Penguins are aquatic flightless birds living in the southern hemisphere especially in Antartica. They are highly adapted for life in the water, their wings have become flippers! Most penguins eat krill, fish, squid, and other animals underwater. They spend half of their lives in land and half in the oceans.  They are not only found in cold climates such as Antartica, in fact, only a few species of penguin live so far south. One species, the Galápagos Penguin, lives near the equator.

The Emperor penguin is the largest living species, The adults average about 1.1m tall and weigh 35 kg or more. The smallest species is called the little blue penguin. which is 40 cm tall and weighs 1kg. The smallest penguins are generally found in temperate or even tropical climates, while the largest penguins are generally found in the colder regions. But there are exceptions!!

These pictures are funny, and penguins are very beautiful animals. When I saw these images I decided that penguins are extraordinary when they are swimming. Penguins are famous animals widely regarded as cute and lots of people adore them… there are lot’s of documentaries and movies about them!

Photo1, Photo2, Photo3, Photo4, Photo5, Photo6, Photo7, Photo8, Photo9, Photo10, Photo11, Photo12, Photo13, Photo14

Cattle are ruminants, meaning that they have a digestive system that allows use of otherwise indigestible foods by regurgitating and rechewing them as “cud”. The cud is then reswallowed and further digested by specialised microorganisms in the rumen. These microbes are primarily responsible for decomposing cellulose and other carbohydrates into volatile fatty acids that cattle use as their primary metabolic fuel. The microbes inside the rumen are also able to synthesize amino acids from non-protein nitrogenous sources, such as urea and ammonia. As these microbes reproduce in the rumen, older generations die and their carcasses continue on through the digestive tract. These carcasses are then partially digested by the cattle, allowing them to gain a high quality protein source. These features allow cattle to thrive on grasses and other vegetation. [Wikipedia]

]]> http://www.animals-zone.com/lovely-mountain-cows/feed 0 http://www.animals-zone.com/hedgehogs-sooo-cute http://www.animals-zone.com/hedgehogs-sooo-cute#comments Fri, 14 Oct 2011 18:22:15 +0000 http://www.animals-zone.com/?p=3782

We just happened to find this picture online today, two hedgehogs side by side in a human hand. So cute! One is still a baby, sporting newly grown spikes, while the other is larger (not as large as a hedgehog can get!). Hedgehogs are not aggressive, but rather passive and they suffer a lot when their spikes are growing. If you have a hedgehog pet, you should rub his skin with some vegetal oil (like sunflower or olive) to keep it most and soft while the spikes are appearing. He’ll appreciate it!

Image sources: link link link link link link

He raised his pigeon (Prince) since he was just a few weeks old, thus the bird considers Jeff his parent.

But he was the first surprised after the bird started following him when he went jogging.

He started to increase the distance between Prince and him, whistling the bird to come back to his hand. And then one day, he started cycling, with the bird flying alongside.

All pictures CC from Flickr (link1, link2, link3, link4)

Whale Saves Diver

Athlete Yang Yun was part of an underwater competition that required contestants to remain at to the bottom of a 20-foot arctic pool in China’s Polar Land when the freezing temperatures caused her legs to cramp, leaving her unable to return to the surface.
That’s when one of the tank’s residents, a beluga whale named Mila grabbed Yun’s leg and guided her up toward the air.

Dolphins Save Surfer

Flipper spent several seasons helping humans out of jams, but his rescues aren’t entirely out of the ordinary for the dolphin population.
Stories of dolphins rescuing humans are everywhere, including the one about Todd Endris, a surfer who survived an attack by a great white shark that he said “came out of nowhere” off the coast of California.
After he was bitten, a pod of bottlenose dolphins circled Endris, holding off the shark until he could make it back to shore – just as they would for one of their own.

Gorilla Saves Boy

When a 3-year-old boy fell into the gorilla exhibit at the Brookfield Zoo in Illinois it wasn’t just injuries from the 24-foot-drop that put him in danger: The exhibit had several adult gorillas on display that were also a threat.
But 7-year-old female gorilla Binti took over, picking up the boy and cradling him before leaving him gently by a door for zookeepers to rescue him. The toddler was transferred to the hospital and recovered.

