Imagine a creature that predates the dinosaurs by hundreds of millions of years, yet plays a critical role in safeguarding human health today. Meet the horseshoe crab — a "living fossil" whose blood has quietly underpinned modern medicine for the past 50 years. An Ancient Body With an Unusual Blood Type These helmet-shaped arthropods, with their spiky tails and five pairs … [Read more...] about Ancient Protectors: The Vulnerable Horseshoe Crab and its Vital Role in Modern Medicine
Wildlife & Nature
Why Frogs Never Need to Take a Sip — Their Skin Does It All
Set a bowl of water in front of a frog on a hot day, and it won't do what you might expect. Instead of lapping it up, the frog is more likely to simply sit down in it — and within moments, its body will pull in all the moisture it needs without a single swallow. That's exactly what one Reddit user, going by FootLoosePickleJuice, captured on video: a pet frog settling into a … [Read more...] about Why Frogs Never Need to Take a Sip — Their Skin Does It All
Endangered Western Quolls Are Breeding Successfully After Being Reintroduced to the Wild
Ecologists at Mt Gibson Wildlife Sanctuary in Western Australia have confirmed a major conservation milestone: western quolls, also known by their Noongar name chuditch, are successfully breeding in the wild after being reintroduced to an area where the species had been locally extinct for around a century. What Was Found During a routine wildlife survey, the Australian … [Read more...] about Endangered Western Quolls Are Breeding Successfully After Being Reintroduced to the Wild
Extraordinary Discovery: Orangutan from Borneo Masters the Art of Fishing with Spear Tool
A photograph taken on the Indonesian island of Kaja, off Borneo, captured a moment few people ever get to witness: a wild male orangutan, braced against overhanging branches above a river, using a wooden pole to try to spear fish swimming below. The image was taken by wildlife photographer Gerd Schuster, co-author of the 2008 book Thinkers of the Jungle: The Orangutan … [Read more...] about Extraordinary Discovery: Orangutan from Borneo Masters the Art of Fishing with Spear Tool
A Butterfly Landed on a Frog’s Head in West Java — and the Photos Are Going Viral Again
Freelance photographer Kurit Afsheen didn't expect much when he set up outside his home in Tangerang, West Java, Indonesia, to photograph a dumpy tree frog resting on a branch. He spent about an hour photographing the frog — until, unexpectedly, a bright yellow African queen butterfly landed nearby and turned the shoot into something else entirely. An Unlikely Ten … [Read more...] about A Butterfly Landed on a Frog’s Head in West Java — and the Photos Are Going Viral Again