Saving the graft was critical so the medical team proposed a treatment that surprised Lofgreen: leeches. “I was absolutely floored,” says the 31-year-old Idaho resident. “My initial reaction was, Okay ...

Pity the poor leech. For more than a century, it has been a poster child for the once-decrepit state of medicine. Nothing illustrates the relative backwardness of pre-20 th century health care than ...

Leeches might seem like relics of a bygone age of medicine, but they haven’t outlived their usefulness to people yet. The freshwater leech Helobdella austinensis can eat its weight in snails every day ...

The biological history of leeches is difficult to study: Their tissue decomposes almost immediately, and their boneless bodies rarely fossilize. But a geological formation in Wisconsin preserved a ...

For centuries, observers have told tales of leeches leaping through the air in pursuit of their next meal—with written records of the creatures’ gravity-defying feats dating as far back as the 14th ...

Northumbria University, Newcastle provides funding as a member of The Conversation UK. As we tidy away the Dracula capes and glow-in-the-dark plastic fangs for another winter, one notorious blood ...

A 430-million-year-old fossil has rewritten leech history, showing they are at least 200 million years older than previously believed. Unlike today’s bloodsucking leeches, their ancient ancestors ...

White men can’t jump, but terrestrial leeches can. This is now a scientific fact; after centuries of anecdotal reports, the parasites have been caught on video leaping from leaves in the Madagascan ...

A chance video by a grad student relishing her first big field trip might help resolve an argument that’s raged among biologists for more than a century. The question: Can leeches jump? Yes, at least ...

When I was young we had a cabin in northern Wisconsin where my dad would invite his childhood friends to come and fish. One such friend had a fear for the leeches we used regularly for bait. He would ...