Wildlife

The latest on the fascinating flora and fauna of our planet.

Latest in Wildlife

Aerial view of a hot air balloon over Namib desert. The circular “fairy circles” are derived from any vegetation & surrounded by tall grass.
Science

Mysterious ‘fairy circles’ may appear on three different continents

By Laura Baisas

A tarantula with a mostly black body, but bright blue legs and pincers. Chilobrachys natanicharum is the first tarantula species found in Thailand’s mangrove trees. CREDIT: Yuranan Nanthaisong/ZooKeys.
Environment

Meet the first electric blue tarantula known to science

By Laura Baisas

South Africa’s Missing sharks have been found
Environment

South Africa’s Missing sharks have been found

By David Shiffman / Hakai Magazine

Grizzly bear mom and cubs crossing road in Yellowstone National Park
Environment

Grizzlies are getting killed by roads, but the risks are bigger than roadkill

By Hannah Seo

A Caribbean box jellyfish on a black background. It has a round, bell shaped body, with about 11 visible tentacles. It also has four parallel brain-like structures with roughly 1,000 nerve cells in each.
Environment

These 24-eyed jellyfish learn from their mistakes

By Laura Baisas

Manatee in a patch of sunlight
Environment

Sea the beauty of the world’s oceans with these 12 award-worthy photos

By Popular Science Team

A pied tamarin monkey sits on a large rope. Pied tamarin monkeys live in a small geographic range in Brazil, where they eat fruits, flowers, and various tree gums and saps.
Environment

As humans get louder, monkeys mark more territory

By Laura Baisas

Egyptian fruit bats on a fruit feeder at a zoo
Environment

How do bats stay cancer-free? The answer could be lifesaving for humans.

By Jocelyn Solis-Moreira

A dissected ant and where you can see the encapsulated parasites (white oval structures) spilling out of the hind body.
Science

This parasite deploys mucus slime balls to make ‘zombie ants’

By Laura Baisas

An Australian lungfish named Methuselah swims in a tank at the Steinhart Aquarium. The fish has a flat snout, olive-green scales, and a long torpedo-shaped body.
Science

World’s oldest living aquarium fish could be 100 years young

By Laura Baisas

Giant African land snail, an invasive species in Florida, on a red bucket
Environment

Invasive snails are chomping through Florida, and no one can stop them

By Maddi Langweil

A giant panda eats a green plant.
Environment

‘Jet lag’ could be messing with pandas’ natural mating behaviors

By Laura Baisas

Plastic fishing gear brings in a better catch, but there’s a big tradeoff
Environment

Plastic fishing gear brings in a better catch, but there’s a big tradeoff

By Alastair Bland/Hakai Magazine

Can animals give birth to twins?
Environment

Can animals give birth to twins?

By Michael Jaffe and Tracy Jaffe/The Conversation

Revo Foods 3D-printed salmon
Technology

The world’s first 3D-printed salmon is hitting store shelves, and it looks kind of good

By Andrew Paul

A gray tufted titmouse perches on a scientist's hand.
Science

What songbirds can teach us about being smart

By Jocelyn Solis-Moreira

A rare fish with ‘hands’ is spotted in a surprising place
Environment

A rare fish with ‘hands’ is spotted in a surprising place

By Sara Kiley Watson

Dogs and wolves remember where you hide their food
Science

Dogs and wolves remember where you hide their food

By Laura Baisas

Oysters can’t sleep—and your lights might be the cause
Environment

Oysters can’t sleep—and your lights might be the cause

By Hannah Seo/Hakai Magazine

Possum eating on a doorstep
Environment

11 jaw-dropping photos of marsupials, mushrooms, and more

By Popular Science Team

two jackdaws (Corvus monedula) on a branch
Science

These crow relatives put food over friendship

By Sara Kiley Watson

An orca whale swims around an ice flow with a crabeater seal and penguin on the ice.
Environment

New series offers an intimate look into how climate change impacts the lives of wildlife

By Laura Baisas

Polar bear decline is directly linked to greenhouse gas emissions
Environment

Polar bear decline is directly linked to greenhouse gas emissions

By Bob Berwyn/Inside Climate News

How an internet sleuth rekindled hope for the survival of the clown wedgefish
Environment

