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Imagine trying to tell identical twins apart just by looking at their fingerprints. That's how challenging it can be for scientists to distinguish the tiny powdery pollen grains produced by fir, spruce and pine trees.

Before they can fight to survive, some endangered songbirds are losing their groove and being robbed of their chance at love—all because of what's in their food.

Relief may be in sight for kākāpō affected by an extremely painful disease, thanks to a University of Otago—Ōtākou Whakaihu Waka-led study.

Results from a long-term field experiment shed new light on how grasslands can be restored for nature, the environment, and for farmers.

As urban development continues to creep further into Earth's oldest and most diverse rainforests, a Swansea University-led study reveals native and invasive small mammals aren't just adapting to their changing habitats—they may also be sharing their microbes.

Marine habitats are facing unprecedented threats, with 66% of coastal areas already altered and degraded. Bottom-contact fisheries, which use indiscriminate trawling, physically damage almost 5 million square kilometers of the seafloor each year.

Animal research on biomusicality, which looks at whether different species are capable of behaving in ways that show they recognize aspects of music, including rhythm and beat, remains a tantalizing field at the intersection of biology and psychology.

Increased vegetation growth in European mountains, driven by climate and land-use changes, reduces the genetic diversity of medicinal plants, suggests a new study using satellite data and genetic analyses on Greek mountain tea.

New research led by Monterey Bay Aquarium reveals a surprising ripple effect in coastal ecosystems: the collapse of one marine predator can benefit another.

Scientists at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (STRI) found that the fringe-lipped bat, known to eavesdrop on frog and toad mating calls to find its prey, learns to distinguish between palatable and unpalatable frogs and toads through experience.

Thousands of hectares of Chernobyl-affected farmland, long deemed too dangerous for cultivation in northern Ukraine can safely return to production, according to new research.

Although many conservationists believe biodiversity is intrinsically valuable, the protection of biodiversity has also been argued for on the basis that diversity makes ecosystems healthier and more stable. But are highly diverse ecosystems more stable and productive than ecosystems with low diversity?

Many of the fish we eat play a key role in maintaining the seabed—and therefore our climate, new research shows. Convex Seascape Survey scientists assessed the role of fish in bioturbation (churning and reworking sediments) in shallow UK seas. Their paper, published in the journal Marine Environmental Research, is titled "A functional assessment of fish as bioturbators and their vulnerability to local extinction."

The less intensively you manage the soil, the better the soil can function; for example, not plowing as often or using more grass-clover mixtures as cover crops. These are the conclusions of a research team led by the Netherlands Institute of Ecology (NIOO-KNAW).

Around the world, millions of tons of small fish are processed into fishmeal and fish oil (FMFO) each year—key ingredients in aquaculture that help farmed fish, like salmon, grow. A new University of British Columbia (UBC) study has revealed the global distribution of FMFO factories for the first time, shedding light on a critical area of the aquaculture supply chain, identifying where these ingredients...

New research led by the University of Portsmouth has revealed that African social spiders—dubbed "hippie spiders" for their cooperative lifestyle—may not have distinct personalities after all.

"Get off my lawn!" Funny as a meme but maybe scary in real life, this short sentence is synonymous with an elderly man shouting at kids whose bikes have gotten too close to a well-manicured front yard. But it could just as well represent a female bird, aggressively chasing whatever intruder gets too close to her nest.

If an experiment is repeated under similar conditions, the results should be the same. In reality, the situation is often different—scientists speak of a "reproducibility crisis," which affects different disciplines.

A study published in the journal PLOS One reveals that combining bird observation data with land cover information provides more accurate predictions of numbers of wild bee species—a metric called richness—than using either dataset alone.

Energy scarcity is a central driver of animal behavior and evolution. The amazing diversity of life on this planet is a testament to the plethora of novel biological solutions to the problem of securing and maintaining energy. However, despite being so central to biology, it remains difficult to quantify, and thereby empirically analyze, energy consumption.

In a comprehensive study conducted at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Biology, researchers tracked 244 wild-derived male house mice—yes, the kind you'd find in barns or basements—over their entire lives, up to 11 months, in real-world-style enclosures.

Psychologists from Durham University, UK, have observed the behavior of 90 sanctuary-living apes to establish whether bonobos were more likely than chimpanzees to comfort others in distress.

Sharks are often perceived as the ultimate beasts, an image largely imposed on them by the media. Yet, shark bites are rare—only around 100 or so happen every year, and just around 10% are fatal.

Populations of animals and plants separated by even thousands of miles can rise and fall together driven by ecological factors, a phenomenon scientists call "spatial synchrony."

In a residential backyard in Maine, Project ITCH researchers from the University of Massachusetts Amherst stumbled upon a surprise finding: rabbit ticks harboring a new type of bacteria related to a group of pathogens that can cause sometimes life-threatening spotted fever rickettsioses (SFR) infections in humans. The most common and deadly SFR is Rocky Mountain spotted fever, which has a death rate of 20%–30%...

Biologically speaking, female and male bonobos have a weird relationship. First, there's the sex. It's the females who decide when and with whom they mate. They easily parry unwanted sexual advances—and the males know better than to force the issue.

Authors of an article in BioScience reveal that climate change has become the most pervasive threat to ESA-listed species, marking the first time that this driver has been identified to surpass other causes of biodiversity loss for this group.

