Video by Daisy Gilardini Photography / Rockhopper penguins return to their breeding colonies each October. Typically, they raise two chicks that fledge and prepare to leave the colony by the end of February. After the eggs hatch, the parents take turns caring for the chicks. While one parent stays at the nest, the other heads out to sea to fish—usually returning by late afternoon to feed the chicks and relieve their partner. This is an incredibly busy time on the beach, with groups of penguins c

If ants could speak, the tunnels of some colonies would echo with cries of, “The queen is dead, long live the queen!” Utterly devoted to their matriarchs, these social insects sometimes go through regime change, when a usurper infiltrates an established ant colony, kills the host queen, and persuades the resident workers to serve her instead. But as scientists report in Current Biology, some of these so-called parasitic queens employ an even more devious strategy, one that seems lifted straight

182K views · 2.5K reactions | Teamwork makes the dream... float?  These fire ants will do whatever it takes to protect their colony  | National Geographic Animals | Facebook