Love hurts

Clouds of noxious gas, stink bombs and purple smokescreens may sound like schoolboy pranks, but the animal world is just as capable of executing arresting chemical warfare, says Deborah Nicholls-Lee

For most of the year, greater sage-grouse keep a low profile, blending into their vast sagebrush home across the American West. But come the breeding season, the males suddenly take centre stage – and

W hen a peacock mantis shrimp strikes, it generates the heat of a star. The crustacean retracts a spring-loaded mouthpart known as a dactyl club and puts it on a latch, like a cowboy cocking the hamme

An ecosystem evolves across thousands of years, a biological interaction that is both intricate and fragile. The arrival of a new species can disrupt the balance, as we have seen in Britain with grey

In this new series, I’ll explore just how clever plants are, the complex ways in which they respond to the environment around them, the adaptations they make and the survival strategies they employ. I

Yossi Yovel The Genius Bat Understanding our most mysterious mammal 336pp. Oneworld. £20. Philosophy begins with wonder, according to Plato and Aristotle. As for philosophy, so, and more so, for biolo