This Week’s Top Picks
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Cactus bees are considered a solitary species, meaning that they live without the hierarchy and structure of their European counterparts. Still, they come into close contact when it's time to mate, forming ‘mating balls’ in which each male eagerly seeks a female companion.
Photo: Karine Aigner Photography
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Few animals can stand their ground against a swarm of angry bees, but this crested honey buzzard appears unfazed. Although the bird belongs to the same family as flesh-eating kites, hawks, and eagles, its main foods are bee and wasp pupae and larvae. Crested honey buzzards can feed on enraged, stinging insects thanks to a number of adaptations, including membranous eyes and substance-coated feathers that may serve as a repellant to stings. Their feathers have central shafts that branch into barbs and then into smaller barbules, much the way veins branch into capillaries. Those barbules hook onto each other and form a shield against incoming stingers, and are woven more thickly around sensitive areas such as beaks, eyes, nostrils, and necks. Nature always amazes!
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Photo: Staffan Widstrand
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Hummingbirds. How do they survive on nectar?
They don’t.
You see, nectar is a mixture of glucose, fructose & sucrose. It’s is a poor source of nutrients, so hummingbirds meet their needs for protein by eating insects. That means hummingbirds are really half flycatcher and half nectarivore! By relying on ingested sugars to fuel their energy-demanding flight, they can reserve their limited fat stores to sustain them during overnight fasting, or to power migratory flights. They have the highest metabolism of any warm-blooded animal, consuming their own weight in nectar every day. They must visit hundreds of flowers daily! Always hours away from starving, they are able to store just enough energy to survive overnight! The Andean mountains are a particularly rich environment for hummer evolution (some 140 sp) as diversification has occurred simultaneously with mountain building processes over the past 10 million years! As new habitats and feeding opportunities developed for hummingbirds along with changes in flower evolution over time, changes in bill shapes and length followed. New species of both hummers and plants evolved together. This has allowed for an exceptional evolutionary pattern, with up to 25 hummer species able to coexist in specific regions, each with their own specialization for obtaining nectar. In all, there are about 340 species of hummingbirds! It’s nothing short of remarkable.
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Video: Brian Keating
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In an extraordinary display of raw power and maternal instinct, a protective elephant mother defends her herd against a bold Cape buffalo in the heart of Kenya’s wild plains. What began as a tense standoff escalated into an unforgettable moment — the elephant forcefully lifted the buffalo into the air with a single tusk after a fierce head-on confrontation.
Nature doesn't hold back.
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Photo: Kimberly Maurer
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Many people are surprised to learn there is such a thing as land-dwelling crayfish, (Procambarus gracilis) - and no, this isn’t an April Fool’s joke, there really are land-dwelling crayfish!
These unique crayfish spend most of their lives underground in wet prairie ecosystems, excavating deep, water-filled burrows rather than inhabiting open lakes and streams like their aquatic relatives. As "ecosystem engineers," they shape their environment much like beavers do to create their own perfect habitat, digging tunnels that access groundwater and provide the moisture they need to breathe through their gills. Their distinctive "chimneys" (small towers of excavated mud) are designed to aid in passive air circulation, much like prairie dog burrows, helping to ventilate their tunnels.
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The snow geese have arrived in Alberta, Canada. Video taken on March 25, 2025. Video is mezmerizing.
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The fennec fox (Vulpes zerda). This North African critter is the smallest canid of all, typically reaching weights of only 3 lbs (1.4 kg)! It also has the largest ears (relative to body size) of any canine, which disperse heat and help this mammal hear prey moving under the sand.
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Photo: Barna Takats
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It’s incredible to observe the difference in the jaws of a gray wolf and a spotted hyena! If we look closely at their molars, we can notice a big difference. The molars of the hyena are extremely strong and robust, a true marvel of nature! These teeth are designed to break large, hard bones with ease, which gives them the ability to eat parts of their prey other predators cannot. Their bite is up to three times stronger than that of a gray wolf.
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The fossa is Madagascar's top predator. It's the only animal that hunts the island's lemurs, able to move swiftly through the trees.
Unlike most animals, it isn't active at a set time, making it cathemeral - it wakes and sleeps whenever it feels like it.
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A rare sighting in the Strait of Magellan! The elusive Southern Right Whale Dolphin (Lissodelphis peronii) has been photographed again. This species, known for its sleek, finless body, has been spotted only a handful of times in these waters. While sightings remain rare, previous records, including those from 2018, confirmed their presence in the region.
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Photo: Pablo Cáceres
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Cheetahs immortalized in a photo by Buddhilini de Soyza, battling a furious current in the Talek River, Kenya.
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