Crab

Told you you could find them in soup!

Crab

Why so crabby, Mr. Crab? Well, I think you'd be mighty crabby too if you had a thick, hot, smelly exoskeleton that is hard to get out of! Crabs can be as big as 13 feet long, or as tiny as a pea. Crabs are quite common and can be found almost anywhere, even in your soup.

Crabs come armed with claws, and communicate by using them. Crabs will most commonly fight over female crabs, and during storms, they will fight over hiding holes in the beach. Crabs also commonly walk sideways, giving us the term "crab-walk".

Even though many innocent crabs are killed and turned into fresh meat and soup, many still survive. It's a wonder even more crabs aren't killed, just for pinching people so frequently ..... but I won't go into that. Crabs are omnivores, and eat everything from algae to fish to bugs to just about anything.

Vole

Vole

Voles are mouselike creatures who commonly die in their first month alive. The bigger they are, the slower they die. It has been said that only 12% of voles live to see their first month. 88% die within that month. Voles can usually be found near water, but are common and are found everywhere.

One time, my Dad set out a mouse trap because we were having mouse problems- so he thought. What he caught wasn't a mouse, it was a vole that had lived to see it's second year. It's SECOND YEAR- and Dad killed it.

Litters of voles typically range from 5-10 young- so just having one pregnant vole in a yard can result in over a hundred of the little pests running back and forth in your yard and your home. How obnoxious!!!

Orca

Orca, porpoising to swim faster.

Orcas, or killer whales, are meat eaters. They commonly survive off of sea lions when in the wild, and fish when in captivity. They can be trained, but even with the best of training can backflip into old habits easily. A few trainers from SeaWorld have been killed by orcas.

Killer whales are very big. They can weigh up to 6 tonnes minimum, and their dorsal fin is as tall, if not taller, than a human. They are black and white, and from a distance are mistaken as Rosso's dolphins, or false killer whales. They have very large and sharp enamel covered teeth.

Female orcas mature at around age 15. They can then have babies. Gestation period is about a year-year1/2. Babies are fed milk until about one year old, and are then weened from it. Weening takes about one year to complete.

Peacock

Ever heard the joke about the farmers who split land and such evenly but one day a peacock sits in the middle of their fence and lays an egg? Who keeps the egg, no one does because peacocks don't lay eggs! Only peahens can lay eggs. And the babies are called peachicks. Most peahens are easily told apart from peacocks by their awful coloring. Males have extravagant colors in their feathers, and females have brown feathers.

Only green peahens look exactly like the male except for the size. Green peahens have the color (Score one for female color-deprived animals) of the males. They even have a beautiful tail fan as well. Tail fans have been thought of as a mating sign from male to female. To get the female's attention, the peacock will strut around opening and closing his feathers.

Peacocks are very strange animals. They will sleep in trees (As forests are their natural habitat,) and nest on the ground. During mating season, they will usually give off strange, high-pitched calls to one another. Peacocks are also omnivorous, and will eat almost anything from bugs to leaves to slop.

Flamingo

Flamingos are very strange birds. They usually are found standing in shallow water in Africa on one leg. This is thought to be a state of rest for half of the flamingo's body, and that when they switch, it is because the other half is resting. A more likely reason is to stir up the food near the bottom of the water so that it comes to the surface where the flamingo can easily eat it.

Flamingos have a special way of filter feeding, and can separate mud from the food they eat. If not given enough food with color, flamingos become a sickly pale salmon color. Flamingos who feed on dark colored algae are typically darker in color than the average flamingo. It has been shown that zoo flamingos are usually paler in color than ones left to feed in the wild.

Flamingos hang in flocks of up to 2000, and do this to limit predators, maximize food, and have easier nesting ground. These birds nest down in mud to hatch their young, and a spot is (as usual) chosen by the female. Groups are now split into 10-20 birds. After a few weeks, the baby birds are released into groups of other young, where they grow up without parents.

Toucan

The toucan, in reality

Our inner child....

Oh follow your nose... It always knows... la-da-da-dee-da-doo-da-da... Oops. Sorry, the toucan reminds me of froot loops... and I just watched an ad for them on youtube. Well, here is some info for you about breakfast's favorite bird. You can spot this bird from a mile away- or maybe you could just spot his beak. Toucans are known for their big, colorful beaks.

Female toucans, though shorter than males, are fatter, giving a bulky appearance. Both birds are colorful, not just the male. Feathers are typically black, with hints of red and yellow here and there. Both male and female have large beaks, sometimes which are half of their length and weight. Toucans weigh around 1.5 pounds.

Toucans are social and lazy birds. They stick in small groups, and never work for themselves. Instead of making their own home with their lousy, good-for-nothing bill, they search out the holes of laborous woodpeckers and chase them away. They also never migrate. Lazy, lazy birds!

Narwhal

Narwhal

Oh look, it's a unicorn Mummy! Only it's fat- and fishlike- and its- its- Oh. It's not a unicorn, it's a narwhal! Part of the whale family, a narwhal is easily distinguished by it's unicornlike horn. They are near threatened, no thanks to the ivory in their horns. Many people shoot and kill narwhals just for the tusk. You'd think they'd get enough from elephants!

Narwhals live in the Arctic year-round. They feed on fish and eggs, among other things, and sometimes rocks are even found in their guts from feeding near the bottom of the ocean near wintertime. How something that big can be stupid enough to ingest a rock, I don't know. But then again, my dog does the same thing, so I can't complain.

Narwhals are special in ways though. In winter, they make the deepest dives ever recorded by a sea animal, sometimes diving below 2000 feet. Guess all of those rocks in their gut help after all ... but to get back to their diving. They can stay 2000 feet below for up to 25 minutes, which doesn't include the transition up and down from the top to the bottom.

There is some interesting stories behind narwhals. Some people say they were created when a woman with the harpoon rope around her waist was dragged off to sea by the creature she caught, and transformed into a whale, and since she was wearing her hair in a twisted braid, it became the narwhals' horn. Another legend says that the horns are magical, and can cure illness. Regardless, they are still worth a TON of money.