Cool Facts
Animals Birds Zoology Interesting Facts
The heaviest flying bird is the King Bustard of Africa,it weighs about 19 kg !
Did you know that Giraffes only need to drink water once every few days! Most of their water comes from all the plants they eat !
Woodpeckers don't have any vocal cords that means they can't make a sound.Drumming trees with their beaks play an important part of their communication with each other!
Another amazing fact about woodpeckers is that pecking of trees for the whole day does not cause any pain to them! They have special air pockets in their brains which prevents feeling of pain reaching the brain!
Most of the living organisms have one heart. But a strange fact about octopuses is that every octopus has three hearts. Two hearts pump blood to its gills whereas one heart pumps blood to the rest of the body !
Cheetahs are the only big cat that can turn in mid-air while sprinting !
Do you know that horses express their mood ! Yes they do,they use their ears,eyes and nostrils to express their mood !
The Albatross has a wingspan of up to14 feet and only needs to land once every couple of years to breed !
The bird with the most feathers is the whistling swan,with up to 25000 feathers!
Most of us know that woodpeckers have very long tongue so that they can catch the prey from the depth of the holes of the trees but do you know that many woodpeckers have barbed tongues that help them extract bugs from trees and holes !
Despite not being strongly adopted for the dark,tigers have night vision that is 6 times better than humans!
Sharks have no bones .A shark's skeleton is made up of cartilage !
A rhino's horn is not attached to its skull.It is compacted mass of hairs that continues to grow throughout the animal's lifetime !
An adult hippo needs to resurface every three to five minutes to breathe !
A tarantula spider can survive without food for more than two years!
Dogs have a wet nose to collect more of the tiny droplets of smelling chemicals in the air.That is why dogs are used as detectives by police.
The Australian Mallee Fowl, a bird,builds a nest 5 meter ( 16.5 feet) high and 11 meters (36 feet) wide !
Do you know that the fastest swimming bird in the world is Gentoo Penguin!
Bumblebee bats are the world's smallest mammals!
The birds don't fall off a branch while sleeping because their toes automatically clench around the twig they are perched on!
Do you know that some birds sing so loudly that we're unable to hear them! Many birds ,such as starlings,sing notes too high for humans to hear.
Do you know that Koalas have finger prints like us ! They are the only animals except primates (monkeys,apes ,humans etc) who have finger prints.
A bird's normal body temperature is usually 7-8 degrees hotter than humans !
Here is an amazing fact about Ostrich.Dis you know that an Ostrich eye is bigger than its brain!
Do you know that African Grey Parrot is considered to be the most talkative and most intelligent bird in the world? It often whistles ,clicks or make other sounds.If you have this parrot as a pet,you can expect to listen regular sounds of alarm clocks,video games,telephones as well as dripping water!
An amazing fact - A bird's heart beats 400 times per minute while resting and up to 1000 minutes per minute while flying! In humans ,it can be anywhere between 60 to 100 minutes per minute while resting .
Do you know that Peregrine Falcon is the fastest bird in the world ! It can reach speed in excess of 200 miles ( more than 320 KMs) per hour.
Have you heard about a barking shark? Swell Shark is a species of fish that can bark like a dog.
Did you know that an ostrich has two toes on each foot which gives it greater speed.
Crows are considered to be fifth smartest animal in the word. Here is the list of world's top 5 smartest animals :Chimps,Dolphins,Elephants, Cephalopods & Crows.Although many scientist also put sheep,parrots and dogs also among top 5 intelligent animals in the list of 10 most intelligent animals!
Have you seen Goldfish -a fish which is multicolored !But do you know Goldfish can loose its color? But why & how? If Goldfish is kept in dim light ,it looses its color.Similar to humans,it needs sunlight to keep its pigment.
Do you know that the mosquitoes prefer to bite people who have just eaten a banana or have smelly feet!
Do you know that the roosters can't crow if they do not fully extend their necks!
Do you know a cat can not taste sweetness as it does not have receptors for sweetness !
Do you know a shark is the only fish that can blink with both eyes!
Did you know that mosquito repellents do not repel! They just block mosquito's sensors so they do not realize that you are there!It is like you having a blocked nose and unable to smell anything!
Do you know that 12 honeybees have too spend their whole lives to make a teaspoon of honey!
Baby giraffes can stand within half an hour and after only 10 hours can actually run alongside their family .
Do you know that elephants were known as oilphants .We started calling them elephants only after 14th century!
A goldfish is the only animal that can see the infrared and ultraviolet light!
