Tiny Frog Species Discovered

India’s smallest land vertebrate, a 10-millimeter frog, has been discovered in the Western Ghats of Kerala. The picture shows the tiny frog sitting on an Indian 5 rupee coin.


Scientists discovered the tiny frog living under leaf litter and among the roots of ferns in a humid and mountainous rainforest. The species has been named Nyctibatrachus minimus. This frog can be found during the night (hence the common name of the genus - "Nightfrog") and its mating calls can be heard from under the leaf litter during monsoon months, the ideal time for reproduction.

Pink and White Katydids

A resident of Osaka, Japan found some interesting insects in her flower bed. Among them was an odd pair of grasshopper-like bugs — one pink, one white. An Osaka Museum of Natural History entomologist identifies them as the larvae of Euconocephalus thunbergi (”kubikirigisu” in Japanese), a close relative of the katydid. While he says it is normal for these insects to change between green and brown to match their surroundings, pink and white are considered abnormal. Speculation is that the pink is an extreme variation of the brown coloration, and the white specimen is believed to be an albino, though nobody will know for sure until it becomes an adult.

Zoo Sells Gorilla's Art On eBay

Little Joe and Okie, two of the western lowland gorillas at the Boston zoo, are avid finger painters and their paintings are now being sold on eBay. The finger painting is a part of the zoo’s enrichment program designed to keep the gorillas intellectually stimulated.

Polar Bear Gallery

Some cool pictures taken from this Flickr photo gallery:

Eel Species with Protruding Throat Jaw

Researchers studying one species of moray eels have uncovered a deadly secret that helps the fish to swallow their prey. Like the creatures from the sci-fi movie Alien, these eels have a second, extendable pair of jaws — encrusted with sharp teeth — that thrusts forward to ensnare their prey.

High-speed videos and X-ray photos show how the second jaws, called pharyngeal jaws, lie in wait inside the throat (top of picture), and then extend forwards into the mouth to grab prey that has been captured by the eel's main teeth (bottom of picture). The morsel is then drawn into the eel's esophagus.

This helps the eels (Muraena retifera) to be deadly hunters, despite the fact that, unlike many other predatory fish, they cannot generate strong suction forces inside the mouth cavity to capture a meal. Zoologists had previously been puzzled as to how moray eels, which live on coral reefs and rocky shorelines all over the world, keep hold of their prey long enough to swallow it. Unlike the movie creatures, however, these moray eels cannot extend their second set of jaws out beyond their first.

Many fish species have extra jaws in their throats, which can function to filter food from water or to grind prey when swallowing. But the eel's extendable jaws are the first throat jaws known to be adapted to help catch prey, rather than simply to help swallow it.

Be sure to check out the video of the jaws in action:

Monster spider web spun in Texas

Entomologists are debating the origin and rarity of a sprawling spider web that blankets several trees, shrubs and the ground along a 200-yard stretch of trail in Lake Tawokoni Texas State Park.

Spider experts say the web may have been constructed by social cobweb spiders, which work together, or could be the result of a mass dispersal in which the arachnids spin webs to spread out from one another.

Genome transplant changes one species into another

For the first time, scientists have completely transformed a species of bacteria into another species by transplanting its complete set of DNA. The achievement marks a significant step toward the construction of synthetic life, with applications including the production of clean fuel in as little as a decade. The researchers hope that genome transplantation will enable the production of synthetic microbes for green energy sources, pharmaceuticals, chemicals and textiles.

The scientists’ results show that it is possible to transplant the complete set of DNA—the genome—from one species into the genome of a different species, so that the recipient organism is phenotypically and genotypically identical to the donor organism.

Baby Mammoth Found in Permafrost

The discovery of a baby mammoth preserved in the Russian permafrost gives researchers their best chance yet to build a genetic map of a species extinct since the Ice Age. The mammoth, a female who died at the age of six months, was named "Lyuba." She had been lying in the frozen ground for up to 40,000 years. Weighing 110 pounds and measuring 85 centimeters high and 130 centimeters from trunk to tail, Lyuba is roughly the same size as a large dog.

The fact the mammoth was so remarkably well-preserved -- its shaggy coat was gone but otherwise it looked as though it had only recently died -- meant it was a potential treasure trove for scientists. Its skin condition protects all the internal organs from modern microbes and micro-organisms.

Unidentified "Octosquid" Found

What appears to be a half-squid, half-octopus specimen found off the Big Island of Hawaii remains unidentified and could possibly be a new species. The specimen was found caught in the filter of a deep-sea water pipeline. The pipeline, which runs 3,000 feet deep, sucks up cold, deep-sea water for the tenants of the Natural Energy Laboratory of Hawaii.

The specimen tentatively belongs to the genus Mastigoteuthis, but the species is undetermined. Biologists termed the specimen "octosquid" for the way it looked. It is about a foot long, with white suction cups, eight tentacles and an octopus head with a squidlike mantle. The octosquid was pulled to the surface, along with three rattail fish and half a dozen satellite jellyfish, and stayed alive for three days.

The pitch-black conditions at 3,000 feet below sea level are unfamiliar to most but riveting to scientists who have had the opportunity to submerge. The sea floor is full of loose sediment, big boulders and rocks, and a lot of mucuslike things floating in the water, which are usually specimens that died at the surface and drifted to the bottom. Lots of fish have heads like a fish and a body like an eel. There are fish floating in a vertical position, with the head up, and don't move unless they're disturbed.

Elephants on an Evening Stroll