20+ hour, 47+ min ago   (1008+ words) Seattle coyotes live at nine times the density of Washington's wild lands, with fewer predators, fewer hunters, and far more to eat. Coyotes tend to avoid people. Yet they live far closer together in Seattle than in the wild country…...

2+ day, 16+ hour ago   (574+ words) A 22% drop in butterfly populations from 2000 to 2020 signals a troubling, widespread decline across the broader pollinator community. Scientists count butterflies more thoroughly than any other insect, which makes them an early-warning system for the health of other animal species that…...

3+ day, 8+ hour ago   (1306+ words) Sixteen Asian elephants in Thailand gave up a trunk habit as soon as it stopped working, the first evidence of self-control in the species. Put a piece of fruit where an elephant can see it and smell it, and the…...

3+ day, 11+ hour ago   (1057+ words) Periodical cicadas have failed to return to many recovered forests, and new research suggests natural recolonization could take centuries. Periodical cicadas spend more than a decade underground before pushing out of the ground by the trillions, covering the trees for…...

3+ day, 15+ hour ago   (777+ words) Trees protect wild animals from extreme heat and cold by keeping temperatures inside their cavities more stable than outside. Deep inside the trunk of an old tree, temperatures can remain surprisingly stable, even when the world outside is baking or…...

6+ day, 8+ hour ago   (984+ words) Satellite tracking shows yellow-morph green turtles can remain around the Galápagos for months while moving between nearby islands. Green turtles are known to travel hundreds to thousands of miles across large parts of the ocean to find food and reach…...

1+ week, 4+ day ago   (1067+ words) Snake embryos develop in remarkably consistent clockwise spirals, and their slower-growing gut may explain how the unusual shape forms. Inside a freshly laid snake egg, the embryo is already wound like a corkscrew. Nearly every one of those spirals turns…...

1+ week, 5+ day ago   (995+ words) Cameras in the Saudi Arabian desert captured Verreaux’s eagles behaving in a way researchers did not expect from these specialized hunters. Eagles are famous for being powerful hunters. They often sit near the top of a food web, which shows…...

1+ week, 6+ day ago   (1102+ words) DNA recovered from museum specimens is reshaping the family tree of Hawaiian honeycreepers and revealing how much evolutionary history has disappeared. Roughly 5 to 6 million years ago, one finch species reached Hawaii. Its descendants became more than 60 species of Hawaiian honeycreepers,…...

1+ week, 6+ day ago   (726+ words) Stewart Island/Rakiura is a wild corner of New Zealand filled with native birds, ancient forests, rugged beaches, and remarkably dark skies. Today’s Image of the Day from NASA Earth Observatory features the wild, forest-covered landscape of Stewart Island/Rakiura…...