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Jumping to Their Own Beat – Jumping Spiders Shortcut Recognition

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Wherever you’re reading this from, whether it be your home, the library, wherever, you had to navigate to your current location. We don’t typically think of this as navigation as it usually requires minimal effort when following known routes. But … Continue reading

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The eye of the dragon: retina differences in dragon lizards

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Vision is incredibly important for spotting predators and prey, especially for animals that live in open and flat environments. Dragon lizards, a genus of 29 different lizard species endemic to Australia, are one such group. Despite a lot of similarities … Continue reading

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Why is that monkey making that weird noise? The function of boom calls in blue monkeys.

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Communication is a key part of life. It is what allows us, and many other species, to function successfully as social animals. A world without communication is a world of quiet isolation. This is why it is so important to … Continue reading

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The secret to some insect behaviors? It might be smelly bacteria

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The sense of smell is an incredibly complex and important sense across the animal kingdom. Insects rely heavily on olfaction for everything from finding mates, shelter, and food to locating oviposition sites. While a lot of research has been done … Continue reading

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Please Don’t Eat Me – I’m Just a Cleaner Shrimp

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We hate ticks in the summer. Those greedy eight-legged bloodsuckers bury their heads into our skin and get all the free food they want. They are also dangerous transmitters of diseases and can possibly leave you ill for a long … Continue reading

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To Hide or Dance? Male Fiddler Crabs’ Behavior under Predator Threat

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The decision of taking risks in the presence of a predator involves complex trade-offs between future reproduction and immediate survival. When faced with a predator, many individuals will seek safety in a refuge and must decide when to re-emerge based … Continue reading

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To Fight or Not to Fight, That is the Question

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There’s no way around it, conflict is a part of life: animals must often compete with one another to ensure their own survival. But how does an animal know whether that food source, potential mate or shelter are worth the … Continue reading

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What makes parasitic cuckoo bees so cu-cool? They parasitize foreign nests without detection

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You heard right, some species of bees—known as cuckoo bees—have lost the ability to provide for their offspring, leading them to parasitize the food provisions collected by other bee species. Cuckoo bees are brood parasites, or species with offspring that … Continue reading

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Can socializing save you? The impact of social information on population survival

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A marmot sees an eagle circling above the prairie and lets out an alarm call to warn others before hiding. A sparrow hears a cat climbing the tree its perched on and takes off to fly to safety. Other birds … Continue reading

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Urban noise in need of some ‘Wren’-ovation

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The human population is growing and with it so is the noise pollution that we produce. As urban areas expand, people may complain about the increasing sounds that accompany construction and increasing car traffic in their neighborhoods. However, it is … Continue reading

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