How an internet sleuth rekindled hope for the survival of the clown wedgefish

By Brian Howey/Hakai Magazine

An artist’s illustration of the 25 million year old Ditjimanka Lumakoala blackae, featuring (left to right) the wallaby-sized herbivore Muramura williamsi, an extinct koala relative named Madakoala devis,i and the calf-size lizard called Ilaria lawsone.
Environment

Scientists discover a cat-sized ancient koala in Australia

By Laura Baisas

Two monkeys sitting in a forest. Dartmouth researchers report that apes and early humans evolved more flexible shoulders and elbows than monkeys to safely get out of trees. For early humans, these versatile appendages would have been essential for gathering food and deploying tools for hunting and defense.
Science

Our tree-climbing ancestors evolved our abilities to throw far and reach high

By Laura Baisas

A kākāpō sitting in its burrow. They can live up to 90 years and forage on the ground for food since they are flightless birds.
Environment

The next frontier in saving the world’s heaviest parrots: genome sequencing

By Laura Baisas

Two Atlantic puffins stand on a white rock above the ocean, with another group of puffins in the background, Atlantic puffins are sometimes nicknamed “sea parrots,” and their chicks hatch in Maine in early July.
Environment

Maine’s puffins show another year of remarkable resiliency

By Laura Baisas

A manatee swims through blue water, surrounded by a school of fish
Science

Florida’s aquatic animals prepare early for storms like Hurricane Idalia

By Helen Bradshaw

An artistic reconstruction of Kylinxia, a relative of present day insects and crustaceans. It has two extended forelimbs, a round and segmented body, and three eyes on its head.
Environment

A three-eyed organism roamed the seas half a billion years ago

By Laura Baisas

A magnetic resonance image of the patient’s brain by fluid-attenuated inversion recovery showing an enhancing right frontal lobe lesion (left). A live third-stage larval form of Ophidascaris robertsi removed from the patient’s right frontal lobe (right).
Health

‘Alive and wriggling’ worm survived in woman’s body and brain for at least a year

By Laura Baisas

Two Emperor penguin chicks standing on sea ice in Antarctica.
Environment

Emperor penguins suffer ‘unprecedented’ breeding failure as sea ice disappears

By Laura Baisas

A hogfish swims near the Florida Keys. It has spikes on top and a pointy snout.
Environment

Hogfish ‘see’ using their skin

By Laura Baisas

This is what happens when feral cows take over a remote Alaskan island
Environment

This is what happens when feral cows take over a remote Alaskan island

By Jude Isabella/Hakai Magazine

A coral reef just off of an island in Palau. Coral reefs in Palau provide critical habitats for a number of species and provide a storm barrier.
Environment

Some Pacific coral reefs can keep pace with a warming ocean

By Laura Baisas

The truth behind animal resistance memes
Environment

The truth behind animal resistance memes

By Alexandra Isfahani-Hammond / The Conversation

Elkhorn coral fragments in lab
Environment

The heroic effort to save Florida’s coral reef from a historic heatwave

By Michael Childress/The Conversation

Dead humback whale on beach from aerial view
Environment

Dead whales and dinosaur eggs: 7 fascinating images by researchers

By Popular Science Team

Members of the Dutch Tall Ship Oosterschelde wave goodbye from the quay in Rotterdam on August 4, 2023. The Rotterdam ship departs for a two-year world tour that scientist Charles Darwin made two centuries ago.
Environment

Mission to recreate Darwin’s scientific Beagle voyage sets sail

By Laura Baisas

Artist impression of the stem pinniped Potamotherium valletoni swimming in his natural, freshwater environment. Grasses and plants grow below the animal, that has whiskers, legs, and flippers.
Environment

Hungry seals may have begun following their whiskers 23 million years ago

By Laura Baisas

A new snake species named Tachymenoides harrisonfordi was discovered during an expedition in Peru in May 2022. The copper scaled snake is seen here coiled on some brown grass.
Environment

