Humpback Whales Around the World All Adopted the Same New Song in Under 2 Years
Humpback whale songs spread across entire ocean basins like viral pop songs. A new tune that emerges off Australia can b…
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Animals
The astonishing capabilities and behaviors of creatures great and small
14 Amazing Stories
A Parrot Understood the Concept of Zero — A Mathematical Idea Humans Took Millennia to Grasp
Alex the African Grey parrot, trained by Dr. Irene Pepperberg, demonstrated understanding of zero — a concept humans t…
Dolphins Give Each Other Individual Names and Respond Only to Their Own
Bottlenose dolphins develop unique signature whistles that function as personal names — and they call each other by th…
Crows Can Recognize Human Faces and Hold Grudges for Years Against Specific People
University of Washington researchers proved that crows can identify individual human faces and remember threatening beha…
The Greenland Shark Can Live 500 Years — Meet Earth's Oldest Vertebrate
A Greenland shark hauled from Arctic waters may have been alive when Shakespeare was writing his first plays. A landmark…
A Pistol Shrimp's Claw Snap Creates a Shockwave Briefly Hotter Than the Sun's Surface
When a pistol shrimp snaps its specialized claw, the cavitation bubble it creates collapses with a flash of light and te…
Dogs Can Smell Cancer, Low Blood Sugar, and PTSD Episodes Before Humans Even Know
Trained dogs can detect cancer cells, oncoming epileptic seizures, and PTSD episodes by smell alone — sometimes hours …
Elephants Are the Only Non-Human Animals That Hold Formal Mourning Rituals for the Dead
Elephants gather around the bones of dead family members, gently touch them with their trunks, and sometimes return to t…
The Color-Blind Master of Disguise That Sees With Its Skin
Cuttlefish have only one type of photoreceptor, making classic color vision physically impossible, yet they produce flaw…
Octopuses Have Three Hearts, Blue Blood, and Can Taste Everything They Touch
Octopuses have three hearts, blue copper-based blood, can taste through their skin, and have nine brains — one central…
The Mimic Octopus Can Impersonate at Least 15 Sea Creatures on Demand
Discovered in 1998 off Sulawesi, Indonesia, the mimic octopus does something no other known animal does: it selects from…
Honeybees Perform a Precise Waggle Dance That Gives Nestmates GPS Coordinates to Flowers
A honeybee returns from a patch of clover and immediately begins vibrating her body in a figure-8 pattern on the vertica…