People Are Animals Too!

Animals surround us every day. Did you know that even as you read this tiny, microscopic animals are eating your skin? It's true! Now sit back, relax, and enjoy some more animal facts:

• Due to a shortage of transformers in the 1950’s, Chinese-made neon signs were powered by silver electrodes placed at either end of an aquarium filled with electric eels. This accounts for the “flickering” effect of neon signs you can see in old movies.

• CAN I COME OUT AND PLAY YET? An elephant’s gestation period is 3.5 years.

• If a cockroach is decapitated, it has the ability to turn its neckhole into a rudimentary mouth. It can continue to eat for years in this state, even through nuclear war.

• The family of fish commonly known as “gars” (mocken ichnacius) have green skeletons. The skeletons are rarely seen though, as gars are unable to be caught by humans.

• Koalas and pandas are the only animals known to live exclusively from the fruit of the prune tree.

• BIRD ON A WIRE!!! The next time you really feel like taking it all in, notice the following very little known facts about birds. Birds can land and take off when they want. Sometimes, void of any stimulus, birds will decide to do something such as move a little or fly. Birds also have hollow bones.

• Giant squid actually “see” with their tentacles.

• YOU CAN LEAD A CAMEL TO WATER... Camels can live for three weeks with no water, but if they stand outside during a rainstorm they will drown.

• Dinosaurs were the first animals. Since there were no other animals on the earth during the Age of the Dinosaurs, carnivorous dinosaurs were forced to eat each other, which is where we get the word cannibalism. Herbivorous dinosaurs only ate other dinosaurs during times of drought or mating season. The word "dinosaur" comes from two Greek words: saurus meaning "lizard," and tyrannos meaning "king." Move over, Jim Morrison!