For about three decades, beluga whales and bottlenose dolphins greeted more than a million annual visitors to Marineland of Canada. In the sprawling 162-hectare (400-acre) theme park, located a stone’s throw from the world-famous Niagara Falls in Ontario, Canada, dozens of cetaceans enthralled visitors — splashing, spyhopping and leaping in their concrete-lined tanks. Marineland’s peppy jingle, […]
Walk into almost any reptile specialist in the UK and you will probably find a bearded dragon perched under a basking lamp, calmly watching the world go by. Over the last two decades, these Australian lizards have gone from niche interest to one of the most widely kept pet reptiles in Britain. Their rise in […]
The butterfly-mad British are celebrating what seems to be a permanent return of this large and spectacular species after Dutch elm disease killed it off from the island. Unlike the small tortoiseshell butterfly, the large tortoiseshell butterfly hasn’t been a resident of the UK since the 1960s, but after several years of continuous widespread sightings, […]
You’re doing everything to protect your pet from parasites. You’ve got the treatments, the medications, and the monthly preventatives. You’re vigilant about checking for ticks and careful about where your pet plays. Your pet’s diet treatments are only half the battle. The real foundation of parasite resistance is your pet’s immune system. And your pet’s […]
Climate change has an unlikely new ally. In Ethiopia, urban scavengers, such as hyenas and hooded vultures, are preventing over a thousand tonnes of carbon emissions every year, just by eating rotten meat. The findings are reported in Ecological Solutions and Evidence. Scavenging animals are a common feature of large Ethiopian cities, where they live in the […]
Wildlife releases are usually joyous events. Uplifting scenes of animals cautiously nosing the air as they take their first tentative steps into freedom warm our hearts. However, new research suggests the wild can be a “death trap,” especially if the released individuals lack the essential skills to find food and integrate with wild populations, or […]
The strange-looking Picathartes have lived in the Congo for 44 million years. Bald-headed birds that mate for life and breed in the rainy season, they build their nests out of mud on the underside of overhanging rocks on a cliff or cave roof to stay dry. This has also earned them the alternative name of rockfowls. The ground-loving birds have intriguing ways of […]
From an animal that’s not actually one animal, to the world’s only venomous primate, there are some unusual deadly animals in the world. Whether they inhabit the world’s oceans, jungles or rivers, there are plenty of deadly animals that are more unusual than average. From species that can inflict harm when they’re no longer living, […]