Cooperative behaviour to acquire food resources has been observed in hunting carnivores and web-building social spiders. Now researchers have found comparable behaviours in a fish species. A tiny striped fish called Neolamprologus obscurus only found in Lake Tanganyika in Zambia excavates stones to create shelter and increase the abundance of food for all fish in...
Without 46 million year-old bacteria, turtle ants would need more bite and less armor
You've probably heard about poop pills, the latest way for humans to get benevolent bacteria into their guts. But it seems that a group of ants may have been the original poop pill pioneers -- 46 million years ago.
A new collaborative study, published in Nature Communications, determined that turtle ants (Cephalotes) are able to supplement...
These tropical hummingbirds make cricket-like sounds other birds can't hear
Researchers reporting in Current Biology on March 5 have found that a tropical species of hummingbird called a black jacobin makes vocal sounds with an unusually high-frequency pitch that falls outside birds' normal hearing range. It's not yet clear whether the hummingbirds can even hear themselves, the researchers say.
"These vocalizations are fast and high pitched,...
A leopard may not change its spots but venomous creatures change their venom recipe often
Many animals use venom to protect themselves from predators and to catch prey. Some, like jellyfish, have tentacles, while others, like bees and snakes use stingers and fangs to inject their prey with venomous toxins.
For a long time scientists believed that an animal's venom was consistent over time: once a venomous creature, always a venomous...
Backyard chickens need more regulation
Historically, keeping backyard chickens was a response to economic hardship -- whether it was in the Depression or during wartime food rationing.
But a growing number of chickens today are roaming or are caged on small family farms and in backyards, as suburban and urban poultry gains more popularity among consumers. Many people prefer to raise...
Mammalian development: Blastocyst architecture
The mechanisms that underlie early embryonic development in humans and cattle are very similar. Therefore, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitaet (LMU) in Munich researchers argue that bovine embryos might well be a better model for early human development than the mouse system.
Many fundamental aspects of the early stages of embryonic development in humans are found to be conserved in...