Dog Saves Boy

Man’s best friend isn’t the kind to shy away from rescuing an owner, but it’s still heartwarming to hear about pups that put themselves in harm’s way for their masters.
In this case, it was 18-week-old puppy Pinky who grabbed the attention of a swarm of bees that was headed for her human companion, 9-year-old Richie Bragg: Pinky was stung more than 40 times but survived, and most likely saved Richie – who has a blood condition that prevents proper clotting – from needing serious medical attention.

Seal Saves Man

When an injured elephant seal pup was rescued in 1994 at the animal center that would become the Aquarium of the Pacific, keepers were simply hoping she’d survive — she did, and became a favorite of visitors and locals with a reputation for being “a gentle giant,” as volunteer Hugh Ryono writes on the Aquarium’s blog.
But when Ryono fell while feeding seal pups a year later and found himself unable to get out of the way of the pups’ aggression, it was Gimpy that stepped in, protecting Ryono from an attack (and earning a writeup in Reader’s Digest).

Lions Save Girl

While some sites dispute the truth of this story, The Guardian reports that, in 2005, a girl in Ethopia was kidnapped by seven men and beaten for a week — until three lions chased the men away and stood guard over the girl until police found her.
Theories for the lions’ behavior range from the idea that they mistook her cries for those of a baby lion to the possibility that they were preparing to eat the girl when the police arrived, but The Guardian quotes an Ethopian police sergeant as saying, “If the lions had not come then it could have been much worse.”

Watusi Calf Saves Woman

Along with mentioning Gimpy the seal in its “True Stories of Hero Pets” collection, Reader’s Digest also brought our attention to Lurch, an African Watusi calf that intercepted his owner, Janice Wolf, while she was walking the paths of her Arkansas refuge.
Lurch refused to move out of the way and when Wolf grabbed his horns to guide him, he knocked her off balance – thereby preventing her from stepping on a coiled copperhead snake she was about to disturb.

Dolphin Saves Drowning Swimmer

It’s not just shark attacks that inspire dolphins to swim into action and save humans: One rescuer, Filippo, was a popular resident of the Adriatic Sea off Italy’s Manfredonia who became a spur-of-the-moment lifeguard when a 14-year-old boy fell into the ocean – without knowing how to swim.
Scotland’s Daily Record reports that the dolphin pushed the boy to keep him above the water until his parents could pull him to safety.

Elephant Saves Girl

Amber Mason, an eight-year-old girl from Bucks, England, was in Phuket, Thailand when the tsunami struck in 2005 – riding an elephant named Ningnong.
As the water rose, the elephant ran up the shore, taking the brunt of the impact and keeping Amber above the water.

The word “zoo” was coined in the 1840s by the London Zoo, which first called itself a “zoological garden,” but the idea of holding animals in public viewing cells dates back to 3500 B.C. in Egypt. Ancient Rome collected exotic animals, too, although they were often forced to fight each other (or humans).
Zoos remained more like prisons than parks well into the 1900s, with animals still spending most of their lives in small cages. As decades passed and the concept of animal rights gained traction, zoos began building more naturalistic enclosures. Today, most modern zoos strive to offer their residents a humane habitat — most, but not all. A few zoos still seem to rely on a handbook from the 1800s, due to either desperate poverty, indifference or both.

Kabul Zoo

Of all the places you’d expect to find a zoo, Kabul may not be at the top of your list. The Afghan capital has been racked by years of war and foreign occupation, and remains a chaotic place despite halting progress since the 2001 U.S. invasion. Inaugurated in 1967, the Kabul Zoo once housed more than 500 animals, but decades of war have caused extensive damage, while rampaging soldiers have decimated its animal population — sometimes for food, sometimes for sport.
Today the Kabul Zoo is a sad place for an animal to live. It has a couple hundred inhabitants that regularly endure miserable conditions, often including unchecked harassment from visitors. It has received some support from zoos around the world, but remains in need of substantial improvements.

Gaza Zoo

Gaza is another place you wouldn’t necessarily think of having a zoo. In recent years the Palestinian city has suffered from Israeli blockades and internal conflicts, and its zoo hasn’t fared much better. Today it houses two lions, a few monkeys, some birds, rabbits, cats, dogs and two fake zebras: donkeys painted with black and white stripes (pictured).
The zoo once had two real zebras in its collection, but they died of malnutrition during the Israel-Hamas war, when there was actual fighting within the zoo itself. Zoo officials later tried to replace the zebras, but finally opted for painted donkeys due to limited funds.

