Wildlife

"With their bulging red eyes and their alien-like mating sound, periodical cicadas can seem scary and weird enough. But some of them really are sex-crazed zombies on speed, hijacked by a super-sized fungus."

"The historic removal of gray wolves from the U.S. West facilitated the rise of mid-ranking predators across the region, wreaking havoc on historical ecosystem dynamics, a new study has found."

"A new study finds that only a third of the world’s largest marine protected areas (MPAs) currently implement meaningful conservation measures."

"European Union countries approved a flagship policy to restore damaged nature on Monday, after months of delay, making it the first green law to pass since European Parliament elections this month."

"Warming and habitat loss diminished sage grouse populations 80 percent since 1965, putting them on the brink of an endangered listing. Western states, the federal government and energy and ranching interests are struggling to prevent that."

"Every week at the Maui airport, a small helicopter gets loaded with 250,000 passengers. They're male mosquitoes, key players in a strategy that could be the last, best hope for Hawaii's endangered birds."

"After a decades-long struggle, a Native American tribe won the right to resume its hunting traditions off Washington state's coast when federal regulators granted a waiver on Thursday allowing the Makah people to hunt up to 25 gray whales over a decade."

"A group of the world’s last wild horses have returned to their native Kazakhstan after an absence of about 200 years. ... The wild horses, known as Przewalski’s horses, once roamed the vast steppe grasslands of central Asia, where horses are believed to have been first domesticated about 5,500 years ago."