For her series “Shake“, pet photographer Carli Davidson photographed curious portraits of dogs shaking off water. Use a fast shutter speed and you can capture all kinds of strange expressions on your dog’s face.

You can find the rest of the photographs in the series here.

Shake (via Photojojo)

Image credits: Photographs by Carli Davidson and used with permission

The finding challenges assumptions about the boundary between humans and non-human animals.

By Duncan Geere, Wired UK

The unprecedented flooding in Pakistan in the latter half of 2010 disrupted the lives of 20 million people, but it also affected the country’s arachnid population.

With more than a fifth of the country submerged, millions of spiders climbed into trees to escape the rising floodwaters. The water took so long to recede, the trees became covered in a cocoon of spiderwebs. The result is an eerie, alien panorama, with any vegetation covered in a thick mass of webbing. (You can see images from the region in the gallery linked below.)

However, the unusual phenomenon may be a blessing in disguise. Britain’s department for international development reports that areas where the spiders have scaled the trees have seen far fewer malaria-spreading mosquitos than might be expected, given the prevalence of stagnant, standing water.

The agency is providing aid to the communities affected by the disaster, including safe drinking water, health care, food and shelter. To reduce the population’s long-term dependence on that aid, the government agency is now offering wheat seeds and tools to farmers, and jobs and skills training for those in rural areas. However, reconstruction in the worst-hit areas is expected to take many years.

See more images with the original story on Wired UK.

Image: U.K. Department for International Development

See Also:

• 1 Million Spiders Make Golden Silk for Rare Cloth
• Assassin Bug Eats Spiders After Feigning Capture
• Giant Spider Species Discovered in Middle Eastern Sand Dunes
• The Spider Awards: Wired.com’s Arachnid Hall of Fame
• Black Widow Spiders Are Wasteful Gluttons

Cats attach to humans, and particularly women, as social partners, and it’s not just for the sake of obtaining food.

When a fox was shot by a hunter, it didn’t die. Instead, when the hunter tried to finish the fox off with the butt of his gun, the animal pulled the trigger of the gun and shot the hunter right back. More »