Questions tagged [zoology]
The biological study of animals. Very broad use so be sure to add additional clarifying tags
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Does interspecies breastfeeding occur in the wild?
Does interspecies breastfeeding occur in the wild?
Say, for example, a zebra feeding a wildebeest, or a bushbuck feeding a gazelle.
There is a Wikipedia page on this topic but it only shows animal-...
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Which predator / prey pair of species have the most drastically different body size?
I'm trying to identify which 2 species, one predator species and one prey species that have the biggest size difference. Specifically, which predator hunts the largest prey relative to itself?
I'm ...
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What is happening to this moth cocoon?
We 'adopt' a catepillar each year and this year I believe we have a Buff Ermine Moth.
It seemed healthy and created a woven cocoon. It was at this point that I found out these moths overwinter.
We put ...
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Prevention of disease spreading in animal kingdom
It's my first question on here, so I'm not sure If my question fits the theme. Please refer me to the appropriate one, If I have made a mistake.
So a question that I wanted to ask has to do with ...
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Fungivore that feeds specifically on spores
I'm wondering if anyone has knowledge of an organism that specifically feeds on the spores of fungi. When I attempt to research this the results are flooded with numerous examples of fungivores but I'...
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Largest crinoid species
On the wikipedia page of crinoids (sea lilies and feather stars), one can find the following statement in the paragraph "Morphology":
[...] and fossil species are known with 20 m (66 ft) ...
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What animal does this foot skeleton belong to?
I found an articulated foot skeleton. Sun bleached. What animal is this likely from?
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How to empirically differentiate social interaction from self-awareness in the mirror test?
When placed in front of a mirror, manta rays are more active (e.g. expose their ventral side to the mirror) and present more frequent and repetitive movements (e.g. furling and unfurling their ...
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Phonotaxis and Preference
(Am I losing my mind?) I could have sworn there was solid research indicating that phonotaxis evidence for preferences (during ex situ experiments) was "held up" by en situ experiments...(by ...
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What animal makes these sounds?
An animal near where I live in Austria is making these sounds. I'm thinking it is in distress, but I can't find it. Can anyone tell me what it is?
It goes quiet when you get close, but responds ...
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Can a crocodile crack open a turtle's shell?
To put the question more accurately I consider the Saltwater Crocodile, which has been measured to have a bite force of 16.4 kN and estimates of up to 34 kN in 6.7-meters long individuals.
For turtles ...
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Very small, light and dark "insects" - Italy - Infestation, healthy problems? - Insect identification [duplicate]
I'm currently in a town near Savona, on the coast in north-west Italy.
We had a problem with pigeons, that create their nests in the space between the roof and the ceiling.
Now, from the tube of the ...
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What caused these shallow depressions in a European forest?
Recently, in an eastern European forest, I came across many depressions in the ground of a regular round shape, with a flat bottom and vertical walls.
Many were filled with water.
Some were obviously ...
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Is it possible to identify a kind of scorpion based on a photo of its dried body
Somebody at my university have came back from a vacation trip and brought back a dried body of this small scorpion.
Can you identify it for me?
This is a very tiny (?) scorpion, if I may say so. I can'...
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Estimating the diameter of all earths biomass as a sphere
I am working on an educational resource about the relative scales of resources compared to the earth. Attached is an example of the earth compared to various elements contained within, as well as a ...
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Where do the bones of dead animals go?
I've spent quite a bit of time in the wild, but I've seen little to no bones lying on the ground.
Large bones such as skulls, spines, horns, hooves are not eaten by any other animals, and even ...
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Are there any Bilateria directly able to photosynthesise? If not, are such feasible/possible?
I'm trying to think of a type of animal, easily understood, that does not (and never has) existed, but that could feasibly exist. As most non-bilateral animals are complicated for a child, I was ...
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What this shape name? (concave laterally and straight medially, cross section shape of crayfish rostrum)
What is a shape name for upper surface (colored black) of the cross-sectional shape in the attached image? It is a cross-section through a crayfish rostrum. It is horizontal and linear medially, but ...
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Help identifying an insect
I live in Milan, Italy in the city center. I live in this house since 5 years and I keep finding the insect pictured below.
I see it throughout the seasons (temperatures here range from -1°C to +35°C ...
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I am trying to identify this bone I found on the beach at the Delaware Bay in Delaware. It is 2 1/2 inches wide and 1 1/2 tall
This bone was found at Big Stone beach on the Delaware bay, Delaware. It weighs only 19 grams
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Quantifying species detection probability using sign surveys as a function of distance in known occupied sites
I ran a pilot study to determine the probability of detecting a rare African small carnivore using scat (feces) detection dog surveys to assist with future population monitoring and occupancy surveys. ...
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What is the Latin term for animals which dust bathe?
I have lost track of this term. I am sure that I encountered a Latin word (not a taxonomic word) which applies to all animals which dust bathe.
I fact, I am not even sure how to describe a word like ...
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Is there an example in evolution where a huge jump in evolution happened due to a dramatic mutation?
Here is a chicken that due to a mutation got 4 legs:
I wonder, are there examples, where such one-time dramatic mutational chages gave rise to a new species?
Are there species that appeared not due ...
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Is there any research on whether a choanozoan might have invaded a similar enough holozoan to make the first metazoan?
My mind was piqued by the idea of endosymbiosis of a bacterium penetrating the cell of an archaean being a precursor to the advent of eukaryotes. And I thought that perhaps something analogous to this ...
