Ocelot Facts

Ocelot Facts

1. The Ocelot is a beautiful medium sized spotted cat with body dimensions similar to the bobcat (30-41 inches long and 15-30 lbs).  Its body coloration is variable; with the upper parts gray or buff with dark brown or black spots, small rings, blotches, and short bars.  A key feature is the parallel stripes running down the nape of the neck.  The under parts are white spotted with black.  The Ocelot’s long tail is ringed or marked with dark bars on the upper surface. The backs of the rounded ears are black with a white central spot.

2. Ocelots have an excellent coat for the environment in which they live in. Also they have super sharp claws to kill their prey and climb trees. Ocelots of many adaptions some of them are huge eyes for night vision and can swim. Ocelots have a special feature like all cats it has retractable claws. So this helps keep the ocelots claws very sharp. Though the ocelots ears are short its hearing is super.

3. The ocelots name came from the Mexican Aztec word tlalocelot, which means field tiger.

4. Leopardus pardalis is the ocelots scientific name ..

5. These largely nocturnal cats use keen sight and hearing to hunt rabbits, rodents, iguanas, fish.

6. The ocelots Protection status is : Threatened .

7. Due the fact that Ocelots are high strung, unpredictable, comedic little cats, humans de-fanged, de-clawed, de-scented, and altered these cats in order to make them conform to the “pet” industry.

8. Ocelots produce a litter of 1-2 young

9. Ocelots are mammals.  They weigh 24 to 35 pounds and are 5 feet long. They have whiskers, a mouth, a nose, legs, ears, eyes, a tail and teeth-like scissors.

10. People kill ocelots for fur to make coats.  People take over ocelot land and make it into farmland.  Ocelots are sold as pets in the U.S and they are threatened.

11. Ocelots live in South America, Arizona, and south Texas. They live in rain forests, jungles, dens and brushes. They like to live alone in trees and rest there so other animals won't see them.

12. Ocelots are carnivores. They eat peccaries, snakes, rabbits, rodents, iguanas, fish, frogs, monkeys and birds. They hunt their prey at night, stock their food, and chase prey.  They tear their food into little parts.

13. Ocelots like to swim and are amazing climbers.  They travel 1 to 3 hours looking for food.  They are speedy and active at night.  They also fight fiercely to death.

14. Ocelots mark their territory with urine.

15. Ocelots are predators.  They feed on bobcats, coyotes, and humans.  Male ocelots are called torns.  Females are called queens.  Baby ocelots are called kittens. Baby ocelots live with their mother for 2 years and then they leave their dens. They are nocturnal and have whitish, yellowish, reddish, and gray fur. They are 28 to 35 inches long and weigh 11 to 16 kilogram.

16. As nocturnal hunters, they move at night and are rarely seen by people.

17. Ocelots are the only remaining spotted cat in the United States.

18. Female ocelots have litters of two or three darkly colored kittens. In northern locations, females den in the autumn, while in tropical climates the breeding season may not be fixed.

19.  Average 50" in length, from the tip of the tail to the tip of the nose.

20. Ocelot males confine themselves to a range of up to 7 square miles, while females inhabit smaller areas of about 4 square miles. A male's home range usually overlaps that of several females.

21. They are generally solitary animals, except during the breeding season.

22. Ocelots can adapt to human habitats and are sometimes found in the vicinity of villages or other settlements. They do fairly well as long as hunting pressure isn't too intense and they have appropriate habitat available to them.

23.  Unlike many cats, they do not avoid water and can swim well.

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Amazing Badger Facts

Amazing Badger Facts

The name badger is probably derived from the French word 'bécheur' meaning digger. 'Brock' probably originated in Scandinavia and is retained in the gaelic languages. Badgers are usually around 90cm long, and on average weigh 10-11kg. They are very muscly and power ful for their size, and - as they are the UK’s biggest land predator - other wild animals will not usually attack them.

Badgers belong to the Mustelidae (weasel) family of carnivores. The weasel, otter, polecat, marten, mink, fisher, grison, sable, skunk and wolverine are all close relatives. Badgers are spread over all continents other than Australasia and 

Antarctica. badger (meles meles) is the most widespread over Europe and Asia, but the others include the American badger, the Hog badger of East & South Asia, the Chinese ferret badger and the Indonesian & Palawan stink badger.

Badgers are built for digging. Their den can be up to 3 metres underground and contain up to 10 metres of tunnels, with an enlarged chamber for sleeping. Badgers have long strong claws and a streamlined skull enabling them to create these dens and dig prey out of burrows.

