Zoologger is our weekly column highlighting extraordinary animals – and occasionally other organisms – from around the world. Here’s our top 10 extreme beasts of the year Michael Marshall
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Jet-propelled living fossil with a problem
With 500 million years of evolution behind it, the nautilus has coped with mass extinctions, jet propulsion and even mazes. We are more of a challenge Read more
(Image: Jurgen Freund/Nature Picture Library/Rex Features)
The biggest spider web in the world
A spider less than 2 centimetres long builds webs that span rivers Read more
(Image: Matjaž GregoriÄ)
The sharpest mind in the farmyard
Their dumb reputation belies their abilities – sheep can pass a psychological test that many primates struggle with Read more
(Image: Nick Morgan/Brighton Argus)
The only fish that cries like a baby
The three-spined toadfish is the first fish heard making non-linear calls, which it produces with a specially modified swim bladder Read more
(Image: Aaron N. Rice)
Cryo-frog survives deep freeze
Still another animal that makes humans look like wimps: the brown tree frog survives being frozen by secreting protective chemicals from its skin Read more
(Image: Jason Edwards/Getty)
World’s nicest bird murders chicks
The greater honeyguide is famous for helping humans find bees’ nests, but it begins its life as an infanticidal parasite Read more
(Image: Claire Spottiswoode)
The first non-human meat farmers
It’s the real animal farm: an African ant appears to farm other animals for meat – it may be the best example of true domestication besides our crops Read more
(Image: Brian L. Fisher/)
The hardest spider in the world
If you’re a spider, you’d be crazy to hunt a spider that hunts spiders – wouldn’t you? Looks like no one told Palpimanus gibbulus Read more
(Image: Stano Pekár)
Slime killer hagfish feasts in rotten flesh
Despite not having any jaws, hagfish hunt fish, deter predators with slime, and eat rotting corpses from the inside out Read more
(Image: Zintzen et al., Scientific Reports)
The hairy beast with seven fuzzy sexes
What it lacks in size, one single-celled animal more than makes up for in sexual exploits: it has not two but seven sexes Read more
(Image: Volker Steger/E. Cole/SPL)
