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It's bigger than London, teeming with a staggering 30,000 dangerous alligators and is one of the deadliest lakes on the planet
5+ hour, 39+ min ago (168+ words) Boogich / Getty Images Covering 1,900 km2, Lake Okeechobee is the largest freshwater lake in Florida.From bass to snakes,manateesto turtles, the water is teeming with wildlife, including around 30,000 alligators who call the shallow lake their home. This makes Lake Okeechobee one…...
Which animal has saved the most human lives?
11+ mon, 4+ day ago (101+ words) Evolutionary biologist Ben Garrod answers your wild question. The award for "most lives saved" must go to the Atlantic horseshoe crab Limulus polyphemus. In the 1950s, scientists isolated from its bright-blue blood a clotting agent, coagulogen, that binds to fungi and…...
It's famous as one of the world’s deadliest flowers – but it became a miracle treatment that changed medicine forever
14+ hour, 44+ min ago (193+ words) How one plant revolutionised heart treatment after one curious doctor tested it on himself. Kilito Chan / Getty Images The therapeutic effects of extracts of foxglove Digitalis purpurea, which are used to strengthen heartbeat in patients suffering from heart failure, were…...
“I’m awoken by a rumble and look across the Danube to see smoke rising.” These predators are reclaiming their home in the middle of a warzone
1+ day, 17+ hour ago (1809+ words) Eagle owls were once heavily persecuted. But thanks to a new initiative, these magnificent birds are reclaiming a wetland home Following two weeks spent acclimatising in a special enclosure near Vylkove, a town on the edge of the Ukrainian part…...
It’s a slimy, prehistoric grisly parasite with the mouth of an alien. And two fearless photographers are obsessed with finding it
1+ day, 20+ hour ago (406+ words) The'sea lamprey'is a most peculiar fish. It has a slimy, eel-like body and an alien-like mouth, and is a parasite, latching onto other creatures to feed. It first appeared 300 million years ago, making it more ancient than the dinosaurs. It…...
"It's highly territorial and if one of their 192 tentacles come into contact with neighbouring individuals they become extremely hostile"
3+ day, 6+ hour ago (485+ words) Discover seven fascinating facts about the beadlet anemone in our expert guide by Buglife. Clinging tightly to rocky shores and hidden within shallow tidal pools, beadlet anemones are among the most intriguing " and often overlooked " creatures of the coastline This…...
"There wasn't a curve in sight." Straight bananas found growing on remote Caribbean island
3+ day, 11+ hour ago (388+ words) Is it the end of the bendy banana? Naturally straight bananas have been discovered growing on a small island 47km off the coast of Costa Rica. Pl'tano Recto, a land slightly smaller than the Isle of Wight, has been off-limits to…...
A zookeeper went to a former penal colony in Australia only to find it overrun with adorable wombats
4+ day, 3+ hour ago (949+ words) A convict settlement in a past life, Maria Island is now a sanctuary for endangered species. Ross Gurden heads there in search of wombats I had barely disembarked from the ferry when I spotted my first wombat, shuffling across the…...
“It produces a boiling-hot, caustic chemical that sprays with an audible pop.” The 10 weirdest animal weapons in the world
3+ day, 23+ hour ago (302+ words) Some animals have claws, some have antlers and some razor-sharp teeth. But a few weapons are decidedly weirder than others" Whether it's the strike of a peacock mantis shrimp or the bite force of a great white shark, animal weapons…...
“Staring menacingly, the buffaloes encircled our vehicle.” My close encounter with a mega-stampede
4+ day, 3+ hour ago (1903+ words) In a quiet corner of Africa a dramatic and dusty spectacle unfolds with the arrival of megaherds of buffaloes We're parked up in our Land Cruiser on the golden grasslands of Botswana's Mababe Depression, surrounded by Cape buffaloes caked in…...