popular Science Team

a 3D rendering of three early humans butchering a giant armadillo
Animals

Early humans butchered enormous armadillos

By Laura Baisas

Nubian spitting cobra (
Animals

Breakthrough cobra venom antidote discovered

By Andrew Paul

a long, dark brown millipede crawling on brown and green leaves
Animals

Expedition finds a 10-inch long millipede lost to science for 126 years

By Laura Baisas

The English women's athletics team, the appearance of the first UK female athletes at international Olympics, Sweden, Stockholm 1912.
Science

The Olympics has been obsessed with sex for centuries

By Popular Science Team

Cat Falling
Science

How animals use physics

By Tom Siegfried / Knowable Magazine

Dragonfly resting on flower
Animals

Dragonflies reveal how toxic mercury moves in nature

By Andrew Paul

A blue Bird Buddy Smart Bird Feeder filled with seed is mounted to a green post.
Gear

The Bird Buddy is the best bird feeder camera at its best price ever for Prime Day

By Stan Horaczek

several snakes entwined together on a rock
Animals

Ssssso many snakes: Watch a ‘mega-den’ of rattlesnakes in real time

By Laura Baisas

A eufy pet camera in a pattern on a plain background.
Gear

The 50+ best Prime Day pet sales, chosen by our editors

By Amanda Reed

beluga whales
Environment

Beluga Whale Live Cam brings the ‘canaries of the sea’ to your screen

By Laura Baisas

Beautiful cat on red background
Environment

Why do cats make biscuits?

By RJ Mackenzie

harvester ants
Environment

How ants acts for the common good of the colony

By Tom Hawking

Close up of bald eagle
Animals

Hunters’ bullets are poisoning bald eagles

By Andrew Paul

Bag filled with smuggled snakes
Animals

Chinese Customs caught man with 104 snakes in his pants

By Andrew Paul

An illustration of newly discovered crocodile relative named Benggwigwishingasuchus eremicarminis on the coast of an ancient ocean called Panthalassa.
Animals

Say hello to the surprising crocodile relative Benggwigwishingasuchus eremicarminis

By Laura Baisas

a thick mammoth foot preserved in permafrost. it is round and dark brown
Animals

Woolly mammoth ‘jerky’ preserves 52,000-year-old fossil chromosomes

By Laura Baisas

Millions Of Red Crabs Make Their Way To Ocean As Part Of Annual Migration On Christmas Island
Science

Millions of crabs scuttle across this island every year

By Lauren Leffer

a male lion sits in a tree
Environment

Lion brothers take risky swim across crocodile-infested channel

By Laura Baisas

an illustration of a large shark jumping out of the water and eating a winged dinosaur
Animals

When the ocean got hot, the sharks bulked up

By Laura Baisas

A sampling of haplochromine cichlid fish.
Environment

One fish, two fish, 3,000 fish …

By Curtis Abraham / Knowable Magazine

Barred owls have expanded their range across North America, from east to west.
Environment

These owls spread from east to west. Not everyone is pleased.

By Jude Isabella/Hakai Magazine

lanternfly
Environment

What’s going on with spotted lanternflies?

By Lauren Leffer

Octopus in water
Environment

The ‘smart’ animal club keeps getting bigger

By Mack DeGeurin

a nearly complete skeleton of a salamander-like creature that lived 300 million years ago. it's head is round and shaped like a toilet seat
Animals

This giant tetrapod sucked in prey with its ‘toilet seat-shaped’ head

By Laura Baisas

cone shaped skull
Science

These viking ladies tried to start a trend for pointy heads, but it didn’t take off

By Popular Science Team

a striped cat scratching a grey armchair
Animals

Why some cats scratch more than others

By Laura Baisas