A gecko sticks to a vertical surface because of the huge surface area on its feet (thanks to microscopic hairs). If you ran the gecko's feet under a tap, (or dipped it in a pond), would the gecko just slide down/fall off the vertical surface, because it's feet were busy sticking to water molecules instead?

And if it did, would it have the emotional capacity or facial muscles to look surprised? 

I don't see the benefit of sleeping at night in the wild, especially since this is when the animal is most vulnerable... 

Your article on flying submarines a couple of weeks ago reminded me of the Irwin Allen television series "Voyage to the bottom of the sea", in which the submarine was regularly attacked by various implausible sea creatures. That made me think. Is it biologically possible for a sea creature to grow large and powerful enough to be a serious threat to a submarine?

Probably is a blind shot, but I would like to ask if somebody has calculated the impact in global warming of the direct heat. I am thinking for example in the human population (almost 7 billion with a constant  average temperature of 36.5 º C). And not only that, but the average temperature of all the cattle in the world kept by humans, (billions of animals that otherwise wouldn´t exist). Also we could think in the heat from fires (both wildfires and the small ones) and the heat that escapes from our homes, vehicules or industries.

The proposed drastic badger cull in order to prevent (alledgedly) bovine tuberculosis got me wondering if other livestock was equally affected. I have visions of Starbucks etc serving goats and sheeps dairy produce in defence of poor old brock.

Thanks.

I've noticed, like many others, that dogs hate bicycles and tend to bark or attack them and their riders.

From my observation it's not as simple as it first appears; sometimes I've noticed that dogs simply don't register a bike approaching them, and are then really surprised when nudged with the front wheel even though they've  seen it coming and presumably smelled the rider approaching too, and the rider was shouting and ringing a bell. In these cases, though, stamping a foot down works wonders.

It seems to be all about footfalls/vibration being the key factor that most dogs pay attention to. They see a person apparently gliding along without any obvious footfalls and it either freaks them out, or they completely ignore it and don't perceive it as a large object approaching.

My question is "why should this be?" What possible evolutionary reason is there for ignoring the sense of sight, smell and hearing in favour of vibrational cues? Is it that chasing prey through sunlit and dark areas renders sight less effective than vibration sense? Is it that in a wild pack of dogs, there's constant noise and confusion so footfalls are the most reliable way of sensing a threat?

What is going on here?