Tag Archives: Mammal

Rock hyraxes, known in southern Africa more often as “dassies”, are furry, thickset creatures with short legs and no discernible tails. They spend much of their time sunning themselves on rocky outcrops. Another thing they sometimes do is drag their butts along the ground. Dog owners know that this behavior can be a sign of parasitic infections; in hyraxes the …

The platypus is a deeply unusual animal for a collection of reasons, not least because it is considered to be the most venomous mammal on the planet. Just a small handful of mammals can deliver a dose of venom – and the duck-billed platypus sting is often cited as the most agonizing. Platypus venom isn’t potent enough to kill a fully …

Since the demise of the dinosaurs, mammals have thrived. Without their scaly peers around, their numbers exploded, they diversified, and they got bigger – but just how big? It’s well-known that the blue whale is the largest mammal ever – heck, it’s also the most massive animal to ever live – measuring around 30 meters (98 feet) and weighing up …

The DNA of pathogenic bacterial species known to cause blood poisoning in African elephants has been found in the teeth and bones of prehistoric mammoths.Credit: aleks1949/Shutterstock An analysis of the bones and teeth of ancient mammoths (Mammuthus) has identified some of the microorganisms that lived in the animals’ mouths and bodies more than one million years ago. The study, published …

A groundbreaking study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences has redefined the evolutionary timeline of mammals and possibly early human ancestors. Thanks to the precise application of argon-argon dating, a team led by Ferhat Kaya from the University of Oulu has pinpointed the ages of fossil-rich volcanic sediments in central Türkiye to between 7 and 10 …

Published last week in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B, a team of Chilean scientists announced the discovery of Yeutherium pressor, a mouse-sized mammal that lived alongside dinosaurs roughly 74 million years ago. Found in the remote Rio de las Chinas Valley in the Magallanes region of southern Chile, the fossil offers an unusually complete glimpse into the diversity …

Fossil Shows a Sharp-Toothed Mammal That Thrived Among Dinosaurs  The New York Times Source link

When we think of apex predators in the Arctic, most of us immediately picture the iconic polar bear. They roam the icy expanses, hunting seals, and surviving in one of the harshest environments on Earth. But a recent study has revealed something that might surprise you: beneath the waves, there’s another predator that may be equally, if not more, powerful …

In a remarkable discovery on the cliffs of Durlston Bay near Swanage, Dorset, a new species of prehistoric mammal has been unearthed, offering fresh insights into the diversity of early mammals that coexisted with dinosaurs. The fossilized remains, dating back approximately 145 million years to the Berriasian age of the Cretaceous period, were found by Benjamin Weston, an undergraduate paleontology …