Josh Davis

London

Writer and Digital News Editor at The Natural History Museum London

Natural history writer | Queer nature, eels and embroidery | He/him | ✏️🏛🦦 | Author: A Little Gay Natural History 🌈

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Articles

Homo luzonensis: A small, ancient human species from the Philippines

Mar 11, 2025 | nhm.ac.uk | Josh Davis |Beatrice Boutayre |James Ashworth

By Josh Davis, Beatrice Boutayre and James AshworthThe ancient human species Homo luzonensis is one of the most recent branches to be added to the human evolutionary tree. It’s also one of our most mysterious ancient relatives, with only a handful of Homo luzonensis fossils discovered so far. Find out more about this miniature member of our extended family. The story of human evolution is not straightforward.
DiCaprio’s snake and Sauron’s piranha: Natural History Museum describes 190 new species in 2024

Dec 19, 2024 | nhm.ac.uk | Josh Davis

Sauron’s piranha and DiCaprio’s snakeThe fossil poop was not alone with getting a literary name. This year saw the description of two new vegetarian piranhas, or pacus. One was named Myloplus sauron due to its flame red fins and prominent black stripe which reminded researchers of the main antagonist in The Lord of the Rings. The fish comes from the Xingu River in Brazil, but the building of a dam across the stretch of the water where the fish is found has put its future at risk.
Homo sapiens and Neanderthals were distinct species that were becoming reproductively isolated

Dec 4, 2024 | nhm.ac.uk | Josh Davis

When our ancestors migrated out of Africa, they entered a world already filled with a range of other human species. But questions about when and how these all evolved mean that it can be tricky to trace our origins and pinpoint the exact steps that resulted in our own species’ evolution. Part of the problem comes down to issues in deciding when to name fossils as new species.
15,000-year-old human burial shows evidence of medicinal plant use

Dec 2, 2024 | nhm.ac.uk | Josh Davis

A cave in northern Morocco contains dozens of ancient graves. Dating towards the end of the Pleistocene, some 15,000 years ago, the burials at Grotte des Pigeons are providing a wealth of information about the lives and culture of hunter-gather people. One grave in particular has provided astonishing insights into potential cultural behaviours. It appears that a young man was buried carefully in an oval pit alongside a medicinal plant now known as Ephedra.
Vote for Wildlife Photographer of the Year 60 People’s Choice

Nov 26, 2024 | nhm.ac.uk | Josh Davis

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The slender-billed curlew is declared extinct

Nov 18, 2024 | nhm.ac.uk | Josh Davis

The slender-billed curlew was last officially seen in 1995. Over the past 30 years there have been a trickle of reports of the migratory bird being seen across south and eastern Europe. It now seems likely that these were mistaken identities. Researchers have gone through the account of every specimen, photograph and report for the slender-billed curlew since the late nineteenth century to figure out the probability that the bird survives to the present day.
London commuter rediscovers tiny, invasive bug not seen for 18 years

Nov 12, 2024 | nhm.ac.uk | Josh Davis

Even the most blurry photo can be consequential. After posting an “awful” image of an insect on the internet, Giuliana Sinclair put in motion a national monitoring campaign to seek out an invasive bug last seen in the UK 18 years ago. In the process, she’s highlighted how powerful the online nature community can be and how anyone can make a significant contribution to protecting the natural world.
How to clean up a mine: From toxic waste to feeding communities

Oct 30, 2024 | nhm.ac.uk | Josh Davis

Follow the winding roads through the tropical mountains of the northern Filipino island Luzon and you’ll find a community dealing with a toxic legacy. Just outside the city of Baguio is a former copper mine. At its height of production, it was processing almost 8,000 tonnes of ore per day, but since 1982 it’s been abandoned. This left the local people with a whole litany of problems to cope with.
Almost 80% of nature critical for human wellbeing is outside of protected areas, analysis finds

Oct 21, 2024 | nhm.ac.uk | Josh Davis

Beta During Beta testing articles may only be saved for seven days. Create a list of articles to read later. You will be able to access your list from any article in Discover. You don't have any saved articles.
Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2024 winning images

Oct 8, 2024 | nhm.ac.uk | Josh Davis

In The Swarm of Life, a drove of inky-black and gold western toad tadpoles swim among towering plants and algae in an ethereal underwater world in British Columbia, Canada. The image, taken by Canadian marine conservation journalist Shane Gross, has been awarded 2024’s Wildlife Photographer of the Year.