Awesome Nature

The biggest spiderwebs we’ve encountered are a few feet across. BBC Earth introduces us to the Darwin’s bark spider, an orb-weaver that can shoot bridging lines for webs up to 25 meters (82 feet) across. That’s not the only extraordinary fact—this spider’s silk is also regarded as the world’s strongest natural fiber.

As we’ve learned before, shrimp can be fascinating creatures. Nature show host Ze Frank takes another look at these weird crustaceans to teach us about some unusual adaptations they have developed. From their jumble of gangly legs to their food-specific pincers to their camouflage abilities, each attribute helps them survive and thrive.

Volcanoes and the Northern Lights can be amazing to watch on their own. Associated Press shared this incredible footage of a volcano erupting in southwestern Iceland while the Aurora Borealis danced in the skies above. The contrast between the orange flames and the green and pink skies showcases the power and beauty of nature at the same time.

Animals come in all shapes and sizes. In this video from Posit Pixel, they use pixel art to describe some of the extremes of the animal kingdom, from diminutive parasitic wasps to a 42-foot-long snake. Along the way, you’ll learn about a fingernail-sized frog and Quetzalcoatlus, an extinct flying animal with a wingspan as big as a single-engine airplane.

Inspired by Bernard Werber’s eponymous fantasy novel, Empire of the Ants is a photorealistic real-time strategy game. You play as 103,683rd, the heralded savior of their ant colony. Build and expand your anthill, conquer other territories, and befriend and fight other forest creatures. Coming to PS5 in 2024.

We love the style and message of this pants-keeper-upper from Arcade Belts. Designed by artist Hanna Eddy, the We Are All Connected belt is illustrated with an abstract landscape in shades of green, blue, brown, and white. Like other Arcade Belts, it’s made from stretchy recycled webbing, and its TSA-friendly buckle glides smoothly through belt loops.

If you browse YouTube regularly, you might have noticed certain trends and similarities between the most popular videos, from how their titles and thumbnails are presented to their duration. MinuteEarth explores this convergence and how video creators adapting to algorithms works kind of like animal evolution.

When it comes to living creatures, everything starts small. This fascinating and creepy nature video from Adrian Kozakiewicz’s Insecthaus uses jump cuts to show how insects progress from eggs or larvae to their adult forms. Adrian also has no problem letting his menagerie of bugs crawl all over his face.

Mosquitoes are the world’s deadliest animal because they spread diseases like malaria and dengue. Scientists have developed a fascinating way to reduce this threat – infecting mosquitoes with Wolbachia, a bacteria that limits mosquitoes’ ability to carry other diseases. To jumpstart the process, they’re releasing millions of infected bugs. AsapSCIENCE explains.

Insects are weird, so we’re not surprised by some of the strange things we learned about butterflies and moths in this video from Ze Frank. Lepidoptera are attractive prey for birds, reptiles, wasps, and other animals. To help survive against these threats, these insects have evolved defenses, including unpredictable flight patterns, toxins, and mimicry.

We always assumed that crows find their food with their beaks. But it turns out that some of them use sticks to fish prey out of trees. In this True Facts video from Ze Frank, we learn about this unusual adaptation and why New Caledonian crows are some of the smartest birds. We think it’s just an excuse for him to say “crow’s stick” repeatedly.

Are sloths lazy? Are elephants afraid of mice? Can porcupines shoot their quills? In this video from Mental Floss, host Justin Dodd explores myths, misconceptions, and inaccuracies about 64 different animals. We’re just glad we’re not actually swallowing spiders in our sleep.

Nature can be truly amazing, bestowing creatures with all kinds of wondrous capabilities to help them survive and thrive. Ze Frank looks at creatures with superpowers like transparency, squeezing prey to death, and the ability to sling slime.

With the holidays upon us, the fragrance of pine is in the air. After buying some pine cones from the market, Boxlapse plucked and planted one of their seeds to see if it would grow into a tree. This captivating time-lapse footage condenses 300 days of growth to about two minutes. Perhaps it’ll be big enough to use as a Christmas tree in a few years.

It’s common knowledge that octopi are intelligent creatures. After he purchased an octopus from a pet store, engineer Mark Rober wanted to release the animal back into the ocean. Before he could do that, he built a challenging maze to confirm that Sashimi would be able to hunt for food after being hand-fed for most of her life.

Budding artists are often encouraged to draw trees for quick sketching success. Drawing Trees branches out from that lesson with 30 meditative guided drawings of trees, leaves, and other identifiers. Trace the images with a pen or pencil to grow your skills and knowledge of tree species from Black Walnut to White Ash.

Despite their lack of wings, spiders can actually take flight. This video from the University of Bristol video explains a process called ballooning, in which spiders take advantage of static electrical charges and wind currents to carry silk – and their bodies – through the air.

This awe-inspiring video footage shot on Lake Louise in Banff National Park shows a literally cool natural phenomenon. This stuff is called “candle ice,” and it forms when the sun warms ice enough that it starts to break down due to air or liquid water trapped between ice crystals. As the ice begins to melt, it breaks easily into candle-shaped columns.

Ants are well known for their ability to work together to build things and accomplish tasks for their colony. In this fascinating video from Horace Zeng, we see how hundreds of fire ants work in concert to pick up, move, and place pieces of glass gravel on a piece of sticky tape, resulting in a colorfully-paved road of sorts.

Sixty-six million years ago, everything seemed to be going just fine for the dinosaurs. But then something changed, wiping out the thriving beasts. Kurzgesagt looks at how one seemingly minor change in the skies led to the rapid extinction of most life on Earth. It’s a dramatic reminder to live each day as if it was your last.

Despite what you might think, coral isn’t a plant. They’re tiny animals from the same group as jellyfish and anemones. Ze Frank provides a detailed look at these unusual creatures that live atop gigantic skeletal structures they leave on the ocean floor. Like other animals, these guys must find food rather than produce it on their own.

We know Ze Frank from his irreverent yet informative nature videos. On a quest to create some shorter videos for TikTok and YouTube Shorts, he came up with a new character. Creepy Dave is also a nature show host, only he has no idea how to pronounce the animals’ names and has the facts completely wrong.

Nature can be weird, wonderful, and at times, gross. Ze Frank teaches us much more about elephants than the “has big ears and a trunk, likes peanuts, hates mice” education we had before. Along the way, you’ll learn why their skin looks so scaly, how they communicate with their feet, and how many pounds they can lift with their trunks.