Featured
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Millipede Coils Into a Spiral and Releases an Irritant, Then Goes Back to Feeding the Forest Soil
A millipede curls its body into a spiral and can release an irritating secretion from lateral glands. The same animal grinds dead…
Latest Stories
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Woodcreeper uses its stiff tail as a third support and spirals up trunks to catch prey
Reinforced tail feathers bear the bird’s weight while its curved bill probes bark crevices and follows army ants.
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Blue-black grassquit leaps over and over, sings at the top and defends a tiny territory
The black male combines a vertical leap with song in midair while the brown female watches a contest packed into a few…
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Sandpiper Packs On Fat and Shrinks Its Digestive Organs Before Flying Between Continents
Before migrating, the sandpiper eats heavily and stores fat, while organs tied to digestion shrink for a time to lighten the load.…
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Tanager Joins Mixed Flocks and Listens to Other Species’ Alarm Calls Along Urban Edges
The sanhaço, a fruit-eating tanager, can join mixed flocks and react to alarm calls from other species. The habit widens its lookout…
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Brazilian Tanager Is Not Born Red: Fruit Pigments Color Only the Adult Male
The Brazilian tanager, or tiê-sangue, gets its intense red from carotenoids in fruit, and only the adult male shows it. Young birds…
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Buff-Necked Ibis Probes Soft Mud With a Curved Bill That Feels Hidden Prey
The curicaca pushes its long, curved bill into soft ground, where sensory endings in the tip help it find prey by touch.…
Wildlife
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Millipede Coils Into a Spiral and Releases an Irritant, Then Goes Back to Feeding the Forest Soil
A millipede curls its body into a spiral and can release an irritating secretion from lateral glands. The same animal grinds dead…
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Woodcreeper uses its stiff tail as a third support and spirals up trunks to catch prey
Reinforced tail feathers bear the bird’s weight while its curved bill probes bark crevices and follows army ants.
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Blue-black grassquit leaps over and over, sings at the top and defends a tiny territory
The black male combines a vertical leap with song in midair while the brown female watches a contest packed into a few…
Environment
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Rhodoliths: Two Beds of Living Stones in Brazil Hold More Than 450 Species and Possible New Algae
A study of samples from Abrolhos and Queimada Grande Island found more than 450 species in beds of calcareous algae and estimated…
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Lichens Pair Two Organisms, Grow About 0.04 Inches a Year and Record Air Quality on Bare Rock
A lichen is a lasting partnership between a fungus and an alga or cyanobacterium. It grows slowly on bare rock, starts the…
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Pará’s mangroves are nurseries for wildlife and shields against storms
Mangroves along Pará’s coast shelter young fish and crustaceans, support thousands of families, store vast amounts of carbon and reduce the force…
Flora
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Titica Vine, the Amazon Fiber for Baskets and Furniture, Is Safe to Harvest Only If Roots Stay
Titica vine (Heteropsis flexuosa) yields a pale, flexible fiber for baskets and furniture, but the plant dies if all its mature roots…
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Satellite Imagery Spotted a 290-Foot Red Angelim in the Amazon; Scientists Arrived Three Years Later
A red angelim (Dinizia excelsa) of 88.5 meters (290 feet), the tallest known tree in the Amazon, was detected in 2019 by…
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Native Cacao Grows in Floodplain Shade; Full-Sun Farms Need More Care and a Tiny Fly
In the Amazon’s várzea, cacao grows under the shade of the forest. In full sun, growers must replace those conditions with management,…
Science
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The Smell of Rain Comes From Soil Bacteria, and Noses Detect It at 5 Nanograms per Liter
The earthy smell after rain comes in large part from geosmin, a compound made by soil actinobacteria. The human nose is so…
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Zombie-Ant Fungus Found Hiding Inside Amazon Mosses, Brazilian Study Suggests
Researchers at Brazil’s INPA detected DNA of the fungus behind zombie ants in mosses of a forest reserve near Manaus. It points…
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When fruit runs short, capuchin monkeys hunt lizards and snakes, a 45-month study finds
Two groups of bearded capuchins in Brazil were recorded eating small vertebrates 446 times over 45 months, mostly when fruit was scarce.…