Animal Life news stories

We humans like to think our mastery of language sets us apart from the communication abilities of other animals, but an eye-opening new analysis of chimpanzees might force a rethink on just how unique our powers of speech really are.

New research coming out of the University of Cambridge, UK, suggests that complex ecosystems emerged earlier than we thought, in a period of Earth’s history called the Ediacaran.

From machines to animals, there are many kinds of possible minds.

An incredible discovery has just revealed a potential new source for understanding life on ancient Earth.

Cephalopod genomes are as weird and wonderful as they are.

A new archaeological study has unearthed evidence Indigenous people in Australia and North America sustainably managed and consumed oysters for thousands of years.

Ichthyosaurs were large marine reptiles with an elongated, snakey shape. They first emerged after the end of the Permian extinction, an event also known as the “great dying”, which occurred about 250m years ago and which wiped out more than two-thirds of species on land and 96% of marine species.

Named Tomlinsonus dimitrii, the species represented by the specimen is part of an extinct group of arthropods known as marrellomorphs that lived approximately 450 million years ago, during the Ordovician period, the research team reported in a new study.

Current global climatic warming is having, and will continue to have, widespread consequences for human history, in the same way that environmental fluctuations had significant consequences for human populations in the past.

Scientists believe they have found evidence of microbes that were thriving near hydrothermal vents on Earth’s surface just 300m years after the planet formed – the strongest evidence yet that life began far earlier than is widely assumed.

Unicorn-like imagery dates back to the Indus Valley Civilization (about 3300 B.C. to 1300 B.C.) in South Asia, which included parts of modern-day Afghanistan, Pakistan and India.

The discovery of octopus communities came as a surprise to biologists who have long described octopuses as solitary animals that interact with others in three specific contexts: hunting, avoiding being hunted, and mating.

“They’ve lived for so long; just think what they’ve seen.” Forester Nick Baimbridge is gazing fondly at a majestic oak that has stood for more than a thousand years. On this wintry afternoon, birds sing from lichen-covered branches and a deer runs through the undergrowth.