A chameleon's tongue can move at the speed of 21 km/hour (13 mph) .It depends upon temperature and other conditions. Chameleon's tongue shoots out to a distance of up to one and half times their body length ,catch an insect prey on the its sticky end and then retract back into chameleon's mouth in a flash !
Ants stretch and yawn when they wake up in the morning!
Do you think cows bite grass off the ground, the answer is no !Rather they curl their tongues around it and pull !
Frogs breathe through their skin in hibernation .
Here is a cute fact!When a male penguin falls in love with a female penguin,it searches whole beach to find a perfect pebble to give as a present to her !
July 22 is celebrated in many countries as Rat-Catcher's Day!
The longest migration bird : Do you know that the arctic tern makes the longest migration every year,it flies about 20000 to 25000 miles (32000 to 40000 kilometers) each year from Arctic to Antarctic and back again !
Dolphins have 'names' by which they call each other just like humans do! A study at University of St.Andrews in Scotland said that the marine mammals use a unique whistle to identify each other and respond when they hear their own call played back to them.The dolphins are acting like humans;they hear their name ,they answer back!
Did you know that there is only one species in insects which can turn its head and the name of that species is the praying mantis!
A tiger's legs are so powerful that even when it is dead ,it can remain standing.Many a times tigers keep standing even after being shot ,they bleed out and die !
Tigers are excellent swimmers and can swim upto 6.5 kms at a stretch!
Do you know that female cats tend to be right pawed,while male cats happen to be more of left pawed.And another surprising fact about cats is that a cat can't climb head first down a tree because every claw on a cat's paw points the same way.A cat must back down to get down from a tree!
Cats and Dogs: Cats can make about 100 different sounds .Dogs make only about 10 different types of sound.
Do you know that to completely drain out the blood of an average human,it would take at least 1,200,000 mosquitoes, each sucking once.
Do you know that parrots don't have vocal chords! They produce sound by pushing air out of their trachea.
Gorillas have senses very similar to humans including hearing,taste,sight,touch and smell!
Bees have 4 wings and their buzz is the sound made by their wings which beat 11,400 times per month.
Flies do not grow.They are born full size.
Do you know that Sharks have no bones,their skeleton is made up of cartilage.
Rabbits can see behind them,but have a blind spot in front of their face
Flamingos are not naturally pink.They get their color from their food-tiny green algae that turn pink during digestion.
The only known poisonous bird in the bird is the hooded pitohui of New Guinea.
Do you know that weight of bones in a pigeon's body is less than weight of its feathers?
Do you know elephants can't survive for more than 24 hours without drinking? That's why they are never too far way from a water source.
Do you know that rats use their tail to control their body temperature because the can't sweat!.
Fish don't feel pain! A latest study has discovered that fish don't have brain system or enough sensory receptors to experience sufferings ,fish don't even suffer when they are hooked and fighting for lives.
A not-so-known fact about fish-The age of a fish can be determined the same way as trees.Fish scales also have one growth ring for every year of age .
Do you know why dogs are used as detectives?Dogs have a wet nose to collect more of the tiny droplets of smelling chemicals in the air .
Which is the nosiest animal?.This depends what you mean by noisiest. If you mean the loudest , then blue whale's low frequency pulses are considered to be the loudest,they are louder than a jet engine and can be detected more than 800 kms away.On the land, howler monkeys are the loudest ones, who can be heard from 4.8 kms away. In amphibians, it is conqui frog.In birds, oil birds are the loudest.
Normally animals have pink tongues, but Giraffes have black tongues.
The fastest fish is the sailfish.It can swim as fast as car travels on the highway.
Do you know that the fastest moving snake on land is the Black Mamba!
Do you know Vultures digestive system contain special acids which can dissolve dangerous bacteria like Anthrax,Botulism& cholera.That is the reason that they don't fall sick despite eating dead bodies of people having these diseases .
A goldfish has a memory span of only 3 seconds.
Ostrich is a fascinating bird as it is largest living bird & its egg is the largest egg.Although categorized as a bird, it can't fly.It is also the fastest running bird.Ostrich is also the only bird that has only two toes on each foot.
Polar bears live only in Arctic areas that surround the North Pole—not in Antarctica, which surrounds the South Pole.In fact, the word arctic comes from the Greek word for bear, and Antarctic comes from the Greek meaning the opposite, without bear .
A tarantula spider can survive for more than two years without food.
The great horned owl has no sense of smell.
A polar bear's fur is not white. Each hair is clear hollow tube. Polar bears look white because each hollow hair reflects the light.
