zoology

Mario A. Cozzuol, Camila L. Clozato, Elizete C. Holanda, Flavio H. G. Rodriques, Samuel Nienow, Benoit De Thoisy, Rodrigo A. F. Redonod, and Fabricio R. Santos. (2013) A new species of tapir from the Amazon. Journal of Mammalogy. Where I first got the story. Exciting part: Cozzuol et al...

How do porcupines and other spiny animals manage to reproduce? Are they somehow immune to each others' spikes (appropriately placed armor, maybe?), or are they just amazingly acrobatic, or what?

You read that right; there are in fact animals that feed their young with bodily secretions that are not mammals. Some folks are real persnickety and won't call something "milk" unless it came from a mammal, but that's just prejudice. For some strange reason, Middle Age scholars believed that...

Just noticed this article from the New Scientist newsfeed. Biology is so cool. :D What is interesting about this is the fact that kleptoplastisized genes are almost always nonfunctional in the host organism.

A true head scratcher More fun than a barrel of monkees!! Should apes be treated as equals? Koko is supposed to have an I.Q. of 76.