Harrison Ford’s latest namesake is an Andean snake species

By Laura Baisas

Four bivalve species found along the Maine coast, including the Northern Quahog, Eastern Oyster, a steamer clam, and a blue mussel presented together in a bed of seaweed at low tide.
Environment

Popular shellfish resist extinction in surprising ways

By Laura Baisas

A gray wolf howling in the woods. The wolves come in many colors including white, tan, black, and brown.
Environment

A new pack of endangered gray wolves is roaming Northern California

By Laura Baisas

Talpa hakkariensis, found in the Hakkari region of southeastern Turkey, was identified as a new species of mole, highly distinctive in terms of both its morphology and DNA. The mole is peeking out of an underground burrow.
Environment

These moles may have been hiding for 3 million years

By Laura Baisas

An illustration of an ancient whale against a sea-blue background.
Science

This tiny, 8-foot long whale swam off Egypt’s coast 41 million years ago

By Jocelyn Solis-Moreira

The Grand Prismatic Spring at Yellowstone National Park, with steam rising and mountains in the distance. Temperatures at Yellowstone’s famous hot springs can reach 198 degrees Fahrenheit.
Environment

Don’t lick the toads and other things to avoid at national parks

By Laura Baisas

A male peacock displaying his signature blue and green plumage.
Environment

Miami suburb turns to vasectomies to solve its peacock problem

By Laura Baisas

A man is looking in a glass case of coprolites collected in Nong Yakong village, Chaiyaphum Province, Thailand.
Environment

Rare parasites found in 200 million-year-old reptile poop

By Laura Baisas

Reconstruction of Hupehsuchus about to engulf a shoal of shrimp. The ancient lizard widely opens its skinny snout and large mouth to swallow a large ball of shrimp.
Environment

The planet’s first filter feeder could be this extinct marine reptile

By Laura Baisas

A Heliconius butterfly with black, orange, and white on its wings.
Environment

Butterflies can remember specific flower foraging routes

By Laura Baisas

best bird feeders
Gear

The best bird feeders of 2024

By Julian Vittorio

A long and skinny silver trumpetfish uses a colorful parrotfish as camouflage.
Environment

Trumpetfish use other fish as camouflage

By Laura Baisas

Crab in ocean reaching with pincher.
Environment

As oceans become more acidic, creatures could struggle to smell

By Ethan Freedman/Hakai Magazine

A woodpecker uses a bird feeder. Interest in bird feeding surged in 115 countries during early COVD-19 lockdowns.
Environment

People around the world got really into feeding birds during the pandemic

By Laura Baisas

An artist's rendition of the Perucetus colossus.
Science

This giant sea cow-like whale may have been the heaviest creature to ever live on Earth

By Sara Kiley Watson

Porites rus corals and scuba diver
Environment

Coral is reproducing in broad daylight

By Chloe Glad/Hakai Magazine

A moth called a tobacco budworm on a green leaf. Moths like the tobacco budworm use pheromone signaling to find mates.
Environment

How male tobacco budworm moths found their perfect cologne

By Laura Baisas

Artistic reconstruction of a group of Burgessomedusa phasmiformis swimming in the Cambrian sea.
Environment

Jellyfish may have been roaming the seas for at least 500 million years

By Laura Baisas

Side view of woman's hand feeding horseback on sunny day
Health

Why studying horses could help humans stay healthy, too

By Jane Manfredi/The Conversation

wolf pack on rock formation
Environment

Howls, butt sniffs, and pee sprays: understanding animal languages

By Eva Meijer/MIT Press Reader

A scanning electron picture of a female Panagrolaimus kolymaensis nematode.
Environment

Recently awoken 46,000-year-old nematodes already have 100 generations of babies

By Laura Baisas

A pink river dolphin, or boto, displaying aerial behavior in the Mamirauá Sustainable Development Reserve.
Environment

Eavesdropping on pink river dolphins could help save them

By Laura Baisas

Red7Marine kittiwake offshore wind farm habitat
Technology

Artificial nests could give endangered birds a home near new offshore wind farm

By Andrew Paul

Get up close to eagles, owls, hawks, and more with the best bird watching binoculars.
Gear

The best bird-watching binoculars in 2024

By Charlotte Nash

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