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What kind of insect is this? It looks like a huge spider with one long antenna and six legs
It looks like a huge spider but with six legs and has one very long antenna. It also looks like it has claws. Please I would like to know what sort of insect it is. So I would know measures to take if ...
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Have elephants (or any species other than humans) been known to cover their dead?
I was just reading this blog on HarperCollins website about 5 animals that grieve. Of elephants, the following claim is made:
They bury their dead and pay tribute to the bodies and to the bones. [my ...
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Identify blue/translucent jelly-like animal on beach
A few weeks back a beach in California had lots of this animal (if it is an animal?). Can anyone identify what it is?
They had a distinct blue bottom and a see-through top.
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What species is this insect?
I would be grateful for help identifying the insect depicted in the attached picture. It was found inside a residential building (ground floor) at the periphery of Valladolid, a city in Yucatán, ...
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How does sperm gets oxygen in the female reproductive tract?
At the time of insemination, sperm along with seminal plasma enters in female reproductive tract and the plasma contains fructose for providing the energy to sperm
If the fructose follows just EMP ...
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Do some animals have a notion of cooking? [duplicate]
Humans turned the concept of feeding themselves into a whole field in which they rearrange ingredients so as to obtain specific flavours and so on. It's more effort than just feeding ourselves.
Do ...
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Why do Bactrian camels have two humps and dromedaries one?
Why has the Bactrian camel evolved to have two humps instead of the one that the dromedary has?
I searched on Google and I found nothing about it.
All I found was that the that humps store fat, that ...
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Can citrate in semen be utilized as a source of energy by the sperm?
Prostatic secretions of semen include citrate as one of the component.
The role of citrate in motility has been suggested by some researches.
(Kavanagh JP. Isocitric and citric acid in human prostatic ...
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Why do animals excrete excess nitrogen instead of recycling it?
I am aware of the different ways animals excrete excess nitrogen (mainly ammonium, urea, uric acid). My question is: why do we excrete excess nitrogen instead of recycling it? How can we explain that ...
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Tiny insect identification in potted plants
Unfortunately, the new potted soil I've bought seems to be heavily infested with insects. Firstly, I have had a fight with fungus gnats. After using parasitic nematodes about 10 days ago, I no longer ...
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What is right below skin?
I was skinning a gopher so my cat can eat it (it was a pest and we didn't want to waste it). I thought its organs would fall out and make a mess, but that didn't happen. There was this sticky, ...
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Has a bird ever been seen stalling?
Note: I am not sure this is the right site, but I believe birds are off-topic on Aviation SE.
Has a bird of any species ever been seen experiencing an aerodynamic stall by increasing the angle of ...
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What determines the color of the air sac of a Portuguese man o' war?
I know that the Portuguese man o' war is a colonial organism composed of many "zooids", one of which is the pneumatophore, which essentially serves as a flotation device for the whole colony....
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Flora and fauna of early homo sapiens environment?
Where can I find as much detail as possible on the flora and fauna (and perhaps geological structures too) between the time of the origin of Homo Sapiens say ~300kya to their "out of Africa" ...
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Are giraffes living on Calauit island an example of Island dwarfism?
When I traveled to Calauit island I was stricken by the small size of giraffes living there. The giraffes are the descendants of Africa animals imported in the 1970s.
Like Noah and the biblical ark, ...
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Do lions crabwalk?
Cats turn sideways arch their back and puff their fur, to apppear bigger, when trying to intimidate someone. Do lions do that? What is the largest feline that does that?
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Which horn configuration is more effective as a weapon?
For horned animals, there are two common configurations of cranial horns.
One long horn above the nose (Styracosaurus, Rhino).
Two long horns above the eyes or forehead (Triceratops, cattle, African ...
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Are the spikes or prongs in the frill of Ceratopsids considered horns?
Many Ceratopsids, mostly of the subfamily Centrosaurinae, have long spikes or prongs sticking out from the edge of the frill, most famously Styracosaurus, but also Diabloceratops and Rubeosaurus and ...
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Estimates for the volume and mass of most ancestral multicellular organism, and a similar question for alive animals with radial symmetry
please I'm interested in an estimate for the volume and weight, the mass, of (most) ancestral multicellular organisms. Wikipedia has the article Multicellular organism, and my main interest are ...
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Ducks highest body temperature
Normal body temperature for ducks are 106-108°F (41.1-42.2°C).
Young ducks 102-106°F (38.9-41.1°C).
How hot can a duck's body temperature get?
Possible causes are fever and viruses, as well as stress ...
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Specific Heat Capacity and Thermal conduction of Blood
Is the specific heat capacity and thermal conductivity of animal blood (e.g., steer for beef) and bird blood (e.g., broilers, ducks) [e.g., immediately after slaughter] similar/same as human blood?
I ...
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Smallest animal that produces food for humans
I was thinking about how bees can produce honey and human can eat it. After that I came up with question. What are the smallest animal that can produce food for human?
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Does the most known image of Long-finned pilot whale depict one with the melon inflated or not inflated?
The most common image of the Long-finned pilot whale shows a bulbous head. Some may think this is merely an inflated melon:
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/7/76/...
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Superbugs in eusocial animals
I am not a biologist, and I'm interested in eusocial animals, and the porous habitats in which they live. I know few facts about diseases in these animals: I know some interesting instances of viruses,...
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How are ray-finned and lobe-finned fish related in terms of their evolutionary history?
I'm trying to trace human evolution back to the first eukaryotic cells (as a tool to research the evolution of various bodily systems), and I understand that lobe-finned fishes are considered a key ...
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