MinuteEarth
The Fastest-Growing Plant In The World
Bamboo is the world’s fastest growing plant thanks to the cell elongation process it shares with all grasses and its unique cell wall layering adaptation, allowing it to shoot up to 100 ft (30m) in just 8 weeks.
TED-Ed
TED-Ed: Why wildfires are necessary - Jim Schulz
Our early ancestors relied on lightning to cause forest fires, from which they could collect coals and burning sticks to help them cook food and clear land. Yet, it wasn't just humans who benefited from these natural phenomena. Even as...
TED-Ed
TED-ED: From the top of the food chain down: Rewilding our world - George Monbiot
Our planet was once populated by megafauna, big top-of-the-food-chain predators that played their part in balancing our ecosystems. When those megafauna disappear, the result is a "trophic cascade," where every part of the ecosystem...
SciShow
3 Ridiculous Ways Plants Get Sick
Plants can get sick, but since they don’t walk around sneezing on each other, the things that infect them need some very weird strategies to spread.
TED-Ed
TED-Ed: Nature's fortress: How cacti keep water in and predators out | Lucas C. Majure
If you were a jackrabbit in the desert, you'd be glad to stumble across a cactus: the flesh of these plants is a water source for many animals. Known for their spines and succulent stems, cacti of all shapes and sizes have evolved to not...
MinuteEarth
Why Biodiversity Is Good For The Economy
Research suggests that more diverse ecosystems are better for the bottom line.
SciShow
The Secret Language of Elephants
You are probably aware of the fact that elephants make trumpeting noises - but did you know that most of their communication is so low pitched that humans can’t even hear it?
TED-Ed
TED-Ed: The secret language of trees - Camille Defrenne and Suzanne Simard
Learn how trees are able to communicate with each other through a vast root system and symbiotic fungi, called mycorrhizae. -- Most of the forest lives in the shadow of the giants that make up the highest canopy. These are the oldest...
SciShow
6 Weird Mushrooms (And Other Fungi)
Mushrooms can be pretty weird! Some have the power to trick animals into caring for them, appear to bleed, or even clean up radiation!
Chapters
SCLEROTIA Credit: Tocekas
0:59
EGG-MIMICKING FUNGUS
2:05
HYPHAE
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MinuteEarth
This Is Not A Pine Tree
True Pines (conifer trees in the genus Pinus) are often confused with other members of the Pinaceae family like Picea (Spruces), Abies (Firs), Pseudotsuga (Douglas-firs) or Larix (Larches). So is very likely that your Christmas tree is...
Crash Course
What Are Ecosystems? Crash Course Geography
Today we're going to take a closer look at ecosystems -- which are communities of living organisms in an area interacting with their environment -- and how this relationship between the amount of energy a place receives and the movement...
SciShow Kids
How Do Squirrels Find the Food they Hide? | How Animals Prepare for Winter | SciShow Kids
Squirrels eat a lot of things that are pretty tricky to find in the winter, like nuts and berries. Luckily for them, they have lots of clever ways to store up food to last them through the cold parts of the year!
SciShow
These Trees Eat Salmon!
Fish-eating trees sound like they’re straight out of science fiction. But they’re a real thing—one that exists right here on Earth. And they show just how interconnected life on this planet is.
MinuteEarth
Which Came First - The Rain or the Rainforest?
Which Came First - The Rain or the Rainforest
PBS
The Age of Giant Insects
Insects outnumber humans by a lot and we only like to think we're in charge because we're bigger than they are. But insects and other arthropods weren't always so small. About 315 million years ago during the Carboniferous Period, they...
SciShow
The Weird Optical Illusion that Changes the Moon's Size
The full moon might seem bigger on the horizon than when it's higher up, but when does it actually take up more space in the sky?
MinuteEarth
The Real Reason Leaves Change Color in the Fall
Want to learn more about the topic in this week's video? Here are some keywords to get your googling started: Leaf senescence, chlorophyll, carotenoid, anthocyanin
Be Smart
Where Did Humans Come From?
In part 1 of our special series on human ancestry, we tour through our family tree to meet our ancestors and distant cousins, and to find out what made us human along the way. The story of human ancestry is not a simple progression from...
SciShow Kids
Explore the Rainforest! Ecology for Kids
It's raining where Jessi and Squeaks live, so they decided to bust out some books and read up on a special kind of forest where it rains almost every day!
TED Talks
TED: The intended consequences of helping nature thrive | Ryan Phelan
From a special black-footed ferret to coral that can withstand warming waters, genetic rescue efforts that use genomics and synthetic biology are helping nature thrive. But despite the huge successes of this kind of intervention,...
SciShow
Inside the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone
SciShow takes you inside the site of the world's worst nuclear disaster to show you how, nearly 30 years later, life has adapted and persisted.
SciShow
Inside the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone
SciShow takes you inside the site of the world's worst nuclear disaster to show you how, nearly 30 years later, life has adapted and persisted.
SciShow Kids
Life as a Tree!
Did you know you can read the story of a tree's life? By looking at a tree's rings, you can figure out way more than just how old it is! Jessi and Squeaks are here to show you what to look for next time you're on a hike and find a tree...
Be Smart
Beavers: The Smartest Things in Fur Pants
Beavers have done more to shape North American landscapes than any animal beside humans. We don't notice them much today because there aren't many left, but before colonization, North America was home to hundreds of millions of these...