The wasps that rule the world

May 22nd, 2015 Amazing, Interactions 1 min read

On Costa Rica, inside a wheel of sticky silk, an orb weaver spider is doomed to die. She is a formidable predator, but this Leucauge argyra has fallen victim to something even worse. A white grub is stuck to her abdomen, and it’s growing bigger while the spider shrinks. One day, the spider stops building her usual orb web. Instead, she keeps repeating the first few steps,…

Caterpillars contort their bodies to look like bird poop

May 22nd, 2015 Amazing 1 min read

How to ward off hungry birds if you’re a tasty caterpillar? Try to look like something really distasteful: bird poop. Some caterpillars are masters of disguise, fine-tuning their poo mimicry with a grab bag of tricks—using color, pattern, choice of resting place, and, sometimes, contorting their bodies to match the squiggly shape of bird droppings. In a paper published online this month in Animal Behaviour, scientists…

How to solve the global fish crisis? Ban fishing on the high seas

May 22nd, 2015 Uncategorized 2 min read

With demand for seafood increasing and numerous fish species declining due to overfishing and other threats, scientists are proposing a seemingly drastic solution: close the high seas to fishing and turn it into “a fish bank for the world.” Don’t worry, they say, doing so won’t affect the fishing industry’s economic returns, and will ensure that profits from fisheries are more equitably distributed. Marine areas…

Which animal has the most sensitive eyes?

Feb 19th, 2015 Amazing, Life 1 min read

The human eye is one of evolution’s greatest achievements. It can see tiny dust specks and huge mountains, near or far, in full colour. Backed by the processing power of our brains, it can also pick out movement and help us identify the people we love just by their faces. One of the eye’s best tricks is so good, you don’t notice it. When you…