Here are few interesting facts about Giant Panda bears.It's an endangered species .There are around 1000 of them existing in the wild, and one hundred of them in captivity.Panda ears act like its nose & its nose acts like its ears. That means ,it smells through ears & smells from ears. The pandas are very shy, they don’t go to areas where people live.A blind folded Panda would always move north. Panda liver has lot of iron content, which makes it magnetic, that is why it always moves towards north like a compass.Pandas are not affected by any human illness, except chick-pox.In Chinese, the Panda is called 'Da Xiong Mao', meaning 'giant bear cat'.The logo of World Wide Fund (WWF) for nature features a giant panda on it.The Panda sits while eating – Instead of standing while eating food, the panda will sit in order to use its front paws to hold the bamboo shoots.Approximately 99 percent of a panda’s diet is bamboo leaves and shoots.Pandas eat very fast and they eat 12 hours a day.
The pug originated in China and was bred by Chinese Royalty in the Forbidden City during the Tang & Yang dynasties.
The higher the temperature,the faster crickets chirp.When the temperature is little over 11 degree Celsius,cricket chirps about 60 times in a minute
Dog nose prints are as unique as human fingerprints and can be used to identify them.
Addax ,is a kind antelope, which does not drink water .It is found in Africa ,it gets the water it needs from the plants and the the food it eats.
The hippopotamuses are so big that they can easily walk underwater,along the bottom of lakes and rivers.
Camels don't chew their food, they swallow it .They regurgitate & chew the cud later.
Cats spend 30% of their waking hours grooming themselves.
Dolphins have specially adapted eyes which helps them to see clearly in the water as well as out of the water.
A whale shark has more than 4000 teeth ,but each is less than 1/8 inch long only.
You can tell age of a tree by counting rings in the stem but you can tell a horse's age by counting its teeth.
Brood Parasites is the name given to birds which lay eggs in other birds' nest and have the foster parents take care of them e.g. cuckoo
Average rate of heartbeat in elephants is 30 per minute whereas in chicks it is 400 per minute.
Albatross bird has the longest wingspan ,which can go up to 14 feet.. They can use it to glide for hours without rest or even a flap of the wings.
Cicada is the loudest insect in the world.
Tiger Diet -One averaged sized tiger can eat up to 60 pounds of meat at a single time .
Camels is called ship of the desert.Its body has special features which help it to survive in the desert. The hump on its back contains lot of fat which can be broken down to provide energy and water.Camel has double eyelids and long eyelashes to protect their eyes from the sand.Camels can close their nostrils to keep the desert sand out
There are two kinds of camels- dromedary and the bacterian. Dromedary has a single hump & it is mainly found in Africa ,Middle East & India. The bacterian camel has two humps ,it lives in central Asia
Do you know butterflies taste with their feet?
Now this is something cool ,Turtles can breathe through their butts.
Have you slept today, but do you know Honeybees never sleep !
An amazing fact about an African elephant - they can detect seismic signals with the sensory cells in their feet! !
Mosquitoes are more attracted to the color blue than any other color.
A Blue whale's tongue weighs more than an elephant.
Camouflage is the protective shape or coloration of an animal that helps it to blend or merge in its surroundings to protects itself from predators.Most animals have patches and spots which help blend in with patches of sunlight and dark vegetation.Lions & cheetahs have an excellent color in yellow sun-scorched grasses due to their yellow skins.
Army ! tell your friends a group of frogs is also called an army.
Can you sleep while walking ? No ! but an albatross (a bird) can sleep while it flies !
You have 20 teeth when you are a baby & 32 teeth when you grow up & they stop growing but do you know a rabbit's teeth never stop growing.
How many colors you can see? But you know Bulls are colorblind. They can only see black & white color So it’s a black-and-white life for them!
Now this is really mind-boggling! Believe this ! A mosquito has 47 teeth.
Owls have eyeballs that are tubular in shape,because of this ,they can not move their eyes.
You know what is a ‘mob’ ? It is a group of unruly people.But do you know a group of kangaroos is also called mob. Now they may not be unruly as a group of people ,but still their group is called mob.
The parrots are the only birds which can pass food to their mouth with their toes!
Do you know when an Octopus is attacked by predators ,it can detach its arms.After a few weeks ,these amputated arms grow back.
The King of Jungle –Lion , is he the strongest animal ? But remember a lion would be defeated by a polar bear in a battle if the two start fighting with each other?
A giraffe tongue is so long that it can clean its ears with it. It is normally 21-inch long!
One more trivia about giraffe - It is one of the quietest animal. A giraffe does not have any vocal chord to make any kind of noise!
Have you heard about doggy disco? It is held in Italy every year where owners can dance with their dogs.
