Animals 16-20 in our '50 incredible animals series'

Hello and welcome to another 50 incredible animals post where we are sharing 5 more animals that you (hopefully) haven't heard of or know much about! Enjoy!

16. Mantis shrimp

Mantis shrimp are colourful but deadly sea-dwelling creatures that live in tropical and sub-tropical seas in the Indian and Pacific Oceans.

They may look pretty however, they have a surprisingly strong punch. They can punch up 50 miles per hour with a force of over 1 500 newtons. That's enough to go destroy crab shells and punch their way straight through the glass of an aquarium. The punch is as fast as a bullet and is 2 500 times the force of the animal's on weight. If humans could do that, we would be able to punch through steel! Also mantis shrimp are thought to have the most complex eyes in the animal kingdom!

All in all, mantis shrimp are pretty incredible animals!

17. Clownfish

Clownfish are one example for the amazing corporations in the natural world. They live in a close relationship with anemones. The anemone protects them against predators and gives them a place to live. In return, the clownfish bring food and remove parasites from the anemone. This is called a symbiotic relationship.

Anemones are actually poisonous, but these fish have developed ways to stop the anemones from stinging them. This makes anemones the perfect place to hide from predators.

18. Axolotl

What axolotls are best known for, is the fact that they never turn into adults. This is kind of true. Axolotls certainly never undergo metamorphose and therefore look like children for their whole lives. Also, when amphibians turn into adults, they normally leave the water and live on land. Axolotls live in water for their whole lives. So in some sense, they don't turn into adults. However, at some point they mate and lay eggs. It really depends on how you define adulthood.

To make these animals sound even more weird, they can regenerate limbs and organs! Axolotls are territorial and often bite limbs off trespassers. If the trespasser happens to be another axolotl, the limb will grow back later. However these animals are not immortal and they will die of old age when their time comes.

19. Electric eel

These truly are incredible animals as they can grow up to 2.5 meters in length, and sorry to disappoint but they aren't actually eels at all, they are just similar in shape! The shock of these remarkable animals has been known to knock a horse off its feet, which is just amazing! They live in South America, populating the murky pools and basins of the area. A website called aqua states that 'Juveniles feed on invertebrates, such as crabs and freshwater shrimp. As adults, they eat amphibians, fishes and crustaceans.' which sums up their diet. They are able to leap out the water and get most of their oxygen by breathing through their mouth at the surface of the water, which is something they've developed as a result of the muddy, poorly oxygenated waters where they live. To me, these are extremely interesting animals!

20. Desert locusts

These creatures live (surprise surprise) in the desert, mainly in Africa and stretching across to India too. They eat plant material which means that they strip an area of crops when they strike, for they are in fact a real threat to us. Worldbank puts it very nicely saying that 'The growing swarms spread to new areas, disrupting the food supply, upending livelihoods and requiring substantial resources to address. Decimated crops and pasture mean that food security and livelihoods for millions of people—especially in countries marked by fragility, conflict and violence—are at stake.'. They can travel at 21mph and a large swarm can contain about 80 million members! This is another very interesting fact: they change color as they gather in numbers. Neutral-coloured locusts are solitary, but bright yellow locusts are ready to swarm! I think it's incredible how they change colour!

Thank you so much for taking the time to read this post with another 5 animals and we'll be back soon!

Sources:
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/invertebrates/facts/mantis-shrimp
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/fish/facts/clownfish
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/amphibians/facts/axolotl
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/fish/facts/electric-eel
https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/agricultural-and-biological-sciences/desert-locust
https://www.worldbank.org/en/topic/the-world-bank-group-and-the-desert-locust-outbreak

Images:
Mantis shrimp: This image, owned by prilfish (on flickr.com), is licensed under CC BY 2.0.
Clownfish: This image, owned by Teddy Hartanto (on flickr.com), is licensed under CC BY 2.0.
Axolotl: This image, owned by john (on flickr.com), is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.
Electric eel: Elizabeth (on flickr.com), is licensed under CC BY 2.0.

Comments

Discussion || Should Everyone Switch To Electric Cars?

Hi Everyone! Thank you so much for joining me today, as I hop on the blog to discuss whether everyone switching to electric cars would really help the environment. In other words, should everyone switch to electric cars? This is the first part of a two-part series, discussing electric cars, so stay tuned for part two!! I would like to start this post by stating that I am by no means an expert. This is knowledge I have from my own experience, and from research I have done. If anything is incorrect please take it as it is and accept that this is a discussion and I am taking on board all opinions from reliable sources on this complex topic. Electric cars are a huge topic when it comes to sustainability and "saving our planet". There is no debating the fact that electric cars are better for the environment than diesel or petrol once they are on the road. But the production of them is often very polluting, with one study show...

Greta Thunberg's Speech at the UN Climate Action Summit 2019

Hi Everyone! I thought I would share the transcript of Greta Thunberg's inspiring speech from the UN Climate Action Summit. The phrase we remember is 'How dare you!'. But what did she really want us to take away from it? She wanted us to act, so watch the video using the link below and take action because the world isn't just going to heal itself. Greta Thunberg's speech at the UN Climate Action Summit video "My message is that we'll be watching you. This is all wrong. I shouldn't be up here. I should be back in school on the other side of the ocean. Yet you all come to us young people for hope. How dare you! You have stolen my dreams and my childhood with your empty words. And yet I'm one of the lucky ones. People are suffering. People are dying. Entire ecosystems are collapsing. We are in the beginning of a mass extinction, and all you can talk about is money and fairy tales of eternal economic g...

