The Tennoji Zoo in Osaka, Japan has housed a resident hippopotamus named Gen-chan since 2017. Gen-chan, acquired from Mexico, was believed to be a male specimen all this time. However …
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The Tennoji Zoo in Osaka, Japan has housed a resident hippopotamus named Gen-chan since 2017. Gen-chan, acquired from Mexico, was believed to be a male specimen all this time. However …
Prognosticating rodent Punxsutawney Phil may not have seen this one coming: last week he and wife, Phyllis, became new parents, to at least two baby groundhogs. The births surprised a member of the Punxsutawney Groundhog Club, who discovered the arrivals only when he came to feed the parents fruit and vegetables.
Researchers at the Einstein Center for Neuroscience in Berlin noticed a strange clicking sound coming from the aquariums where they kept tiny fish from Myanmar, Danionella cerebrum. Their investigation revealed a very loud noise coming from a very small fish.
What next for Ko Muang Phet, a ginormous albino water buffalo that has soared to celebrity status in Thailand? His burgeoning bulk and fame earned him a recent meet-and-greet with Thai Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin, who must be hoping some of that bovine popularity rubs off.
In August 2017, a total solar eclipse dazzled and baffled animals across much of the country. Even the US president at the time lost his head (momentarily?), and stared directly at the sun without using ocular protection.
It took amateur photographer Nimi Sarikhani three days of searching for polar bears, but he finally happened upon the perfect shot: a young male bear catching a few zees atop a small iceberg, illuminated in northern Norway’s midnight sun.
When the temperature dropped to 18° F in Beaumont, Texas last week, a few alligators got caught in the big freeze, locked solid in the ice. They’ll be fine though, as long as their snouts stay above water.
On the coast of southern Tasmania, a 1,300-pound southern elephant seal has been plopping his prodigious girth on beaches, in driveways, on the road, and on front lawns. The 3-year-old, dubbed Neil the Seal by the locals, has a special fondness for traffic cones, which he plays with and gnaws on like a toddler with a pram toy.
When it comes to power naps, the chinstrap penguin is king. Researchers in Antarctica have determined that the species will doze off for four seconds per nap, up to 10,000 times a day. Their study appears in the journal Science.
A deep sea live video stream captured several minutes of the delightful “Dumbo” octopus, placidly swimming near the seafloor of the Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands.
A king penguin in Scotland’s Edinburgh Zoo reached a new career milestone this week as he was promoted to Major General in the King’s Guard of Norway. His new title is a mouthful: Major General Sir Nils Olav III, Baron of the Bouvet Islands.
Scientists in Peru discovered a new species of snake in the Andes Mountains, which they promptly named after a movie star whose most famous character happens to hate snakes: Tachymenoides harrisonfordi.
A rare two-headed snake took two years to recover from its self-induced injury, but he’s (they’re?) finally back in his exhibit at the Cameron Park Zoo in Waco, Texas.
Researchers at Berkeley have been looking into the drinking habits of hummingbirds. Turns out the little birds get a lot of alcohol in their diets, but they tend to moderate their intake.
Hangzhou Zoo in eastern China felt the need to deny allegations, made on social media, that their Malayan sun bears are in fact humans wearing bear costumes.
The staff at the Columbus Zoo and Aquarium were surprised to find a newborn baby in their gorilla troop, partly because they hadn’t realized the mother was pregnant, but mostly because they’d thought the mother was a male.
Orcas continue to attack yachts in the Mediterranean, sharks still menace bathers in Australia, and humpback whales are terrorizing fishermen off the Canadian coast. Now comes a new marauder, a sea otter who bullies surfers in Santa Cruz.
Most birds are monogamous(ish) and a few species even mate for life, but divorce is also common, and may even be on the rise. A German-Chinese research team analyzed data on 232 bird species to document the avian discontent.
A mayor in Mexico’s Oaxaca state has married a caiman – a toothly reptile and close cousin to alligators and crocodiles – in a traditional wedding. Victor Hugo Sosa got hitched to one “Alicia Adriana” in the town of San Pedro Huamelula, re-enacting an ancestral ritual believed to bring good fortune.
Perhaps you’ve seen a squirrel, spread-eagled and flat on the ground, motionless. He’s fine, he’s just “splooting,” that weird, limbs akimbo pose assumed by some mammals to beat the heat.