Giza Zoo

Founded in 1891, the Giza Zoo in Cairo, Egypt, was once among the best zoos in Africa. But today it’s a shell of its former glory, expelled from the World Association of Zoos and Aquariums in 2004 after failing an inspection. WAZA director Peter Dollinger wouldn’t tell Reuters in 2008 why exactly the zoo was expelled, saying only that “There were things that were not acceptable.”
Zookeepers reportedly augment their salaries by charging patrons to enter the cages with the animals, and two men broke into the zoo in 2007, killing two camels. Dozens of birds died from avian flu in 2006, and more than 500 were slaughtered to stem the outbreak. According to the Global Post, zoo workers also inhumanely killed two gorillas in 2004 thought to be infected with the Ebola virus.

Mumbai Zoo

The Mumbai Zoo in India is quickly transforming itself into a taxidermy museum. Unable to replace animals that die in its cramped and dirty cages, the zoo decided it’s better to stuff them and put them on display. The zoo’s collection of more than 200 mammals, 500 birds and 45 reptiles are now basically running out the clock, waiting for their demise and a quick trip to the taxidermist.
Zoo officials defend their plans as making the best of a bad situation. Zoo director Sanjay Tripathi told the BBC in 2010 that “the public will be able to see and appreciate the animals and even study their body structure.”

Tirana Zoo

The zoo in Tirana, Albania, is better described as an animal prison — most of its residents are kept in small, featureless rooms lined with hospital tiles. Monkeys sit sadly in their cells, eagles cling to inadequate perches, and bears pace in chain-link cages far too small for their size. As photographer Paul Cohn writes in a Flickr caption,The staff have put up chain-link fence and mesh fence to keep people from throwing food and cigarettes into the cages, or sticking their fingers in to touch the animals. Visitors have tried to vandalize the fencing nonetheless.”
And since there aren’t many other zoos in Albania, the Tirana Zoo reportedly has a hard time finding qualified staff and is grossly underfunded.

Pyongyang Central Zoo

North Korea’s Pyongyang Central Zoo is located in suburban Pyongyang and has a large collection of more than 5,000 animals. It was built in 1959 under the orders of dictator Kim Il-sung and is, like many places in that walled-off country, a grim place to live.
A 2006 report by the Asia Times described a movie shot in the country called “Fighting Animals,” which purported to be a wildlife documentary but actually showed caged animals — even some endangered species — fighting to the death. Since many of the animals in the video can only be found in the Pyongyang Zoo, it seems likely zookeepers were involved in the film’s production.

‘It was very cruel to try to drown him. I didn’t really think about it – I just jumped in,’ said  Dan.
It is believed the dog survived because the water was deep enough to cushion the blow but shallow enough to allow it to poke its head out of the sack.

Dan has been told he can keep the dog – believed to be just six months old – as a pet. He and his brother, Yau, seven, have yet to name it.

Cats

Cats along with mice, pigs and cheetahs love to spend a lot of quality time snoozing. They can sleep for around 12 hours per day. Rats, gerbils and lions are a little ahead of them as they can sleep for about 13 hours a day. This means they essentially spend 2/3rd of their entire lives in dreamland.

Squirrels

Squirrels mostly eat food rich in carbohydrates, protein and fat, which might be the reason that they sleep about 14 hours a day. Even Golden Hamsters and ferrets are at the same position in this race. The Golden Hamster sleeps deep inside its burrow to avoid predators during the day. Though these animals sleep a lot, they are very active when awake. Nevertheless, they are capable of sleeping almost twice as much as we humans do.

Human Babies

Do not get surprised to find a human baby at 5th position. We all learned in biology that we human beings are animals. A human baby of age 1-12 months can sleep 16 hours a day. There is another animal that also sleeps, curled up like a baby, for 16 hours a day – the lemur. It is a nocturnal animal and often sleeps in small groups.

Owl Monkey

The Owl Monkey is a truly nocturnal animal – and is also known as the night monkey. The owl monkey spends about 17 hours a day sleeping. Mostly active at night, and widely distributed in the forests of Central and South America, these monkeys have big brown eyes which help them to see more clearly during the night.

Giant Armadillo

Armadillos sleep for about 18-19 hours a day. They are most active during the night and sleep away the larger portion of the day. Scientists still do not know just what makes this animal so sleepy. Perhaps being a solitary animal, the only thing an armadillo can think of is to crawl inside its burrow and sleep as much as possible. Opossums and tigers also sleep about the same amount each day.

