nature
How Brazil Protects and Preserves Its Luminous ‘Golden Grass’
In the Cerrado, the Mumbuca community spin capim dourado into hats, baskets, and jewelry.
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It's a world filled with rainbow trees and vampire birds; tent-making bats and self portrait-sculpting spiders. Where snakes fly, plants chat, ants explode, and crabs accessorize.
This is the world of Wild Life — and it's your world, too. As we wait for our ultimate explorer's guide, we're collecting some of our best-ever writing on animals, plants, fungi, and natural adventures. Scroll down and take a walk on the wild side with us.
Learn to speak prairie dog, meet an immortal tree, or spy (respectfully) on a moonlit coral orgy.
nature
In the Cerrado, the Mumbuca community spin capim dourado into hats, baskets, and jewelry.
nature
The self-sacrificing insects explode, showering their enemies in killer goop.
nature
These scrappy and squat high-elevation trees can live for thousands of years without seeming to age.
birds
As their name suggests, these small birds provide critical cleaning services to oxen, impala and other animals of the savanna—with a side hustle as rhino guards.
nature
The world’s largest living structure renews itself in nights of moonlit passion.
nature
Meet the mighty midge.
nature
We learn how to listen closely to these critters—they're saying a lot more than you'd think.
nature
Xenophyophores can craft multichambered compounds that resemble morel mushrooms.
flight
From Himalayan jumping spiders to brown widows, arachnids love to float over your head.
nature
More than 20 species of these winged mammals construct tiny leaf homes with climate control and built-in security alarms.
nature
Every five to seven years, Chile's Atacama Desert shows its true colors.
nature
More than 45,000 years ago, these porky foragers inspired the earliest known non-abstract art.
animals
Polish cities trust their water quality to elite shellfish teams.
nature
The colorful giants of the tropics are thieves, and they're not picky.
nature
Across sub-Saharan Africa, these birds lead humans to hidden bee colonies.
science
As their habitat dwindles, reptile relocators are springing into action to save these slow-moving icons.
nature
From birds to butterflies, there are many examples of animals that combine male and female characteristics.
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A conservation biologist in Argentina once hosted one of the animals in her living room, but finding them in the wild has proven far more difficult.
For one biologist studying the rock frogs' behavior, safeguarding their habitat is personal.
The wildly uncharismatic buffy-tufted-ear marmoset needs a boost.
Turns out this big, striped lemur-eater didn't come from mainland Africa.
One of the last unmanaged group of horses contend with their non-native home.
The animals face threats from climate change, fishing, and a tourism boom, but their biggest advocate remains hopeful.
These ancient guardians of the traditional nomadic way of life are making a comeback.
Join us for a daily celebration of the world’s most wondrous, unexpected, even strange places.
The Juan Deriba killifish, found in a tiny area of Bolivia, jumps out of water to evade threats.
Orcas and humans once hunted together in southeastern Australia, until their millennia-old relationship broke down.
Before cows and chickens, cuscuses may have been the original livestock.
Renowned entomologist Frank Nischk remembers when the determined insects tried to invade a field station.
Join us for a daily celebration of the world’s most wondrous, unexpected, even strange places.
In rural Chile, the kodkod, or güiña, has a bad rep for stealing chickens—and as a portent of death and disaster.
Scientists fitted the famously bitey marsupials with tiny accelerometers to learn their secrets.
These isolated, pocket-sized silky anteaters live among the mangroves of Brazil’s Atlantic coast.
For scientists, monitoring the feisty, endangered burrowing bat includes moments of "actual madness."
Join us for a daily celebration of the world’s most wondrous, unexpected, even strange places.
Cliffside with Argentina's burrowing parrots, biologist Juan Masello has broken bones, crushed a vein, and nearly drowned.
The deer of Nara Park are part of a millennium-old genetic lineage—does that make them more deserving of protection?
The mini-paratroopers have a new role to play today.
Join us for a daily celebration of the world’s most wondrous, unexpected, even strange places.
Jack and his handler Collette Yee found challenges, meaning, and each other in their work helping scientists better understand orcas, bats, and more.
When vessels such as the WWII tanker E.M. Clark sink, they begin a second life as habitat for a diverse ecosystem.
A new study shows how the birds identify their mates in a sea of black and white.
There is a lot to learn about Orfelia fultoni, the only bioluminescent fly in North America, but its larvae put on a show.
Off-limits and full of venomous pit vipers, this rock has certainly earned its nickname.
diving
Discover the amazing underwater world that can be experienced only in the Sunshine State.
paddling
Paddle out to gain a unique perspective on the Sunshine State
flora
Explore 8 spectacular spots in search of charismatic plants and wildlife that can only be found in the Sunshine State.
birds
Discover the feathered residents that are only found in the Sunshine State.
From the authors of The New York Times bestselling Atlas Obscura series.
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