Have you seen elephant’s teeth? Now think ,an elephant's tooth can weight as much as three kilograms
Do you know there are no snakes in New Zealand.
You always thought protein is a nutrient? But do you know snake venom is ninety percent protein.
They say our ancestors were either chimpanzee or monkeys. But do you know a chimpanzee can learn to recognize itself in a mirror, but monkeys can't.
Can you sleep with open eyes ? No ! but dolphins sleep with their eyes wide open.
You know lightest /smallest bird of the world ? It is Humming Bird !A coin is heavier than a hummingbird!
Also do you know a Humming bird can also fly backwards !
The smallest egg is laid by the Vervain Hummingbird and is the size of a pea !
How many hours you can sleep ? Can you compete with snails. A snail can sleep for three years, at a stretch.
Do you have any friend who is left handed ? Tell them they are not the only ones, as all polar bears are left-handed.
Do you know things keep changing over the years? Here is one , the butterfly was originally known as the ‘flutterby’.
Next time when you see a Zebra ,think is a zebra black with white stripes, or white with black stripes? Well, it’s white with black stripes.
A camel is known as Ship of desert as it can survive long without drinking water .But do you know a rat can survive longer than a camel without water.
Do you know whose immune system is strongest among all animals? Sharks ! They are the most healthy, as they are immune to all known diseases.
Now don’t laugh, there are more dogs in Paris than there are people.
Do you know Australia has 17 million people but 150 million sheep.
Do you know that Rodeheye rockfish of the North Pacific can live more than 200 years!.
You have eyelids, whenever there is dust-storm or strong light ,eyelids protect your eyes .But insects and fish have no eyelids. Hardened lens protect their eyes.
Squirrels save our environment ! How ? Squirrels accidentally plant millions of trees, as they bury their nuts and forget where they are.
A baby kangaroo is called a Joey .A newborn kangaroo (joey) is smaller than a thumb!
Do you love dogs ? Do you know eyesight of dogs are better than that of human beings?
A dog shoulder blades are unattached to the rest of its skeleton to allow it greater speed while running!
Do you eat eggs? Keep eating as they are plenty of hens giving plenty of eggs ! On an average a hen lays 19 dozen eggs in a year.
Always enter a dark cave from right .You would save yourselves from bats as they always turn left when exiting a cave.
Now this is called elephant-size smelling power ,an elephant can smell water from a distance of three miles.
Milk lovers! Make a cow listen to music and there will give more milk!
Elephants can not run as they can not lift all 4 legs off the ground at the same time but they move at up to 25 miles per hour by using the ‘Groucho walk’ with their knees bent & body lowered.!
Do you know a housefly lives only for 14 days.
Do you know a bat is the only mammal which can fly !
Have you been in airplane? But do you know dog was the first animal to be sent up in space.
Do you know whale is largest animal .The small car on the road is probably the size of the heart of a blue whale.
If you thought elephant is the biggest animal, just imagine this, length of an elephant is the same as the tongue of a blue whale.
Are you a brainy kid ? But do you know poor Starfish don't have brains.
King of the jungle –Lion. You know lions spend most of their day resting as they hunt during the night hours until morning.
Have you ever used mosquito repellent at home ? Tell your parent s !Mosquito repellents don't repel. They hide you. The spray blocks the mosquito's sensors so they don't know you're there.
Now try this & prove us wrong !No piece of paper can be folded in half more than 7 times.
You know Walt Disney created Mickymouse character ? But do you know Walt Disney was afraid of mice.
Elephants are the only animals that can't jump.
Do you know that elephants can not survive more than 24 hours without drinking water ?
The only 2 animals which can see behind themselves without turning their heads are the rabbit and the parrot.
When hippos are upset, their sweat turns red.
The "nine lives" attributed to cats is probably due to their having nine primary whiskers .
The word Spain means "the land of rabbits."
A butterfly can see the colors red, green, and yellow.
Lions cannot roar until they reach the age of two.
A baby kangaroo is called a joey
A group of crows is called a murder.
In one trip, a honey bee visits about 75 flowers.
A sheep, a duck and a rooster were the first passengers in a hot air balloon.
A Glow Worm (Fire Fly) glows to attract small insects .The glow worms construct snares made from silk threads and sticky droplets to capture the insects attracted to their glow
Dolphins sleep with one eye open.
Chameleon is derived from the Greek, meaning "little lion."
An octopus has three hearts whereas Earthworms have 5 hearts & poor humans have only one
A dog by the name of Laika was launched into space aboard the Russian spacecraft Sputnik 2 in 1957.