Brown Bats

Could it be – 20 hours a day? Yes, Brown Bats are awake for only 4 hours of the day and love to sleep, some 83% of the time. Hanging upside down and only emerging during the night, these bats hibernate half the year because of lack of food. Sloths also sleep for the same amount of time.

Koala

An arboreal animal, koalas grabs the top position for being the sleepiest animal in the world. Found only in Australia, they live mostly on eucalyptus trees, and sleep about 22 hours a day. When awake they spend quality time only on eating.
Though many animals spend more than half of the 24 hours of the day sleeping, that doesn’t mean they are lazy. They are actually very active when awake. Some animals do rest half-asleep and some seems to be at rest but fully conscious. Scientifically, a good sleep, and rest, is essential for a healthy body and gives it a chance to repair. Talking of humans, it really is important to ensure that you get good sleep helping you to get over your worries and to dispel the tensions of your day to day life.

These dogs can weigh up to 50 pounds, that’s quite the size for a dog that’s so low to the ground.  Their heads are massive and their legs are short but very strong and sturdy.  Bulldogs are all muscle and can be a bit intimidating at first but that changes once you get to know these friendly creatures.

They don’t need as much exercise as other dog breeds but they do need to be walked and played with.  Short walks are good for these dogs considering their short legs… they tire easily.  The Bulldog can do well in an apartment and is great for someone who doesn’t have an overly active lifestyle.

This breed is not a needy animal and doesn’t require a whole lot more than your love and attention.  They are pretty wrinkly so it’s important to bath them a few times a month.  If you are looking for a dog with low energy, this is the one for you.

For many years stories of cats with strange abilities to foretell natural disaster or weather changes have abounded. Most reports concern cats showing strange behaviors before storms, volcano eruptions, earthquake or even before less natural phenomena such as air raids.

Pigeons have iron-containing structures in their beaks, which are arranged in a complex three-dimensional pattern. This gives the birds an acute sense of spatial orientation, allowing them to identify their geographical position.

Dolphins use sonar to plot the sea around them and detect food. Dolphins communicate with very high frequency noises or clicks.  They have their own language that we cant comprehend.

Platypus use electroreceptors within the skin of their bills to detect the electrical field that gets generated when their prey contracts its muscles.A platypus swings its head from side to side while swimming as a way to enhance this sense. The bill is also lined with mechanoreceptors, which give the animal an acute sense of touch and make the platypus’ bill its primary sense organ.

All spiders have unique mechanoreceptory organs called slit sensilla, which allow them to sense minute mechanical strains on their exoskeleton. This sixth sense makes it easy for spiders to judge things like the size, weight, and possibly even the type of creature that gets caught in their webs. It may also help them tell the difference between the movement of an insect and the movement of the wind, or even a benign blade of grass, as it moves across the web.

Much like salmon returning to their home stream, sea turtles also prefer to return to nest on the same beach where they were born. Given the vast distances they travel, their ability to locate their home beach is remarkable. As with many migratory animals, sea turtles accomplish this feat by measuring the Earth’s magnetic field. However, their ability cannot account for deflection from ocean currents, and some turtles wander aimlessly for long periods of time at sea when currents are strong. Maybe this handicap explains why they live such long lives!

These fish somehow find their way back to spawn in the same rivers from which they were born, despite traveling great distances in the open ocean during their adult life. How do they do it?
Though it is still largely a mystery to science, many suspect that salmon utilize ferromagnetic mineral magnetite deposits in their brains to pick up the Earth’s magnetic field. It has also been discovered that they have a refined sense of smell and can tell the difference between the smell of their home stream from any other.

Bats for instance use their own form of Radar  waves to plot the environment around them, many of the Bat species are blind, they have no need for eyes.

Venomous snakes of this family of are most easily identified by a pair of deep “pits” that can be found between the nostril and the eye. These pits are actually heat-sensing organs that allow the snakes to see in infrared — an invaluable sixth sense for a predator that often hunts at night. The sense is so sensitive that pit vipers can accurately judge the distance and size of their prey even when their other senses are deprived.

Weatherfish, or weather loaches, have an incredible ability to detect changes in pressure. They use this sense to monitor buoyancy underwater and to compensate for the lack of a swim bladder.
Remarkably, this sixth sense also allows these fish to “predict” the weather, and fisherman and aquarium owners have long recognized changes in their activity as large storms approach.

Perhaps animals logical train of thought is not so developed as humans?  Perhaps their sixth sense takes over in a possible dangerous situation and tells the creature to save itself?

