In June 2013, in a Target parking lot in Wilsonville, Oregon, an estimated 50,000 bumblebees dropped dead. Shoppers reported bees falling from branches and crawling on the ground. Piles of carcasses scattered beneath dozens of linden trees marked the largest mass bee kill ever recorded.
(Trilobites): Leishmaniasis parasites eat human flesh. Cordyceps fungi lead ants to suicide. Toxoplasma gondii eliminate a mouse’s fear of cats. And a barnacle called Sacculina carcini castrates crabs, roots itself into their bodies and brains and transforms them into walking zombie slaves that care for the parasite’s brood as if it were their own.
(Trilobites): You got a kitten. Congratulations! You’ve joined the club of more than 36 million Americans with pet cats. Now, will your kitty be an indoor cat or an outdoor cat?
In Australia in recent decades, the bilby, the bettong, or rat kangaroo, the brush-tailed possum and other medium-sized mammals all disappeared from the Western Desert.
Fungi too can sense attackers and manufacture powerful weapons to combat them, including the toxins and poisons that can send you to the emergency room if you eat the wrong mushroom.
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