Imagine a creature that looks like a mashup from a child’s wildest dreams: a furry animal with the bill of a duck, the tail of a beaver, and webbed feet, that also lays eggs and produces venom. This ...

Note, however, that the cladogram does not imply that modern monotremes (including the platypus) are part bird. Rather, birds are included in this diagram because they are contemporary ...

The platypus is the ultimate biological oddball. At first glance, it almost seems like someone stitched together leftover animal parts just for fun. It has the bill of a duck, the tail of a beaver ...