Skeptics Stack Exchange
Skeptics Stack Exchange

Questions tagged [zoology]

Use this tag for questions involving animal biology; evolution, ecology, physiology, behavior, genetics, and marine biology.

Zoology the branch of biology that relates to the animal kingdom, including the structure, embryology, evolution, classification, habits, and distribution of all animals, both living and extinct, and how they interact with their ecosystems.

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Can dogs smell fear?

Ever since childhood I've been told that if you encounter an unfamiliar dog, you should not show fear, because if you do, the dog is more likely to become aggressive. I have been told that this is because "dogs can smell fear" I'm sure there are…
Monkey Tuesday
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Do apes/monkeys open bananas from the floral end?

I often hear people lecturing about how to open a banana from the "right" end, including an explanation that this is how monkeys do it. A quick search in the internet offers a lot of examples (for example: this Youtube video or this Instructables…
saramkon
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Is cows' milk bad for cats?

My mother used to tell me that I shouldn't give our kitten cow milk, even if she seemed to enjoy it. Since I loved my kitten, and was quite disobedient at that time, I did it fairly often, and never observed any unwelcome consequences. I did a…
Aeronth
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Do wombats share their burrows during fires?

In the wake of the devastating bushfires currently burning in Australia, an image has been widely shared on social media: Here is one example from Twitter, retweeted 11K times: While I have an open mind, I am suspicious for three reasons: It is…
Oddthinking
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Can a 7-Hz tone kill chickens via resonance?

In the Sound function section of the Turbo C Version 2.0 Reference Guide 1988, I found the following comment. Emits a 7-Hz tone for 10 seconds. True story: 7 Hz is the resonant frequency of a chicken's skull cavity. This was determined empirically…
duongntbk
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Do goldfishes have a two or three seconds memory?

It is often claimed that goldfishes have a very short memory, usually of two or three seconds. Like most claims in the real world, I have yet to see a source provided for it. So, do goldfishes have a short memory?
Borror0
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Did humans see fish at the bottom of the world's deepest trench, the Mariana trench?

Several Wikipedia articles, (Bathyscaphe, Trieste and Challenger Deep), about the 1960 Bathyscaphe Trieste trip to Challenger Deep, the deepest part of the Mariana trench, mention observations of lifeforms on the deep sea floor: "The bathyscaphe…
user2547
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Did an octopus visit another tank to hunt?

I've seen several versions of this story. An aquarium (or pet store, or rich fish collector) noticed that fish were mysteriously vanishing from a tank at night. After this happened a few times, someone decided to stay overnight to try to find out…
Joe Gottman
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Do dogs know when their owner is coming home through some form of telepathic link?

My friend cited a study by Rupert Sheldrake which ran an experiment over several years that video taped dogs, showing that dogs knew when their owner was coming home due to some psychic link. He published a paper called: A Dog That Seems to Know…
Kit Sunde
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Do cats like keeping warm on car tyres in winter?

An image macro I've seen a few times, has an image of a cat sitting on top of a car tyre, and says to the effect of 'Reminder, cold season is starting, and cats seek shelter in cars, please check for cats before starting your car'. Do you cats…
dwjohnston
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Do monkeys love bananas?

This one comes from my 7-year-old. So, do all monkeys go bananas for bananas? Some types of monkeys? Do all monkeys like bananas somehow? ...or is it just a cartoon convention with no basis in reality?
yrodro
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Do ducks sink in soapy water?

It is often said that if one were to add surfactants to water ducks would not be able to float as their feathers would start soaking water instead of repelling it. Has anyone actually tried this experiment? What were the results?
picakhu
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Do cats and dogs have saliva that has antibacterial or antiseptic properties?

Do cats and / or dogs have saliva that has antibacterial or antiseptic properties? Are these any more effective at preventing infection than the saliva of humans or any other animal (is cat or dog saliva more special than any other animals saliva)?…
going
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Can a cat's purr heal injuries?

I've read it on Wikipedia's article about purring (in French), which I will paraphrase as follows: Veterinarians think that cats heal fractures etc. more rapidly than dogs. [citation] A hypothesis alleges that purring may have a healing effect on…
POSIX_ME_HARDER
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Did any armed forces, or units give pets to their soldiers at the start of their training which they were required to kill at the end of it?

In the QI episode about killers the panel mentions that German SS soldiers during WWII were given puppies at the start of their training to raise, and then they were required to kill the dogs at the end of the training. I found that the same claim…
SIMEL
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