Snowshoe Hare

The snowshoe hare (Lepus americanus) is a found in Canada and the northern parts of the United States. It eats a variety of plant matter, including leaves, grass, berries, twigs, bark, but is also know to eat carrion (which is something that is already dead).

 Some of you might have worn snowshoes before, but for those who haven't, they are special shoes that help us walk across the snow. The snowshoe hare has this ability too. The spaces in between the hare's toes are lined with thick fur. This allows it to hop across the snow without sinking into it. This is also a handy way for it to escape predators. Another way it escapes predators is by camouflage. During the summer months, the snowshoe hare has a brown coat that helps it blend in. During the winter months, it's fur changes to white which allows it to blend into it's snowy surroundings. 

Like all rabbits, the snowshoe hare is a rodent. Mice, rats, squirrels, hamsters, and guinea pigs are also rodents. All rodents share a common characteristic; their incisor, or buck, teeth continually grow. This means that they must constantly gnaw on things to keep their teeth filed down. If they didn't their teeth would grow so long that they would not be able to eat or drink and they would starve to death. They usually file them down naturally by the food they eat, such as the twigs and bark the snowshoe hare eats. The food and toys that you can give your pet rodents help them keep their teeth filed down. 

Source: The Encyclopedia of Animals, 2006, Per Christiansen

Okapi

The okapi (Okapia johnstoni) was found in 1887, in the jungles of the Democratic of Congo located in Africa. It is a very shy and secretive animal, making it hard to study. Okapis are around 6 to 7 feet tall, with females bigger than males, which is uncommon in the mammal world. Male okapi are generally smaller and have small giraffe like horns on their heads. 

The giraffe and the okapi are the only two species found in the Giraffidae family. Like giraffes, the okapi has a long purple tongue that it can use help it grab leaves and other food from high places. It's tongue is so long that it can wash it's ears with it! The okapi eats many plants, many that, scientist have discovered, are poisonous to humans.

  

It may seem like the okapi would stand out where ever it goes with it's zebra like legs, but the strips actually help it camouflage. In the jungle where it lives there are plenty of trees that cast shadows and sunlight beams through. The stripes on it's legs replicate this and break up the okapi's shape as it move through the jungle. This makes it hard for predators to focus on the okapi.

Of course, here is your own okapi to color!

Source: The Encyclopedia of Animals, 2006, Per Christiansen

Humpback Whale

The humpback whale (it's scientific name in Megaptera novaeangliae) lives in most of the oceans around of the world. They are mammals, like dogs, cats, and humans. Something that mammals have in common is that they are covered with hair, nurse their young with milk produced from their bodies, and have live births (except for a few exceptions like the platypus and echidna). Whales and other creatures like dolphins that belong to the Cetacea order have all those characteristics, even hair! 

Humpback whales can get to be as long as 52 feet. In comparison, most school buses are 45 feet long. And they can weigh as much as 7,900 pounds. So what does an animal this big eat? Other whales? Nope, it eats the total opposite. The humpback whale's diet consists mostly of krill, which are basically tiny shrimp, as well as small fish.

 In winter, when food is hard to find, it will relay on it's blubber, or fat, reserves to survive. Humpbacks swallow water and filter out krill and other food with special teeth called baleen that look like hair combs. Whales are slow swimmers so to help them catch fish, humpbacks will find a school and blow bubbles from their blow holes around it. This creates a bubble net around the fish and keeps the fish from swimming away. Once the fish are trapped, the humpback swallows the school whole.

Want to color your own? Click the image below and print it out!

Source: The Encyclopedia of Animals, 2006, Per Christiansen

Fact #6

Taxidermists are people who preserve no longer living animals. Their jobs are important because it allows scientist as well as you and me to see what animals look like. By looking at a preserved animal, we can see what color it is, it's anatomy, how it's muscles sat on it's body, as well as giving us a clue that this is what an animal looked like. Without taxidermist we would not be able to know what many now extinct animals look like. They also preserve animals that people hunt and turn them into trophies to remember what an awesome animal it was. In North America, the bobcat is the most common mammal that are prepared by taxidermists.

Fact #5

We probably all have heard that goats will eat anything, even tin cans. They eat a lot of things, including a lot of plant stuff many other grazing animals wont eat, but tin cans are not a goat's menu. Goats will chew on tin cans in order to eat the paper that has glue on it that they find rather tasty. Cockroaches also find this glue very appetizing, which is why so many roaches are found in cardboard boxes; they like to eat the glue that's holding the boxes together.

Fact #4

Greyhounds are super fast as well as being super pets. They belong to a breed group known as sight hounds, which means they use primarily their eye sight to hunt instead of their nose or ears. Other sight hounds include Afghan hounds, Borzois, Salukis, Whippets, and the largest of all dogs, the Irish Wolfhound. Many of these dogs have long narrow faces and long legs, which give them the ability to see better and run faster than other breeds.

Fact #3

A jellyfish, living or dead, can give you a nasty sting. Their tentacles contain little stinging cells called nematocysts they use to subdue their prey. Most jellies are toxic, but their toxicity varies between different species. The most venomous jelly is called the box jellyfish.

Fact #2

Have you ever noticed how the hair on your head will only fall a certain way? That is because it is following a certain pattern or grain. Moles do not have a grain to their fur, which allows them to easily move forwards and backwards in their tunnels with out turning around.

Fact #1

Everyone needs vitamin D and in most cases we get it naturally from being in the sun and absorbing it through our skins. Vitamin D helps us absorb calcium, which gives us strong bones. Chickens get their dose of vitamin D little differently. They absorb sunlight through their combs and waddles on their heads and get their vitamin D that way. Plants kind of do the same thing and absorb sunlight through their leaves.