There are certain jobs where thinking about someone else’s life is just built into it. Aviva DeKornfeld has a theory that petsitting is a job like that.

Lilly Sullivan talks with former science reporter, Kelsey Padget, who’s on a mission to disabuse the world of its incorrect assumptions about an allegedly murderous creature: the black widow spider. (10 minutes)Kelsey Padgett will be hosting an upcoming weekly podcast about big history rivalries and gossipy petty feuds. Dr.

Senior Editor David Kestenbaum talks with a different kind of advocacy group: animal scientists doing their best to save a particular species before it winks out of existence. (16 minutes)

As a joke, Jessica Williamson posts a fake “CAT FOUND” poster with pictures of a possum instead of a cat. To her surprise, she gets hundreds of phone calls that ultimately shift her view on humanity.

For most of their history, salmon were born upstream and swam to the ocean before coming back as adults to spawn. But humans have disrupted the route the salmon take to the ocean.

At the age of 17, competitive swimmer Lynne Cox had already accomplished a lot in the open ocean. She’d set two world records crossing the English Channel.

Senior editor David Kestenbaum helps his kids set up an ant farm. They follow all the instructions, to the letter! But he ends up learning a lesson he’s pretty sure the manufacturer did not intend.

Ira goes out birding with birder extraordinaire Noah Strycker, who tells the dramatic story of the bird that changed his life: the turkey vulture.

Linda Lutton and her eleven year old daughter Pirecua explain what happened the year Pirecua begged for a gift that she turned out to be allergic to. Linda is a reporter at our home station, WBEZ Chicago.

Producer Lilly Sullivan used to feel such a strong kinship with “the loneliest creature on earth” that one of her first radio pieces seven years ago was about him. (9 minutes) You can read Lilly's 2013 report about this whale.

Producer Dana Chivvis follows the night zookeeper at the Denver Zoo as she doles out snacks and tucks the animals in.

We turn to those who are truly spineless, and I mean literally, they are creatures that have no spines. Also featured in this story: the people who study them who, like us all, could sometimes use a little more spine.

Mike Wise tells Ira about a run he went on one winter night with his dog, years ago along the C&O Canal in DC. It was late.

After hearing about the heist, Kirk Wallace Johnson gets sucked into the feather underground. He ends up discovering things that the people in charge of the theft investigation didn’t.

Heather and her girlfriend lived with a cat named Sid. The girlfriend showed all sorts of affection toward Sid that she never showed toward Heather.

Nature photographer David Slater went to Indonesia. While he was there, he got some stunning photos of monkeys.