Weirdo ancient beetle looks like a scrub brush By Nicoletta Lanese Scientists recovered the insect from 100-million-year-old amber.
Florida manatee with 'Trump' scraped into back spurs a federal investigation By Stephanie Pappas U.S. Fish and Wildlife officials are looking for the person who scratched the word "Trump" into the back of a manatee.
Bizarre new type of locomotion discovered in invasive snakes By Harry Baker Researchers believe the new locomotion is behind the success of invasive snakes in Guam and hope to use this information to create countermeasures.
Zookeepers mourn death of world's oldest orangutan By Harry Baker The world's oldest known orangutan, a 61-year-old Sumatran female called Inji, has died at Oregon Zoo, ending a lifetime of inspiring visitors to care about her kind.
Desert geckos glow neon green in the moonlight, scientists discover By Mindy Weisberger Special skin cells give desert geckos from Namibia a neon-green glow.
Sleep evolved before brains did, study finds By Rachael Rettner It turns out you don't need a brain to sleep.
Megalodon shark mamas had human-size cannibal babies By Mindy Weisberger New analysis of rare megalodon fossils revealed that their newborn babies were the biggest live babies in the shark family.
The strange history of white tigers By Patrick Pester A white tiger cub born at a Nicaragua zoo is the result of a rare genetic mutation with a strange history.
Adorable dwarf giraffes spotted for the first time By Rachael Rettner Too bad they'll have trouble mating.
A truck-size shark washed up on a Maine beach. How did it die? By Brandon Specktor An enormous basking shark washed up dead on the coast of Maine this week. Officials have not determined the cause of death.
Young killer whale rescued after stranding on Scottish beach By Harry Baker A marine mammal medic praised locals who helped save a stranded juvenile killer whale from a beach in Scotland. Here's how they did it.
Jaguar kills another predatory cat in never-before-seen footage By Nicoletta Lanese These predator-on-predator interactions are thought to be rare.
Discovery of endangered female turtle provides hope for extremely rare species By Harry Baker There are now two known Swinhoe’s softshell turtles, one male and one female, and potentially more waiting to be discovered.
Endangered ferrets get experimental COVID-19 vaccine By Stephanie Pappas To protect endangered black-footed ferrets from COVID-19, scientists in Colorado have injected a major captive breeding population with an experimental vaccine.
Would you eat a python to save the Everglades? By Patrick Pester Invading pythons are causing problems for the native wildlife in Florida. Should people start eating them and are they even safe to eat?
Murder hornets and monkey cannibals: 10 times nature freaked us out in 2020 By Mindy Weisberger Some of this year's top science stories were truly the stuff of nightmares.
10 strange animals that washed ashore in 2020 By Laura Geggel Here are 10 gnarly animals from our ocean's depths.
Bats are superheroes of the night. Their superpowers could help us protect them. By Cori Lausen Conservationists are using bats' echolocation abilities to help track these mammals, as many of them succumb to white nose syndrome.
10 times sharks made our jaws drop in 2020 By Kimberly Hickok Here are our favorite stories about sharks from 2020.
10 bizarre animal stories of 2020 By Nicoletta Lanese 2020 was a weird year, even in the animal kingdom.