30 Thirty animal facts to make you smile. http://www.boredpanda.com/happy-animal-facts/ Ok it's a bit of a cheat, but we always need a smile and a giggle.
17 Swallows begin their northwards migration when the temp reaches 17°C. The most barn swallows begin their movement to northern Europe in April. Sometimes earlier, depending on the weather. They like to begin their journey with the wind in their backs and at temps when there will be insects available...and that is at temps of 17º.
80 The number of bird species that are proved to be nesting at Runde, an island not far from here. Every summer the island is invaded by more than 500,000 birds. You can read more about the island here: http://www.visitalesund-geiranger.com/en/The-bird-island-Runde/The-unique-bird-life/
50 An ant can lift fifty times its own weight. They weigh very little and do not require much muscle power to keep themselves upright. Large animals and people are much heavier and require more muscle power to keep themselves upright. p.s. Thanks for the link, Droopy. I would have liked going to that island when we were up there, but if there are no birds, then the interest is diminished.
200 Rietzangers (Acrocephalus schoenobaenus) can imitate 200 other bird sorts. They learn the "songs" underway to the breeding grounds as well as in the breeding areas themselves...and perhaps in the over-wintering areas. That is why you can hear them making a bird call of tropical African species that do not at all exist in Europe.
2 Young water voles are independent after two weeks. They can find food by themselves, they can dive and swim well.
1,000,000 ? Does a millipede actually have a million feet (or legs)? The answer is no. They have a long and slender body with many segments. Each segment has two legs...but the total isn't even 1,000, let alone a million. The number of legs that they do have is dependent upon the specific species. The amount of legs varies from 30 to 750.
Yes, that was the fewest measured. 40 The Osprey broods her eggs for 40 days. The nest in which she usually lays one or two eggs is more than 2 meters wide and 1.75 meters deep.
5 The Great Diving Beetel (Dytiscus marginalis) can grow to be 5 cm long! Even though this beetle can get to be so large, it can swim really fast. This is because they have sort of "fold-out" paddles on their back legs. They are preditors and constantly on the move looking for prey. They can even take minnows. These insects can fly quite well too--they look for shiny water surfaces and sometimes mistake auto's for water surfaces.
The nine-banded armadillo (Dasypus novemcinctus) is the state small mammal of Texas. It is the only living mammal that has a plated outer covering, even on its tail; it is related to the sloth and the anteater; and although there are 20 species of armadilloes, only one, the nine-banded lives in the USA. Due to their propensity to trying to cross a highway and becoming road kill, they have earned the nickname "Hillbilly Speed Bump". Here in Texas, you occasionally encounter one of these on the roadside (Lone Star is the national beer of Texas.)
1.6180339887498948420 The Golden ratio is a special number found by dividing a line into two parts so that the longer part divided by the smaller part is also equal to the whole length divided by the longer part. It is often symbolized using phi, after the 21st letter of the Greek alphabet. In an equation form, it looks like this: a/b = (a+b)/a = 1.6180339887498948420 … Adolf Zeising, whose main interests were mathematics and philosophy, found the golden ratio expressed in the arrangement of parts such as leaves and branches along the stems of plants and of veins in leaves. He extended his research to the skeletons of animals and the branchings of their veins and nerves, to the proportions of chemical compounds and the geometry of crystals, even to the use of proportion in artistic endeavors. In these patterns in nature he saw the golden ratio operating as a universal law. In connection with his scheme for golden-ratio-based human body proportions, Zeising wrote in 1854 of a universal law "in which is contained the ground-principle of all formative striving for beauty and completeness in the realms of both nature and art, and which permeates, as a paramount spiritual ideal, all structures, forms and proportions, whether cosmic or individual, organic or inorganic, acoustic or optical; which finds its fullest realization, however, in the human form."
