Our Favourite Animal Facts!
Our Favorite Animal Facts
by Athena Cheung 5A (8) and Hailey Wong 6E (31)
Animals are some of the most amazing and unique creatures in our world. Animal facts can really blow your mind. Here are some of our favorite animal facts that we can share with you, and we hope you learn something new!
“Animals are some of the most amazing and unique creatures in our world.”
1. Did you know that some jellyfish are near immortal? If they get threatened or take physical damage, they reverse back into their polyp stage, which means they turn back into a baby and begin their life all over again!
2. Do you like hedgehogs? Most people think that they are scary and are extremely spiky, but they are actually very unique animals. Hedgehogs are night owls and they hate the hot weather, therefore they only hunt for food at night to avoid the heat. When hedgehogs hunt at night, they have to be very careful as they are lactose intolerant.
3. Surprisingly, animals enjoy getting drunk too. Chimpanzees are known to steal palm wine brewed by villagers and feral vervet monkeys in the Caribbean are famous for stealing alcoholic drinks from bars.
4. If you are scared of animals, then you should know that animals fear us more than their most feared predators! A number of studies have shown that animals around the world fear humans far more than some of the world’s most famous predators, such as bears, wolves and lions.
5. Some fish can walk! Yes, you heard it right! But one kind of walking fish is especially strange. Deep in the Thai rainforest there are cave angelfish, which are one of the very few fish to have a bone connection between their pelvic fins and spine. This combined with strong muscles, allows them to walk through caves and even up waterfalls in a fashion similar to a newt.
6. Flying snakes doesn’t sound too good, but they do exist! Technically, they’re more gliders than fliers. They can glide for up to 100 meters and are the only known limbless vertebrates that can glide through air.
7. There's an animal that's part vegetable -literally! The Costasiella sea slug, also known as the leaf sheep- is a photosynthetic animal. It spends most of its time grazing on marine algae.
8. The loudest animal in the world is the tiny Pistol Shrimp. It’s capable of snapping its claws shut rapidly which creates a bubble that collapses to produce a sonic blast, louder than Concorde’s sonic boom. The shock wave can reach 230 decibels, also louder than the sound of a gunshot. The imploding bubble for split seconds also generates temperatures of 4,400C, nearly as hot as the sun, killing its prey.
9. Did you know that humpback whales use bubbles to hunt? In fact, humpback whales even team up to use a bubble net technique to catch their prey. They would swim in a spiral and blow bubbles underwater, creating a circular ‘net’ of bubbles that makes fish harder to flee.
10. Reindeers’ eyes turn blue in the winter! According to the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council, “the eyes of Arctic reindeer change color through the seasons, from gold to blue, adapting to the extreme changes of light levels in their environment.” The changes in the eye color affects how light is reflected through the animals’ retinas and improves their vision.
These are some of our favorite animal facts. We hope you find these facts interesting and be sure to share them with your friends and family!