Bald eagles

Bald eagles are known for remaining faithful and mating for life. Moreover, bald eagle couples are also known for their aerial acrobatic stunts together, which include locking their talons together and spiraling downward, only to release at the last minute.

Penguins

These penguins are either affectionately necking or one of them is a penguin-turned-vampire.

Black vultures

Black vultures mate for life, and if one vulture is suspected of cheating, a community of vultures will attack the cheating vulture.

Mallard ducks

These mallard ducks appear to be happily strolling along together.

Meerkats

These meerkats are just so darn sweet and precious.

Flamingos

These flamingos look like they’re dancing as they create a heart with their necks.

Frogs

Frogs are small, green creatures, known with fact that people do not like them so much, and they are afraid of them, but when two frogs are together, they are so beautiful!

Zebras

These zebras in are in full embrace as one of them rests its head on the other’s back.

Foxes

These foxes are enjoying serenity together.

Lions

What is the lion whispering to his mate? In any case, they look adorable.

White Tigers

These white tigers are quite the majestic pair.

Horses

Strong, beautiful, lovely animals, together they make unusual kind of energy that cannot leave anyone indifferent!

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Gray Wolf

After being nearly wiped out in the 1930′s, the Gray Wolf population is up to 5,000 in the lower 48 states. The Bush administration recently removed the Gray Wolf from the endangered species act after the population had risen, but some argued that 5,000 is not enough, so a Federal Judge overturned that ruling and put the Gray Wolf back on the list.

Giant Panda

When I was growing up, the Giant Panda seemed doomed to extinction, but thanks to extensive captive breeding, the population remains stable at about 1,500 and their habitat has been promised extensive protection by the Chinese government.

Bald Eagle

Reduced to 417 breeding pairs in the 1960s by the ravage of DDT, Bald Eagles have made a huge comeback and have been removed from the endangered species list. There are now about 10,000 breeding pairs in the wild.

Black Footed Ferret

Black Footed Ferrets were given up for extinct in 1979, but when a small population was discovered, captive breeding and artificial insemination programs have brought the population back up to 4,000, with 1,400 having been released into the wild.

Humpback Whale

Hunted down to only about 1,500 in the 1940s, the Humpback Whale has made a dramatic comeback after a 1963 ban on hunting. Now there are approximately 40,000 of them inhabiting our oceans. Unfortunately, the Japanese have begun hunting them again even though they are still protected. Humpbacks are still officially considered endangered.

Yangtze Alligator

The Yangtze Alligator of China was nearly wiped out in the 1980s as forests were destroyed and turned into farmlands. This 230 million year old species, considered a living fossil, now has about 150 living in the wild. Some alligators been bred in captivity over the years and released into the wild to help the species out.

Regent Honeyeater

Although the total population is still small, Australia’s Regent Honeyeater is making a definite comeback. Some birds had been bred in captivity and released into the wild, and encouragingly enough, most of them survived and adapted quickly.

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Dogs

Dogs can’t see the difference between the colours red and green.

Cats

A cat’s eyes color can vary vastly! By the way do you know the nose pad of a cat has a unique pattern just like a human’s fingerprint?

Horses

The eyes of this animal are one of its most sensitive areas including ears and nose. Via touch, this creature perceives and responds immediately to changes in its environment, sensing contact as subtle as an insect landing anywhere on the body.

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Goats

Goats’ eyes are creepy because they have a horizontal pupil. So do horses and cattle.

Owls

An Owl’s eyes are large in order to improve their efficiency, especially under low light conditions. In fact, the eyes are so well developed, that they are not eye balls as such, but elongated tubes. They are held in place by bony structures in the skull called Sclerotic rings. For this reason, an Owl cannot “roll” or move its eyes – that is, it can only look straight ahead!

Frogs

Frog eyes come in a stunning range of colors and patterns. Most frogs see well only at a distance, but they have excellent night vision and are very sensitive to movement. The bulging eyes of most frogs allow them to see in front, to the sides, and partially behind them. When a frog swallows food, it pulls its eyes down into the roof of its mouth. The eyes help push the food down its throat.
Eyes positioned atop the head give frogs a field of vision of almost 180 degrees. This peripheral vision helps them spot predators and prey.

Chameleons

A chameleon’s eyes can look in different directions – at the same time!

