Ecology & Zoology

Even Plants Recognize Their Siblings, Biologists Discover

It's no secret that humans can recognize siblings on a biological level. Now it turns out plants can also, according to biologists at McMaster University. Even more, they get downright competitive with strangers of the same species. “The ability to re ...

Article - News Staff - Jun 13 2007 - 11:16am

The Swedes Get A Jurassic Tree

A specimen of the Wollemi pine, an Australian conifer and one of the world's oldest tree species, has been donated to Bergianska Garden at Stockholm University in Sweden. The Wollemi was discovered on September 10, 1994, in an isolated valley in Wolle ...

Article - News Staff - Jun 15 2007 - 10:51pm

Ice Age Extinction Claimed Highly Carnivorous Alaskan Wolves

The extinction of many large mammals at the end of the Ice Age may have packed an even bigger punch than scientists have realized. To the list of victims such as woolly mammoths and saber-toothed cats, a Smithsonian-led team of scientists has added one mor ...

Article - News Staff - Jun 22 2007 - 12:16am

Bees Love The Color Purple

A bee’s favorite color can help it to find more food from the flowers in their environment, according to new research from Queen Mary, University of London. Dr Nigel Raine and Professor Lars Chittka from Queen Mary’s School of Biological and Chemical Scien ...

Article - News Staff - Jun 23 2007 - 1:16pm

Maintaining The Social Order In Fish Societies

Fish use the threat of punishment to keep would-be jumpers in the mating queue firmly in line and the social order stable, a new study led by Australian marine scientists has found. Their discovery, which has implications for the whole animal kingdom inclu ...

Article - News Staff - Jun 27 2007 - 3:09pm

Female Iguanas Will Even Die For The Right Mate

Picking a mate isn’t easy—if you are a female iguana. In a study Maren Vitousek of Princeton University and colleagues found that female Galápagos marine iguanas spend a lot of energy picking a mate from a wide range of suitors – energy they could otherwis ...

Article - News Staff - Jun 27 2007 - 9:53pm

Teaching Farmers To Use Less Nitrogen

Ongoing field trials since 2002 by a team that includes 16 farmers, Cornell researchers and Cornell Cooperative Extension field crops educators in 10 counties are showing the value of on-farm research. Their results are successfully quantifying and predict ...

Article - News Staff - Jul 1 2007 - 10:22am

Rats Know The Golden Rule- Do Unto Others...

Cooperation in animals has long been a major focus in evolutionary biology. In particular, reciprocal altruism, where helpful acts are contingent upon the likelihood of getting help in return, is especially intriguing because it is open to cheaters. In a n ...

Article - News Staff - Jul 3 2007 - 6:43pm

Wolves Of Alaska Became Extinct 12,000 Years Ago- Global Warming Implicated.

Seriously. ...

Article - News Staff - Jul 5 2007 - 2:07am

The Magnetic Properties Of Chicken

An international working group under the direction of Wolfgang und Roswitha Wiltschko of Frankfurt University has now succeeded in demonstrating the presence of a magnetic sense of direction in domestic chickens. 40 years ago, Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Wiltschko ...

Article - News Staff - Jul 5 2007 - 10:39am