Bats are large pollinators, have an impact on our fruit supply and keep pest insect levels down. Learn some interesting facts about bats here.
Food security is a global priority – and it is becoming more urgent in the face of climate change, which is already affecting crop productivity. One way to improve food security is to increase crop yields.
In his 1859 book, On the Origin of Species, British naturalist Charles Darwin put forward his theory of natural selection. This, he argued, was the mechanism of biological evolution: like an animal or plant breeder selects for certain characteristics, individuals with better survival ability leave more offspring.
Most South Africans love eating meat, but animal diseases regularly threaten a constant, affordable supply.
Caves are overlooked but essential parts of the natural world. Many animals use caves for shelter and for raising their young – bats among them. Caves are often home to multiple bat species. Bats may also use different caves for specific reasons; some travel to particular selected caves, known as maternity caves, just to have their pups. This means that large populations of bats rely on a...
Warmer weather makes feeding time much easier, and more effective, for honeybees, according to Professor Sue Nicolson of the University of Pretoria (UP) and colleagues from Chinese universities, who made this discovery after analysing high-speed videos. The results were published in the Journal of Experimental Biology.
Once upon a time there was a world without bees, but we would not have liked this world. It was a dark world without flowering plants competing to attract buzzing bees for pollination—a world without colourful fruits and berries. Even after solitary bees emerged, it took many millennia before bees became social and a colourful and sweet world, a place with nectar, emerged.
Most people have a perception that beehives and colonies are perfectly built, and that they are places of industrious labour for the greater good of the colony and a workforce working for the common good. Prof Crewe’s research uncovers the “dark” side of bees.
Most people have a perception that beehives and colonies are perfectly built, and that they are places of industrious labour for the greater good of the colony and a workforce working for the common good. Prof Crewe’s research uncovers the “dark” side of bees.
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