Butterflies

The eyes of butterflies are large spherical structures. These are compound eyes consisting of thousands of hexagonal shaped omatidea. Each omatidea, or miniscule sensor, is directed at a slightly different angle from the others. Collectively they are directed in every direction — up, down, forwards, backwards, left and right. Because of this, butterflies are able to see in virtually every direction simultaneously.

the young

In spring, the female comes on land or on the pack ice to give birth to her babies ( pups ).
A ringed seal gives birth to her pups in a small den in the snow on top of the ice. This shelters them from their enemies. The pup stays in the den for about 6 weeks feeding on the mother’s rich milk. The mother returns to the water to feed herself. Sometimes she makes more than one den, so she can move the pup if there is danger.

Harp seals are born with fluffy white fur coats. The mother takes care of the pup for about ten days. As soon as the pup has a layer of thick blubber under its skin it is ready to go into the water. The white coat turns to gray.

adaptation

The baby harp seal’s white coat makes it hard for enemies to spot the young seal on the ice.
Seals are clumsy on land but are very good swimmers. Their strong flippers and smooth bodies help them move easily in the water. Seals are able to dive deep and can stay under water for half an hour.
The seals’ fur and a thick layer of fat under their skin helps them to keep warm in the freezing cold water.
Seals are mammals and need to come up for air. If ice forms on the surface of the water they gnaw ( chew) the ice to make breathing holes. They also bash the ice with their heads.

food

They eat fish, squid and krill ( shrimp-like animals).

enemies

Arctic foxes and polar bears hunt the seal.

Few countries in the world allow seal hunting. The majority of commercial seal hunting occurs in Canada, where millions of seals have been killed for their fur, according to the Humane Society of the United States. Most of the seals killed in recent years have been younger than one month old. They are so innocent they do not understand survival and literally what for someone to crush their skulls with a club and to add to this cruelty a large percentage of the seals are skinned alive on the spot. The beauty of white surroundings turns into a horrifying red blood bath.

The hunters, armed with clubs and other illegal weapons, beat to death the baby hooded and harp seals in front their mothers, who often die trying to save their pups. Male adults often are left to bleed to death after have their penises brutally removed to export to countries such as Japan where they are used as aphrodisiacs.
The most shocking evidence comes from 2001, when an international team of Veterinarians who witnessed the hunt, perfomed post-mortem examinations among some carcasses chosen randomly and proved that a 42% of those seals where skinned alive !!!
This is the largest mammal killing in the world and there is no excuse for such a massacre or for the torture of these beautiful living beings.

This barbarism should be stopped! Don’t turn your back on the poor seals.

Black Squirrel

Black Cat

Black Panther

Tasmanian Devil

Black Wolf

Black Owl

Black Seals

Black Duck

Black Snake

Black Butterfly

Black Calf

Black Swan

Black Bear

Black Lambs

Black Dogs

Black Monkey

Black-Horse

More than 50 million years ago, a small fox-sized animal crept through the forests of North America, browsing on fruit and leaves. Its arched-back body was only about a foot high at the shoulder, and a long tail and short-snouted head probably gave it a distinctly dog-like look. In fact, its feet sported pads like a dog’s, except each toe ended in a tiny hoof instead of a claw. Interestingly, in modern horses, one toe has become the hoof, and the others remain as vestigial bumps higher up the leg.

When fossil hunters first discovered the bones of this creature a century ago, they named it Eohippus — “the dawn horse” — and believed it was the first link in an evolutionary chain that led directly to today’s horse. Indeed, many museums and textbooks still have displays and pictures showing this neat, predictable progression, with horses gradually getting larger, shifting from many toes to modern hooves, and gaining longer teeth able to grind down tough prairie grasses.

These days, however, researchers have a far more complex picture of horse evolution — and they have given the dawn horse a much less colorful name. While they agree that today’s horse probably arose from that smaller ancestor, the path was by no means direct. Instead, paleontologists have uncovered fossils that show that horse ancestors varied in size: some large early horses gave way later to smaller ones. They also discovered that some lines of horse-like animals alternated between many and few toes over time. In addition, some proto-horses once thought to be direct forefathers of the modern animals were revealed to be distantly related cousins — just one dead-end branch on a bushy family tree.

One branch, however, kept growing. About a million years ago, it produced an array of small pony-sized animals that galloped across ancient plains around the world in large herds. They probably behaved much as today’s wild horses do, using their flowing tails as remarkably accurate fly swatters and signal flags, and snorting the air for the smell of enemies and the scent of food.

