Amazing Animal Facts
The world is full of strange animals, but what may be even stranger is the fact that everyday animal
species have weird adaptations you may not know about. Here are just a few, and if you have any
you'd like to add, email us at zootours@hotmail.com and we'll add them to the list!
The world's longest snake on record is a reticulated python which measured 33 feet long and weighed over 500 pounds!
The tiny and multi-colored poison dart frog from Columbia contains one of the most poisonous substances
known to man. Many tribes use the poison on the end of darts for hunting, hence their common name.
To extract the poison from the frog they heat it over a fire and rub the ends of their darts in the substance
which excretes from the back of the frog. One frog excretes enough poison to tip 50 darts,
and the tips remain poisonous for a year!
As a defense mechanism the Texas horned lizard can squirt blood from its eyes. Some can squirt
and hit an enemy up to 10 feet away!
A Russels' vulture holds the record for the highest flying bird at 37 000 feet, and their excellent vision
allows them to see carcasses on the ground almost seven miles below them!
The smallest amphibian to ever hop the earth was Eleutherodactylus libatus.
The frog was an incredible 0.3 inches from head to toe when fully grown!
The African Goliath frog is the largest frog known in the world, growing up to one foot wide!
The Komodo dragon is the world's largest flesh eating lizard and living reptile and can grow up to
10 feet in length! Its bite is extremely lethal because of bacteria which infect the bite wound and
causes septacemia, or blood poisoning, and can kill within hours!
The Gaboon viper of Africa has the longest fangs of any snake. One specimen which was 6 feet in
length, had fangs over 2 inchel long!
Some frogs pull their eyes into their throats to aid in swallowing!
A slug has 4 noses!
A giraffe's heart weighs an incredible 24 pounds and can pump 160 galons of blood per minute!
A giraffe can go longer without water than a camel!
Giraffe saliva contains an antidote to the poison that acacia trees have in their leaves. The trees
also have 1 inch long thorns to protect it, and if both methods of defense fail, there are ants
that swarm the giraffe and attack it while it's trying to eat the leaves!
When mating underwater, the sound of the male toadfish is so loud it can be heard by people on shore!
An ostrich's eye is bigger than its brain!
It takes one and a half hours to hard boil an ostrich egg!
Lions can't roar until they're two years of age!
Between 1902 and 1907 the same tiger killed 434 people in India!
Great white sharks have excellent vision and can see in color!
Sharks can sense a struggling fish up to 100 meters away!
A lobster's kidneys are in its forehead and its teeth are in its stomach. Its blood is blue,
and for no apparent reason, it sometimes dismembers itself!
Penguins have an organ above their eyes that converts sea water to fresh water!
A pigeon's feathers are heavier than its bones!
Hummingbird hearts beat 1400 times a minute. They can fly upside down and backwards but they can't walk!
No insects have ears in their heads!
A blind chameleon can still camouflage itself to match its surroundings. No one knows how!
Yak milk is pink!
Ants have 5 different noses, each for different purposes!
The big-eyed wolf spider of Hawaii has no eyes!
At an estimated population of 40 million, there are more than twice as many kangaroos as
people in Australia. There are more than 50 different kinds of kangaroos!
Chocolate kills dogs! True, chocolate affects a dog's heart and nervous system;
a few ounces are enough to kill a small dog!
The largest bird egg in the world today is that of the ostrich. Ostrich eggs are from 6 to 8 inches long.
Because of their size and the thickness of their shells, they take 40 minutes to hard-boil.
Ants never sleep!
The largest known ants can measure up to two inches long!
There are over 12000 known different species of ants in the world today!
A cockroach can live several weeks with its head cut off - it dies from starvation!
A mole can dig a tunnel 300 feet long in just one night!
You are more likely to be killed by a Champagne cork than by a poisonous spider!
Rampaging elephants, mostly bulls in musth (rut) kill over 300 people every year!
Sloths sleep for 16 hours every day and go down to the ground to go to the washroom only once each week!
Up to 300 naked mole rats live in a colony and the queen can have up to 27 babies at a time!
The top straight flight speed for a pigeon is 100 km per hour!
The chameleon changes colors by expanding contrasting pigment cell layers and can change
from green to bright red in 20 seconds. It will use this display to show aggression or anger to try and avoid fights!
Male ring-tailed lemurs rub their scent glands from their hands and legs onto their tails and
flick the scent at other lemurs to establish mating hierarchy. The odor carries information
about the owner's size, strength, and health status!
A rhino can weigh up to 2 tonnes and can have a horn which measures up to 5 feet in length!
