A python can swallow enormous prey and then fast for months. To digest such a feast, its body transforms within days: its metabolism rises dozens of times over, its intestines thicken and its heart gains about 40% in mass. Once digestion is over, everything returns to normal. Researchers see clues here for treating human heart disease.
In 2022, a young tagged bar-tailed godwit flew from Alaska to Tasmania in about 11 days of nonstop flight, covering 13,560 km without eating, drinking or landing. Before departure, these birds pile on huge fat reserves and shrink their digestive organs, which are useless during the journey.
To escape rivals, a dung beetle rolls its ball of dung in a straight line. At night, it holds its course using the glowing band of the Milky Way. In a planetarium, researchers showed that beetles rolled straight under a starry sky but wandered aimlessly when the galaxy was switched off. It was the first animal known to navigate this way.