Less than 10,000 years ago, however, many of these horse-like species became extinct, along with other browsing animals such as mammoths. Climate changes and over-hunting by humans may have been to blame, but no one knows for sure. The only survivors were horses in Asia and several zebras. In North America, however, horses were wiped out.
So where did the modern horses come from, the ones that spawned America’s cowboy myth? Historians believe that Spanish explorers brought the animals with them on their voyages to the New World in the 1500s. Let loose upon the land, they soon reclaimed the prairies that had once been theirs alone, producing vast herds of wild horses.

Even today, as HORSES shows, tens of thousands of wild horses roam the American West. To prevent the herds from destroying their habitat, the U.S. government captures hundreds each year and puts them up for adoption. For some of the proud new owners, the chance to ride a wild-born horse is a dream come true — and the continuation of an age-old relationship that has made the horse one of our most revered and fascinating animal partners.

The cheetah  is an atypical member of the cat family  that is unique in its speed, while lacking climbing abilities. The species is the only living member of the genus Acinonyx. It is the fastest land animal, reaching speeds between 112 and 120 km/h (70 and 75 mph)in short bursts covering distances up to 460 m (1,500 ft), and has the ability to accelerate from 0 to 103 km/h (64 mph) in three seconds, faster than most supercars. Recent studies confirm the cheetah’s status as the fastest land animal.

Why would a cheetah need to be able to run so fast? The only animal that comes in a close second to the Cheetah’s amazing speed is its favorite prey, the gazelle. In order to catch up with a meal that’s as swift as the wind, the cheetah had to develop the ability to run as fast, or faster than the gazelle, or face the alternative – starvation. Pretty strong motivation for practicing their wind sprints.

Heaviest Animal on Land…
AFRICAN  ELEPHANTS

African elephants are the largest land animals on Earth. They are slightly larger than their Asian cousins and can be identified by their larger ears that look somewhat like the continent of Africa.
Elephant ears radiate heat to help keep these large animals cool, but sometimes the African heat is too much. Elephants are fond of water and enjoy showering by sucking water into their trunks and spraying it all over themselves. Afterwards, they often spray their skin with a protective coating of dust.
An elephant’s trunk is actually a long nose used for smelling, breathing, trumpeting, drinking, and also for grabbing things—especially a potential meal. The trunk alone contains about 100,000 different muscles. African elephants have two fingerlike features on the end of their trunk that they can use to grab small items.
Both male and female African elephants have tusks they use to dig for food and water and strip bark from trees. Males use the tusks to battle one another, but the ivory has also attracted violence of a far more dangerous sort.
Because ivory is so valuable to some humans, many elephants have been killed for their tusks. This trade is illegal today, but it has not been completely eliminated, and some African elephant populations remain endangered.

Elephants eat roots, grasses, fruit, and bark, and they eat a lot of these things. An adult elephant can consume up to 300 pounds (136 kilograms) of food in a single day.
These hungry animals do not sleep much, and they roam over great distances while foraging for the large quantities of food that they require to sustain their massive bodies.
Female elephants (cows) live in family herds with their young, but adult males (bulls) tend to roam on their own.
Having a baby elephant is a serious commitment. Elephants have a longer pregnancy than any other mammal—almost 22 months. Cows usually give birth to one calf every two to four years. At birth, elephants already weigh some 200 pounds (91 kilograms) and stand about 3 feet (1 meter) tall.

Best Jumper Animal…
CAT FLEA

Did you know a flea can jump 33 cm. in one leap – over a foot?
You’ve seen them – tiny, quick creatures that scurry through your cat’s fur, feasting on her blood, and causing painful itching – so bad that kitty may scratch herself raw in seeking relief. If you have a bad flea infestation in a multiple-cat household, you’ve probably been bitten yourself by these voracious feeders, and you may even have seen them hopping through your carpeting.

Best Flyer…
HUMMINGBIRDS

Hummingbirds are birds comprising the family Trochilidae. They are among the smallest of birds, and include the smallest extant bird species, the Bee Hummingbirds. They can hover in mid-air by rapidly flapping their wings 12–90 times per second (depending on the species). They can also fly backwards, and are the only group of birds able to do so. Their English name derives from the characteristic hum made by their rapid wing beats. They can fly at speeds exceeding 15 m/s (54 km/h, 34 mi/h).