A rhino can't see anything more than 100 feet away, which can cause it charge at anything that
startles it, even if it's only a butterfly!
A human has 840 muscles in their entire body, but an elephant has 40 000 in its trunk alone!
Elephants have only dichromatic vision and can only see two primary colors!
Elephants only sleep for 4 hours each night!
A baby crocodile is 3 times the length of the egg it inhabits and can grow to over 15 feet in length!
There are 7 types of vulture that feed on the African savannah!
An Egyptian vulture will use a rock to break into an ostrich egg for a large meal!
Giraffes weigh in at 300 kilos and are 6 feet tall at birth. At a full gallop they can reach 60 kilometers per hour!
Mature giraffes can survive without ground water as they get their moiture from leaves as
high as 18 feet from the ground!
An adult giraffe can take a lion's head off with a single well-aimed kick!
The African porcupine is the 3rd largest rodent after the capybara and beaver and has
over 20 000 quills, some over 12 inches long!
Each gecko foot has more than 1 billion split hair ends that allow it to walka cross roofs or up walls!
Theoretically, a gecko can carry up to 90 lbs on its back while hanging upside down from the ceiling by their feet alone!
Squid are the fastest underwater invertebrate and can travel at 25 miles per hour!
More than 1/2 of all Canadians have 1 pet, and Canada alone has over 13 million cats and dogs!
Aspen valley is the largest black bear rehabilitation facility in the world. It has 22 permanent
residents that can never be reintroduced from mice to moose!
Strange (but true) Laws
Humans have to make laws in order for society to function, but sometimes
these laws are weird and wacky and make you wonder - just why was this law passed in the first place!?
Here are a few laws concerning animals that we found fell into the "What in the world?" category.
Alaska law says that you can't look at a moose from an airplane!
In Corpus Christie, Texas, it is illegal to raise alligators in your home!
In Miami, it is forbidden to imitate an animal!
In Utah, birds have the right of way on any public highway!
In the State of Kansas, you're not allowed to drive a buffalo through a street!
In Florida, it is against the law to put livestock on a school bus!
In North Carolina, it is against the law for dogs and cats to fight!
In Galveston, Texas, it is illegal to have a camel run loose in the street!
In Virginia, chickens cannot lay eggs before 8:00 a.m., and must be done before 4:00 p.m!
In the state of Colorado, a pet cat, if loose, must have a tail-light!
In North Carolina, it is against the law for a rabbit to race down the street!
The law states that more than 3000 sheep cannot be herded down Hollywood Blvd. at any one time!
In California, animals are banned from mating publicly within 1,500 feet of a tavern, school, or place of worship!
Also in California, it is a misdemeanor to shoot at any kind of game from a moving vehicle, unless the target is a whale!
Florida state laws says that if an elephant is left tied to a parking meter,
the parking fee has to be paid just as it would for a vehicle!
In Ohio it is illegal to get a fish drunk!
Also in Ohio, It is illegal to fish for whales on Sunday!
(Where these whales might be found in Ohio is anyone's guess)
In Texas, it's illegal to put graffiti on someone else's cow! (Your own cow is yours to tag however you wish)
In Berkeley, California, you can't whistle for an escaped bird before 7:00 a.m!
In Atlanta, Georgia, it is illegal to tie a giraffe to a telephone pole or street lamp!
(But you can, however, tie it to a flag pole)
In North Carolina, elephants may not be used to plow cotton fields!
In Cleveland, Ohio, it's illegal to catch mice without a hunting license!
In Illinois, it is illegal for anyone to give lighted cigars to dogs, cats, and other domesticated animals kept as pets!
In Chicago it is illegal to take a French poodle to the opera, and for women over 200 pounds to ride horses in shorts!
In Oklahoma, people who make "ugly faces" at dogs may be fined and jailed!
It's against the law in Fairbanks, Alaska to give a moose a beer!
It's illegal to kill any "living creature" in Fayetteville, Arkansas!
Also in Arkansas, it's unlawful to walk your cow after 1:00 on Sundays!
In Marshalltown, Iowa, horses are forbidden to eat fire hydrants!
In Los Angeles, California, toads may not be licked!
In Denver, Colorado, the dog catcher must notify dogs of impounding by posting, for three consecutive
days, a notice on a tree in the city park and along a public road running through said park!
In Florida, having sexual relations with a porcupine is illegal! (We're not sure about the other 49 states, though)
In Key West, Florida, chickens are considered a 'protected species'!
Georgia law states that donkeys may not be kept in bathtubs!
Have you ever seen a baby panda grow?
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
