Ecosystems

Environment

What you can do to improve soils

Soils are the life-sustaining structures under our feet. Here are some tips for keeping soils healthy. First rule of thumb: Give more than you take.

Agriculture

Healthy soils are life-giving black gold

Scientists explain why everyone needs to value the soils beneath our feet — and why we should not view them as dirt.

Animals

Newfound technique allows some tree snakes to climb wide trees

When a tree is too wide to climb, brown tree snakes use a lasso-like trick to slowly ascend up to snacks.

Ecosystems

Can people protect as much space as nature needs?

To save biodiversity, nations are drafting a plan to protect 30 percent of Earth by 2030. Up for debate is how best to do that.

Animals

Scientists Say: Lachryphagy

Some insects land on the eyeballs of larger animals. They are seeking out the salt and proteins in the animal’s tears.

Oceans

Analyze This: Shipwrecks provide a home for bottom-dwelling fish

Fish have found a habitat in a submarine and freighter that sunk to the seafloor during World War II.

Animals

Around the world, birds are in crisis

Human activities around the world are threatening bird species. Numbers of even some of the most common species are starting to fall.

Genetics

Scientists Say: Evolution

Evolution is how species change over time. Individuals in the group vary, and some will pass on their genes. Over time, the whole species changes.

Animals

Analyze This: Ropes restore a gibbon highway through a rainforest

When endangered Hainan gibbons started making risky leaps across an area mowed down by a landslide, researchers provided them a rope bridge.

Environment

Jumping ‘snake worms’ are invading U.S. forests

These bad-news invaders are spreading across the United States. As they turn forest debris into bare ground, soils and ecosystems are changing.

Environment

Polluting microplastics harm both animals and ecosystems

Researchers are beginning to uncover the real-world impacts of polluting microplastic bits on animals and the ecosystems they inhabit.

Plants

The faster trees grow, the younger they die

As climate change spurs forest tree growth, it also shortens trees’ lives. That results in a quicker release of climate-warming carbon back into the atmosphere.