PBS
Could This Sperm Whale Eat The Meg?
New ReviewUnlike in fiction, giant whales do not emerge fully-formed from the ocean deep. So, where did Livyatan melvillei come from? How did such a large predator live? And what caused the titan to die out? The answer may lie in an appetite so...
Be Smart
Camouflage Isn't What It Appears To Be
New ReviewCamouflage is nature’s ultimate game of hide-and-seek, and the secret to winning this game is all in the brain. By studying the masters of disguise, we can see how they trick the brain to make themselves invisible — and what this can...
SciShow
This Is The Best Predator Defense Of All Time
It's a hard world out there, especially for a little guy. So what's a soft-bodied animal to do? Turns out that marine invertebrates basically figured out the best defense system of all time, and nobody's a better demonstration of that...
SciShow
Here’s the Reason Why Megalodon Got Mega
We've learned a lot about Megalodon by studying its terrifying teeth. But we're just beginning to understand what made this ancient shark so huge. Hosted by: Jaida Elcock (she/her)
SciShow
The Birds That Eat Fire
Plenty of animals do things that seem risky, but they clearly have a good reason for doing it. After all, they've made it this far by taking chances. But these birds really take the cake when it comes to daredevil stunts, all in the name...
SciShow
The Octopuses Are Making Fish Armies
Octopuses are smart. Like, gather a posse of fish to do their hunting for them smart. And when the fish step out of line, the day octopus punches them. Really. Hosted by: Hank Green (he/him)
MinuteEarth
What Happens When Predators Disappear?
A world without predators. It sounds like a safer, happier world, but come on, this is science…
SciShow Kids
Say Hello to Saber-toothed Smilodon! | SciShow Kids
Smilodon the saber-toothed cat had really big teeth! Join Jessi and Squeaks and learn all about how fossils can tell us how these Ice Age animals lived.
SciShow Kids
These Caterpillars Don't All Look Like Caterpillars | SciShow Kids
In this episode, Jessi and Squeaks explore the many ways that caterpillars use to avoid being munched on by predators, and that it often comes down to how they look!
TED-Ed
TED-Ed: These animals can hear everything | Jakob Christensen-Dalsgaard
The world is always abuzz with sounds, many of which human ears simply can’t hear. However, other species have extraordinary adaptations that grant them access to realms of sonic extremes. And some of them don’t even have ears— at least,...
MinuteEarth
Why These Bears “Waste” Food
Optimal foraging theory means that turning down food is sometimes more efficient than eating it - but even then, what’s “wasted” doesn’t necessarily go to waste.
SciShow
Becoming a Predator Was Hard
Animals eating other animals seems like a tale as old as time, but it's only almost that old. Predation had to evolve in the Ediacaran period -- so let's look at early almost-predators like Auroralumina, Kimberella, Ikaria, and whatever...
PBS
How Plankton Created A Bizarre Giant of the Seas
At more than 2 meters long, Aegirocassis was not only the biggest radiodont ever, but it also may have been the biggest animal in the Early Ordovician. This bizarre marine giant may have only been possible, thanks to a major revolution...
Curated Video
When The "Combat Wombat" Became An Apex Predator
In Australia, evolution built a family of deadly predators by taking a group of cute, harmless herbivores and turning them murderous.
PBS
When Ichthyosaurs Led a Revolution in the Seas
The marine reptiles Ichthyosaurs arose after The Great Dying, which wiped out at least 90 percent of life in the oceans, changing the seas forever and triggering a new evolutionary arms race between predator and prey.
PBS
When Crocs Thrived in the Seas
While dinosaurs were dominating the land, the metriorhynchids were thriving in the seas. But taking that plunge wasn’t easy because it takes a very special set of traits to fully dedicate yourself to life at sea.
PBS
The Sudden Rise of the First Colossal Animal
A truly enormous ichthyosaur around the size of a modern sperm whale, reached its size within just a few million years of taking to the water - a blink of an eye in evolutionary time.
PBS
The Reign of the Hell Ants
This ancient species had the same six legs and segmented body that we’d recognize from an ant today. But it also had a huge, scythe-like jaw and a horn coming out of its head. This bizarre predator belonged to a group known as “hell...
Curated Video
The Mystery Behind the Biggest Bears of All Time
The short-faced bears turned out to be remarkably adaptable, undergoing radical changes to meet the demands of two changing continents. And yet, for reasons we don’t quite understand, their adaptability wasn’t enough to keep them from...
PBS
The Forgotten Story of the Beardogs
Because of their strange combination of bear-like and dog-like traits, they’re sometimes confusingly called the beardogs. And even though you’ve never met one of these animals, the beardogs are key to understanding the history of an...
PBS
The Croc That Ran on Hooves
In the Eocene Epoch, there was a reptile that had teeth equipped for biting through flesh, its hind legs were a lot longer than its front legs and instead of claws, its toes were each capped with hooves. How did this living nightmare...
PBS
How Whale Evolution Kind Of Sucked
Mystacodon is the earliest known mysticete, the group that, today, we call the baleen whales. But if this was a baleen whale, where was its baleen? Where did baleen come from? And how did it live without it?
PBS
How South America Made the Marsupials
Throughout the Cenozoic Era -- the era we’re in now -- marsupials and their metatherian relatives flourished all over South America, filling all kinds of ecological niches and radiating into forms that still thrive on other continents.
PBS
How Plants Became Carnivores
How and why does botanical carnivory keep evolving? It turns out that when any of the basic things that most plants need aren’t there, some plants can adapt in unexpected ways to make sure they thrive.