Dinosaurs probably lived to be between 75 to 300 years of age. Scientists figured this out from looking at the structure of their bones.
Skunks can shoot their bad-smelling spray only about two yards, but you can smell it up to two and a half miles away.
One way to tell the age of a fish is by looking at its scales. They have growth rings just like trees. These are called circuli. Clusters of them are called annuli. Each annuli show one year.
The northern fur seal, rather than using a layer of fat to keep it warm, depends on its thick fur with some 300,000 hairs per square inch.
Did you know porpoises could surf? They are frequently seen riding the bow wave of a ship. They make no swimming motions and can ride the wake for more than an hour. They can also turn on their side or flip completely around. Surf’s up porpe!
Fish swimming at depths of 15,000 feet (almost 3 miles down!) can withstand a pressure of 7,000 pounds per square inch. They are able to live in these crushing depths by pumping gas into their swim bladder.
You may have heard someone say, "It’s raining cats and dogs." There have been actual documented cases from all over the world of fish, frogs, dead birds, snakes, snails, beetles, worms and jellyfish raining down from the sky in great numbers, but no reports of showers of cats or dogs.
The blue whale, the largest animal to have ever existed, is 96 feet long and weights 125 tons. This is as much as 4 large dinosaurs (Brontosauri), 23 elephants, 230 cows or 1800 men.
Some animals produce their own lights, called bioluminescence. The Brazilian railroad worm has a red light on its head and green lights down its side. All it needs to drive on the street is a turn signal.
The fastest bird is the peregrine falcon. It can fly at a speed of 168-217 miles per hour.
The largest egg laid by a living bird is that of the North African Ostrich. It is 6 to 8 inches in length and 4 to 6 inches in diameter. The smallest is that of the hummingbird. It is less than 0.39 inches in diameter.
Whether an alligator is a male or female is determined by the temperature of the nest where the egg is hatched – 90 to 93 degrees will make it a male; 82 to 86 degrees will turn it into a female.
Animals with some of the longest lives are the Marion’s tortoise (152 years), the fin whale (116 years) and the deep-sea clam (100 years).
An electric eel can produce a shock of 600 volts. That’s enough to stun large animals – even knock a horse off its feet.
Cows can sleep standing up.
Submitted by D.
A Giant squid's eye can be as big as a basketball.
Submitted by SpeederGal
Salamanders are known to come out of wood when it was burning inside a fireplace, this is because Salamanders hibernate in wood.
Submitted by Amanda
Some frogs can pull their eyes into their throat and help push food down!
Submitted by AquaGrl195
An African adult elephant eats about six hundred pounds of food a day; that’s four percent of the elephant’s body weight!
The smallest fish in the world are the pygmy goby and the Luzon goby, from the Philippines, which are only one-half-inch long when they are full grown.
The 14-foot-long narwhal is a whale whose tooth can reach up to eight feet long!
Chimpanzees use tools more than any other animal except man.
Elephants purr like cats do, as a means of communication.
The mandrill baboon has a red nose, blue cheeks, and an orange beard!
