Biologist Adam Hartstone-Rose had one big question on his mind heading into this month's solar eclipse: Why are animals so stressed out during totality?
On April 8, as the moon crossed in front of the afternoon sun and plunged the area into sudden darkness, he and a team of researchers, zookeepers and high school students observed nearly three dozen different species at the Fort Worth Zoo in Texas. Hartstone-Rose says the animals were considerably less stressed than those he observed during a solar eclipse seven years ago — and thanks to "groundbreaking" preliminary data, he has an explanation.
