Category Archives: Insects

Harden the Fuck Up, Dying Temnothorax Unifasciatus

For a recent study published in Current Biology, Jurgen Heinze and Bartosz Walter from the University of Regensburg monitored the behaviour of over a hundred terminally ill ants. By observing 28 Temnothorax unifasciatus colonies containing individuals infected with Metarhizium anisopliae, … Continue reading

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Wandering Ponies #2

While my brain eases itself out of the haze of Christmas madness, here are some things that have amused me of late: It’s no secret that I’m a massive fan of Alex Wild’s photography, so I thought I should mention … Continue reading

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Filed under Animals, Archosaurs, Insects, Science, Video

That’s No Way To Get A Girl, Brawny Dawson’s Bee.

Topping my list of things that stick in my craw about Australian TV right now is that we don’t get BBC’s new documentary series, Life. If we did, we’d know all about the unusual courtship behaviour of one of the … Continue reading

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Way to be a vegetarian for all the wrong reasons, Bagheera kiplingi

As published in the latest issue of Current Biology, researchers have identified the first-known mostly vegetarian spider out of the 40,000 discovered species in the world. The curious behaviour of this wide-eyed jumping spider, Bagheera kiplingi, discovered in the late … Continue reading

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Beware Those Yellow Crazy Ants, Christmas Island White-Eye…

An online report published in last week’s Biology Letters has revealed the damaging effect an invasion of ants (Anoplolepis gracilipes) is having on some of Christmas Island’s native bird and plant species. In this study, led by ecologist, Dennis O’Dowd … Continue reading

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Filed under Animals, Insects, Science, Sea Creatures

A Plague’s A Crowd, Bosavi Woolly Rat.

A three-week expedition into the heart of an extinct volcano in Papua New Guinea has produced some truly remarkable results, with the discovery of a significant number of previously unknown species of frog, insects, fish, birds, and mammals. A team … Continue reading

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Filed under Animals, Insects, New Species!, Science, Sea Creatures