Largest Animal  on Land…
BLUE WHALE

The blue whale is the largest mammal, possibly the largest animal, to ever inhabit the earth. Its body is long, somewhat tapered, and streamlined, with the head making up less than one-fourth of its total body length. Its rostrum (upper part of the head) is very broad and flat and almost U-shaped, with a single ridge that extends just forward of the blowholes to the tip of the snout. Its blowholes are contained in a large, raised “splash guard”, and the blow is tall and straight and over 20 feet (6 meters) high. Its body is smooth and relatively free of parasites, but a few barnacles attach themselves to the edge of the fluke and occasionally to the tips of the flippers and to the dorsal fin. There are 55-68 ventral grooves or pleats extending from the lower jaw to near the navel.

Strangers greet each other differently than people who know each other well. You wouldn’t greet a new kid at school the same way you’d greet your best friend. You wouldn’t say hello to your mother the same way you’d say hello to the president of the United States. Most greetings are friendly or polite. Some aren’t. Some greetings show respect for a person’s rank. Most probably don’t.

The same is true of animals. Their greetings are as many and varied as the species themselves. You know how people greet each other. But what are animal greetings like? When different animals meet their own kind, just what do they do?

If the two continue on the same trajectory, they could evolve into two different species and conservation efforts will need to be focused on each separately, the researchers claim.

Dr Andy Foote, from the University of Aberdeen, undertook the study along with colleagues from universities and museums in Denmark and the UK.

“It’s exciting to think about two very different types of killer whale in the waters around Britain,” said Dr Foote.

“Killer whales aren’t really a species that we think of as being a regular visitor to Britain, but in fact we have two forms of these killer whales in our waters.”

Otherwise known as Orcas, killer whales are the largest member of the dolphin family and live in family groups called pods. They are known for their intelligence and range of hunting behaviours.

Dr Foote and his team made their discovery by examining the teeth from remains of killer whales stranded over the past 200 years. They found that the teeth fell into two distinct camps: those that were well-worn and those featuring virtually no wear at all.

“We found that one form, which we call ‘type 1′ had severely worn teeth in all adult specimens,” Dr Foote said.

“The other form, ‘type 2′, had virtually no tooth wear even in the largest adults.”

The research team tested the teeth to find out about the mammals’ diets. They found that the killer whale with the worn teeth generally consumed fish such as herring and mackerel as well as seals, whereas the ‘type 2′ killer whale fed on smaller whales and dolphins.

Their differences in diet also affected their shape and size, along with colour, pattern and number of teeth.

Type 2 adult males were almost two metres larger than types 1 males. Whereas the type 1 whales are closely-related and found across the North East Atlantic and around Britain, the type 2 whales are regularly seen off the west coast of Scotland and Ireland and, according to Dr Foote, are more closely related to a group of Antarctic killer whales.

The discovery shows how the creatures have evolved to suit their environments, and according to Dr Foote, could have important implications for how they are monitored by conservationists.

“It’s similar to how Darwin’s finches have adapted to different ecological roles in the Galapagos, but on a larger scale,” he said.

This behaviour backs a theory that males of some species can boost their sperm levels to raise the odds of passing on their genes. Male fish, for example, release more sperm into the water when they sense a nearby rival.

Even men who spend more time bonding with their girlfriend unconsciously release more sperm during sex. “Males can be just as choosy as females; sperm may be cheaper to make than an egg, but it still isn’t free,” says Solensky.

Another great collection of helpless cute animals in costumes. Earlier collections can be found here and here. Well, some may argue that it is animal cruelty but there are innovative creativity in some of these costumes. 26 more pics after the jump.

Adorable sweater wearing pug that looks a bit too depressed as it hangs around outside cafe Trieste in San Francisco. Someone needs to give the little guy some love.

Gulls (often informally called seagulls) are birds in the family Laridae. They are most closely related to the terns (family Sternidae) and only distantly related to auks, skimmers, and more distantly to the waders. Until recently, most gulls were placed in the genus Larus, but this arrangement is now known to be polyphyletic, leading to the resurrection of several genera.

They are typically medium to large birds, usually grey or white, often with black markings on the head or wings. They typically have harsh wailing or squawking calls. They have stout, longish bills, and webbed feet. Gull species range in size from the Little Gull, at 120 g (4.2 oz) and 29 cm (11.5 inches), to the Great Black-backed Gull, at 1.75 kg (3.8 lbs) and 76 cm (30 inches)…