A tiger's canine teeth can grow up to 3 inches long .It is easily capable of crunching through the spine of any creature of the earth.
You know Chameleon can change color of its body ,but do you know the Chameleon can focus its eyes separately to watch two objects at once.
You know Chameleon can change color of its body ,but do you know the Chameleon can focus its eyes separately to watch two objects at once.
A bird’s normal body temperature is usually 7-8 degrees hotter than humans.
Do you know that the humming bird can fly up, down, forward, backward and even upside down.
The giraffe has the highest blood pressure of any animal.
A giraffe can feed for up to 16 hours in a day.And it can eat up-to 60 kgs of leaves daily .
The ant can lift 50 times its own weight, can pull 30 times its own weight.
Female mosquitoes are non- vegetarian in nature and continue their existence by taking the blood of human-beings and other animals.They are only responsible for the spreading of the infectious diseases like Malaria, Dengue and Chikungunia etc.
Dogs have better low-light vision than humans because of a special light-reflecting layer behind their retinas.
There are people all over the world who eat bugs and insects as food, and the practice is called Entomophagy, which comes from the phrase “insect eating” in Greek.
Dog's noses are 10,000 times are more sensitive to Human ,that is why they are used in detective jobs.
A giraffe can grow up to 18 ft (5.5 meter) whereas an Ostrich ,the largest bird ,can reach 8 ft ,they can't fly but can run very fast.
You know why Flamingos are pink? Well, they feed on certain kind of algae which contains a chemical called cartenoids ,which is responsible for Pink color.In zoos, they don't get this kind of algae ,so their color fades to white.
A whale called humpback is famous for its singing.
An octopus has 3 hearts & a cow has 4 stomachs.
An animal epidemic is called an epizootic.
Dragonflies have the sharpest eyesight and largest eyes among all the insects .
The eyes of a sea lion are well adapted for seeing both above and below the water.
Male hippos use their lower canine teeth as weapons when fighting for female territory.
The thick coats of the camels reflects sunlight and act as a insulation from heat of the desert's sand.
A surprising fact about spiders: Spiders have transparent blood.
The Bonobo (also known as pygmy chimpanzee) makes a night nest in a tree in a new location every night .
The ostrich can cover 10 to 16 feet (3 to 5 meters ) in a single stride (leap) .
The Thorny Devil lizard from Australia drinks water through its feet .
Earthworms do not have lungs,they breathe through their skin .
Most plankton have little or no swimming ability and rely on ocean currents and tides for transport .
The antennae of the ant are used for smelling,tasting and touching purposes .
Octopuses can eject a cloud of blackish ink to escape from predators .And do you know that a baby octopus is about the size of a flea when it is born!
Squirrels use their tails as a signalling device to communicate .
Cranes have a large vocabulary of specialized calls including alarm bells .
Grasshoppers have 3 pairs of legs,the hind legs are longer and more powerful than other legs .
Hummingbirds keep hovering while eating their food,beating their wings 70 times a second .
Did you know that rabbits and guinea pigs don't sweat.
Here's a small trivia about Woodpecker. A big woodpecker can peck 12000 times a day and it can peck 20 times per second! Unbelievable, isn't it?
Here's a small trivia about Giraffe . Giraffes are the only animals born with horns!They are born with bony knobs on their forehead?!
An adult hippo needs to resurface every 3-5 minutes from water to breathe!
A small trivia about cobras:The metabolism of the cobra is very slow so it only needs to eat every couple of months.
Have you heard about a bird known as ravens? They look like crows but they belong to different categories of species.A funny fact about them is that whenever they see other ravens,they hide their food.Strange thing about hiding is that they pretend to hide it at one place but they actually keep it at some other place!
Do you know that sea otters hold hands while eating and sleeping so they don't drift apart.
Here is a strange fact about woodpecker.A green woodpecker can eat as many as 2000 ants on any given day!Strange isn't it?
Owls can not swivel their eyes. Instead they move their heads completely around to see straight behind them!.
A flamingo can only eat when its head is upside down !
A seagull can drink salt water because it has special glands that filter out the salt!
The Pygmy Mouse Lemur is the smallest primate!
The honey bee is the only insect that produces food eaten by humans!
Do you know that ants can not chew their food? They move their jaws sideways like scissors to extract juices from the food!
Do you know that Kangaroos are the only large animals to use hopping as their primary method of locomotion!
Shark's eyes are on the sides of their heads ,so they can have an amazingly wide sight line spanning near 360 degrees!
Compiled by Dr P.Norman, Library of Modern Culture