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Science / Wildlife

One of the oldest living organisms on Earth is a colony of Neptune grass in this vast meadow of the plant in the Mediterranean Sea.

Planet Positive

Why Seagrass Could Be the Ocean’s Secret Weapon Against Climate Change

A vast, mostly invisible ecosystem crucial to our life on Earth is in trouble, but efforts to save the ‘prairies of the sea’ are finally coming into focus

Echidnas have a four-headed penis, though only two heads are put to use at a time.

Nine of the Weirdest Penises in the Animal Kingdom

A short list of some of nature’s most curious phalluses, from the echidna’s four-headed unit to the dolphin’s prehensile member

The Smithsonian’s Division of Birds provided about 40% of the tissue samples for the new bird genomes in a landmark study.

Smithsonian Voices

Landmark Study Relies on Bird DNA Collected Over Three Decades at the Smithsonian

A new study in Nature published the genomes—the complete DNA sequences—of 363 species of birds, opening the door for hundreds of new studies

Scientists caught a juvenile female vaquita in October of 2017 and released her after she showed signs of stress.

Vaquita Genome Offers Hope for Species’ Survival

A new study suggests the marine mammal can recover naturally if illegal fishing is eliminated

The Peruvian tern's desert camouflage makes it almost impossible to track, but that’s exactly what our research team set out to do.

Smithsonian Voices

Searching for the Invisible, Invincible Peruvian Tern

The Peruvian tern’s desert camouflage makes it almost impossible to track, but that’s exactly what the research team set out to do

The area is home to about 500 residential eagles that attract visitors year-round, most especially in the fall when migrating birds up the count to historic highs of 3,000.

Behold the Largest Congregation of Bald Eagles in the United States

Every November, hundreds if not thousands of the birds of prey gather in Haines, Alaska, to feast on salmon

Damselfish typically live in the nooks and crannies of coral reefs. But do you have anything with more of an open concept?

If a Fish Could Build Its Own Home, What Would It Look Like?

By exposing fish to experimental constructions, scientists hope to find out if replicating coral reefs is really the way to go

Rattlesnakes can bite after death.

14 Fun Facts About Frightening Animals

From snakes that eat their prey alive to primates that inject their peers with flesh-rotting venom, these are the scariest deeds committed by critters

The ogre-faced spider earns its name from its large eyes and mandibles.

How Ultra-Sensitive Hearing Allows Spiders to Cast a Net on Unsuspecting Prey

Sounds trigger the ogre-faced spider to backflip and shoot a silk trap on other insects

From leaf-engineering to complex social circles, there’s more to bats than flying and echolocation.

Smithsonian Voices

Five Reasons to Love Bats

Make Halloween the reason to learn to love and conserve these misunderstood mammals

A pelagornithid, likely the largest flying bird that ever lived, soared over the open ocean.

Scientists Reveal What May Be the Largest Flying Bird Ever

Researchers from California and China identified the 50-million-year-old bone of a giant bird that lived in Antarctica

Why does smaller size, like that of the anteater, benefit species in different environments, wondered one Smithsonian reader.

Why Are South American Animals Smaller Than Those on Other Continents?

You’ve got questions. We’ve got experts

100,000 people die from venomous snakebites each year, a problem the Instituto Clodomiro Picado seeks to address with its antivenoms.

The Lab Saving the World From Snake Bites

A deadly shortage of venom antidote has spurred a little-known group of scientists in Costa Rica to action

An African forest elephant makes its way out into the open.

How Humans Benefit From a Highway of Trails Created by African Forest Elephants

The paths the pachyderms make aid plants, other animals, and local people—whose way of life is threatened by the species’ decline

The Pacific bigfin squid Magnapinna pacifica in the Smithsonian collections that Mike Vecchione and Richard E. Young used to describe the deepest-known species of squid.

Smithsonian Voices

The Wonderfully Weird World of Deep-Sea Squids

For this month’s “Meet a SI-entist,” the Smithsonian’s curator of cephalopods says these are the “intelligent invertebrates”

Hundreds of sockeye salmon spawn in a spring-fed pond in Iliamna Lake, Alaska

Seven Natural Phenomena Worth Traveling to Alaska For

From salmon spawning to the dancing lights of the aurora borealis, Alaska has some of the country’s most impressive natural wonders

A reintroduced swift fox outfitted with a GPS collar looks out across the shortgrass prairie of the Fort Belknap Reservation in northern Montana. The tribes on the reservation are bringing the species back to Fort Belknap after an absence of more than 50 years.

Tribes Reintroduce Swift Fox to Northern Montana’s Fort Belknap Reservation

After absence of more than 50 years, the pint-sized predator returns to the prairie

A Galápagos tortoise specimen from the California Academy of Sciences

How an Expedition to the Galápagos Islands Saved One of the World’s Largest Natural History Museums

A soon-to-be digitized and publicly accessible collection of specimens helped resurrect the California Academy of Sciences

Sea turtle eggs, rumored to have aphrodisiac properties, are frequently poached from Costa Rican beaches

3-D Printed Sea Turtle Eggs Reveal Poaching Routes

Scientists put GPS locators inside plastic eggs to find trafficking destinations in Costa Rica

It's a boy! DNA taken from a cheek swab of the 3.6-pound giant panda cub confirms the animal's sex.

Pandamonium

Why It Takes a DNA Test to Determine a Panda Cub’s Sex

The National Zoo announces the 6-week-old giant panda is a boy

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