An international team of researchers with a variety of backgrounds has worked together to calculate a global estimate of the abundance of commercially important fish and invertebrates supported by mangrove forests. In their study published in the journal Communications Earth & Environment, the group analyzed data for 37 commercial species using field data amassed by multiple groups over many years studying mangrove ecosystems around...

A new study from the University of Oxford has revealed that an incentive program increased live releases of endangered species caught as bycatch. However, unexpectedly, the overall positive impact was reduced by some vessels' increasing catches of these species.

A new global analysis finds that many of the world's most threatened seagrass meadows lie within designated Marine Protected Areas (MPAs), raising urgent questions about the effectiveness of current protections for coastal habitats and offering a chance to rethink global ocean conservation.

Yeast is already a familiar ingredient to bakers and winemakers, but new research from the University of Georgia suggests it can also trace the footsteps of our ancestors.

Researchers at the University of South Florida are uncovering new clues about how animals evolve by studying rattlesnake venom—and what they've found could help us better protect wildlife in a world increasingly shaped by human activity.

Biologists have long debated why some plants and animals can adjust to a wide range of climates, while others can't. Understanding why could help conservation managers and decision makers identify which species are most vulnerable to climate change.

Marine heat waves that seemed extreme just a decade ago will become commonplace by the end of this century in waters favored by giant kelp, researchers have found.

Using spill-treating agents to clean up oil spills does not significantly hinder naturally occurring oil biodegradation, according to a new study. The research, published in Applied and Environmental Microbiology, provides information that will be useful in future oil spills.

Insects are disappearing at an alarming rate worldwide, but why? Agricultural intensification tops the list of proposed reasons, but there are many other, interconnected drivers that have an impact, according to new research led by Binghamton University, State University of New York.

In the largest study of its kind, researchers at the Florida Museum of Natural History have used data from a 120-year-old program managed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture to quantify the effects of introduced species.

Parasitoid wasps sometimes lay eggs in unsuitable host insects, a behavior that has traditionally been considered accidental. However, researchers at the University of Tsukuba have discovered that parasitism can still be successful in these cases—if another species of wasp lays eggs in the same host simultaneously. They have named this newly discovered parasitic strategy "pirate parasitism."

In the heart of Canada's Rocky Mountains, an unassuming yet remarkable butterfly has been quietly flying under our scientific radar for years. With a wingspan of an inch to an inch and a half, and wings that are brown on top and grayish brown with black spots below, this population was long thought to belong to the Half-moon Hairstreak (Satyrium semiluna). However, the isolated...

Honeybees are essential pollinators for agriculture and natural ecosystems. Stressors like climate change, habitat loss and pesticide exposure threaten their ability to forage for pollen, a critical resource for colony survival. Researchers in Environmental Science & Technology demonstrate that an artificial intelligence (AI)-based monitoring system combined with a computer model can link the exposure of neonicotinoid pesticides on individual honeybees to the health of...

UC Davis Professor Hugh Safford was hiking for pleasure in California's High Sierra when he stumbled upon a new elevation record for the Jeffrey pine, which may now be the state's highest-altitude tree. His serendipitous finding is published in the journal Madroño.

Researchers from the Cluster of Excellence Collective Behavior at the University of Konstanz have discovered that honey bees from the same colony have different preferences in terms of defensive behavior. While some are still hesitating, others are already attacking.

A recently published paper reveals that soil scratching by gorillas in Congo's Nouabalé-Ndoki National Park is a foraging strategy to access a species of deer truffle, identified as Elaphomyces labyrinthinus, and not insects, as long assumed.

An international team of scientists and crew on board Schmidt Ocean Institute's research vessel Falkor (too) was the first to film the colossal squid (Mesonychoteuthis hamiltoni) in its natural environment. The 30-centimeter juvenile squid (nearly one foot long) was captured on video at a depth of 600 meters (1968 feet) by the Institute's remotely operated vehicle (ROV) SuBastian. The sighting occurred on March 9...

The power of a rattlesnake's venom to incapacitate its prey may depend on more than just its potency, or even the prey animal's tolerance for the poison. According to a new study published April 16 in Biology Letters, it also depends a bit on the weather.

Scientists have unveiled a new food source designed to sustain honey bee colonies indefinitely without natural pollen.

A spat between birds at a backyard birdfeeder highlights the sometimes fierce competition for resources that animals face in the natural world, but some ecologically similar species appear to coexist peacefully. A classic study in songbirds by Robert MacArthur, one of the founders of modern ecology, suggested that similar wood warblers—insect-eating, colorful forest songbirds—can live in the same trees because they actually occupy slightly...

A study of bumble bees has uncovered a potential reason for the insects' decline. By studying bumble bee exposure to particulate air pollutants, scientists at the University of Leicester have determined that the diversity and behavior of the bee gut microbial community is altered when exposed to black carbon found in air pollution, disrupting the beneficial bacteria that live there.

Newly published research from UNC Greensboro biology professor Dr. Bryan McLean and colleagues shows that the masked shrew, a small, mole-like mammal found in the Appalachian Mountains, shrinks its body and braincase to conserve energy during winter months.

If you think doomscrolling leads to sleepless nights, imagine waking up in bed with a blood-sucking monster the size of a basset hound. That's the waking nightmare one species of Australian fruit fly must contend with each night as hungry mites stalk and attach themselves like a tick while the fly is sleeping in the fruit orchards and rainforests of Queensland.