16.08.2020 Animal of the week: Elephant

Hello. On the 12th of August it was International Elephant Day, so we decided that this week's post should be about elephants. Elephants are the largest living land mammals. There are three types of elephant; the African bush elephant; the African forest elephant and the Asian elephant. African elephants have larger ears, whereas Asian elephants have smaller ears. Elephants use their trunks to breath, bring food and drink to their mouths and to grasp objects. Elephants' legs are like pillars. They carry the Elephant's massive weight. African bush elephants weigh 6000kg, Asian elephants weigh 4000kg and African forest elephants weigh 2700kg. Basically, they are very heavy.Elephants eat grasses, small plants, bushes, fruit, twigs, tree bark, and roots. Elephants can live up to 70 years old in the wild. They communicate by sight, touch and smell. Sadly, these wonderful mammals are in danger. African elephants are listed as vulne...

How much do you know about trees? - Quiz

Hello, This month's quiz is all about trees. Questions: What is the name of the network that trees use to communicate? a) the mycorrhizal network b) the mythcorhinia network c) the symbocommunial network How much of the amazon rainforest has been lost due to deforestation in the last 50 years? a) 12% b) 17% c) 23% True or False? Over 75% of land-based species are found in forests? How much carbon do tropical forest contain? a) 230 gigatons b) 280 gigatons c) 330 gigatons In California, there is a rather strange tree that has survived 13 000 years by cloning itself. What species? a) Pin oak ;b) English oak c) Palmer's oak True or False? The oldest surviving tree species, Gingko trees, have been around since just after the meteor that killed off the dinosaurs struck. Where do acacia trees grow? a) cold and ha...

Eco system Galápagos: Part 1 Geography

Hello and welcome to the first post about the Galapagos Islands. Currents and Winds The volcanic islands of Galápagos started to form 4 million years ago. Where they lie, is unique. They are situated directly on the equator, on the Nazca tectonic plate. The Galapagos Islands are on the crossroads of three currents. The cold South Equatorial Current flows westward towards Galapagos. The warm Panama Current runs in from the north. And finally, the deep sea Cromwell Current runs from the west. The Galapagos Islands are also where the Northeast Trade Wind meets the Southeast Trade Wind. Galapagos Hotspot 21 Volcanoes make up the Galápagos Islands with 13 still active. The reason for this volcanic activity is a giant hotspot under the island. A hotspot is a gigantic column of super heated molten lava, rising up towards the surface. It is immense; at least sixty miles (97 kilometers) across and 1800 miles (2897 kilometers) deep. It connects the islands to ...

Announcement: Amazon Rainforest Series

10 animals on the edge of extinction you didn't know about no.4 - Sumatran elephant

Hello everyone, This is the 4th post in our '10 animals on the edge of extinction you didn't know about'. Today we are going to be talking about Sumatran elephants. You've probably all heard about Sumatran tigers, which are also on the edge of extinction, but Sumatran elephants are much less well-known. Characteristics Sumatran elephants live for around 70 years and grow 2 - 3.2m tall. They weigh 2 000 to 4 000 kg and are the smallest subspecies of Asian Elephant. The males have tusks, however, these don't grow as long as their African counterparts. The females also have tusks but these are normally so small, that they are hidden under the upper lip. Sumatran elephants are herbivores, eating bark, bananas, young fresh leaves and occasionally various wild herbs. Social lives Elephants are very social and live in herds of 20 - 35 individuals. These herds are led by a dominant female. Males leave when reach adolescence, either willi...

Ozone layer

Hi everyone, What even is ozone? And the ozone layer? Where does the hole in the ozone layer come from and what does it mean? Is it dangerous? What can be done? Often the ozone-talk can be complicated and confusing, keeping an overview is hard and understanding all the problems always difficult. Let us break it down a bit for you: What is the ozone layer? We'll start with the basics: The ozone layer is part of the stratosphere, which is the second layer of the Earth's atmosphere, between 10 and 50 km above the Earth's surface and made up of protective gases. One of these protective gases is ozone. There is not much ozone in the atmosphere, only 0.3 molecule of ozone per 1 million molecules of air. This is because ozone is chemically unstable and only forms when ultra violet radiation (UV light) hits oxygen and breaks the bonds between the atoms. It fact it is so unstable that even when it has formed, it breaks down again relatively quickly. This leads to ozone turning back ...

Linking climate change and inequality - 'The Great Carbon Divide'

Hey everyone, Have you heard of 'The great carbon divide‘? It is often referred to as the 'carbon footprint gap' or the 'emissions imbalance‘, and produces frightening numbers. The great carbon divide describes the huge gap between the amount of carbon dioxide the rich versus the poor emit, and these numbers shocked even us. What does this mean? There have been many different studies, and all of them show terrifying results. One study from the Guardian and Oxfam, reports that the richest 1% of the world's population emit more carbon than the poorest 66%. The richest 1% consist of 77 million people, which may seem like a lot at first, but the poorest 66% refers to over 5 billion people! Africa, which is home to 17% of the world's population, only causes 4% of the world's emissions. This top 1% emitted 16% of global CO2 emissions in 2019, that's 5.9 billion tonnes of CO2. Modelling suggests that it would take someone who isn't in the top 1% about 150...

Climate change: what is it and what's the problem

Hello, I've noticed that we are always mentioning climate change. Not only us blog editors but also politicians, activists and so on. The words climate change are bounced around in the media and probably in your households, but do you actually know what it is or how it works? I know that for a long time, I didn't know what it really meant. I hope that this post changes that. What is climate change and how does it work? The words climate change describe a slow shift in the earth's temperature and changes in the weather patterns. Having a single warm winter does not instantly mean climate change. Climate change happens over a long period of time. If you look at a temperature graph over the years, it doesn't go up in one day and then stay the same for another hundred years. It curves up slowly but steadily. This is a average temperature graph from 1880 to just after 2000. You can see how the temperature gradually gets warmer....

Green World

Search This Blog