Badgers also have a second (transparent) eyelid which can be closed to protect the badger’s eye from dirt. This eyelid is called the “nictitating membrane.” Diving birdssuch as the kingfisher also have this second eyelid.

When threatened, badgers release a foul smelling musk to drive off enemies. In the face of danger , badgers also become very vocal; hissing and snarling. Badgers are solitary (live alone) for most of the year . Adult males and females only get together to mate in late summer.

The honey badger likes sweet honey, but it does not have a sweet personality.

A member of the weasel family, this mammal was named the “most fearless animal in the world” by The Guinness Book of Records. Why? Not because of its size. The largest male usually weighs less than 30 pounds, and females weigh half of that. However, both have powerful jaws, razor sharp teeth, knife like front claws and thick, tough, loose skin. 

If grabbed by an attacker the honey badger can still twist around and bite itself free. In addition, it can make a terrible stink with its scent glands. 

The honey badger is so fearless that it even eats porcupines and venomous snakes like puff adders and king cobras! They have also been known to take young cheetahs out of dens and to steal the food away from much larger animals like lions and leopards! While it uses it tough personality to hunt all types of animals, this fearless predator sometimes eats melons and berries as well.

The only threats to badgers are man and dogs. Man destroys the badger's habitat through development and changes of land use and  will block setts and even indulge in badger-baiting. 

The male badger is called a ‘boar’, the female a ‘sow’ and their young ‘cubs’. After mating the fertilised egg is retained by the sow as a blastocyst until later it implants in her uterus. 

Although the badger's favourite food is worms, the diet chart shows that badgers are omnivorous. They will eat anything they can reach or catch, be it alive or dead.

Badgers live underground in a sett. They prefer well drained soil- holes at different levels improve ventilation. 

Badgers can live as long as 15 years. However, they rarely survive that long in the wild, with an average life span of just three years.

Badger cubs are usually born in late January or February. They’ll spend their first two or three months underground, being looked after by their parents, and will only come to the sur face in the spring.

Badgers adore peanuts! If you want to encourage a local badger into your garden, leave out a handful of peanuts and see if they’re gone in the morning…

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Interesting Facts About Armadillos

Interesting Facts About Armadillos

1. The name “Armadillo” comes from the Spanish language and means “little armored one”. It refers to the bony plates that cover the back, head, legs and tail of most of these remarkable looking creatures. 

2. Wild armadillos live in the grasslands, forests, and deserts of North and South America. One species, the nine-banded armadillo, has extended its range as far north as the United States. They can be found in several states, including Texas, Florida, Georgia, and the Carolinas. Most other species live in South America, with some also in Central America and Mexico.

3. The smallest armadillo, the pink fairy armadillo, is only six inches long. Meanwhile, the giant armadillo can be five feet long and weigh up to 100 pounds! The nine-branded variety that is found in the United States can grow up to two feet long and weigh up to 22 pounds.

4. While the animal's armor provides some protection, only the small three-banded armadillo can roll into a complete ball. Other species escape predators like wild cats and birds of prey by racing into thorny bushes or by burrowing into the ground with their sharp claws. In fact, most armadillos sleep in the warmth of an underground burrow.

5. You could say that armadillos are crunchy on the outside but soft on the inside.

6. There are over 20 varieties of armadillos and most of them live in Latin America. The nine-banded armadillo is a species that has moved northwards into the United States.

7. Armadillos have poor eyesight. They utilize their sense of smell to hunt. Their strong legs und big front claws are used for digging and their long and sticky tongue is used for extracting e.g. termites from their tunnels.

8. Amongst other things, armadillos even eat fire ants, so it comes as no surprise that they are closely related to ant eaters and sloths.

9. Prior to around 1850 the nine-banded armadillo was not found north of the Rio Grande  river.

10. They vary in size and color. The giant armadillo can get over one meter long!

11. Not all armadillos are able to close themselves in their shells. Only three banded armadillos can protect themselves by rolling up like hedgehogs.

12. The female armadillo is the only mammal that can give birth to four identical babies with one egg.

13. Armadillos are the only animals that can get leprosy like humans.

14. Armadillos can walk underwater! They don’t need to breath very often as have a very low need for oxygen. However, by gulping air into their digestive tract armadillos are able to stay afloat as they paddle. Armadillos can also go underwater and walk along a stream bottom for up to six minutes.

15. The Nine-banded Armadillo is about the size of a cat. It is usually 24 to 31 inches in length.

16. The Nine-banded Armadillo is the only North American mammal armored with heavy, bony plates. The scaly-looking plates cover the animal’s head, body, and tail. 

17. Four young are born in a burrow in March. The four young, which are always of the same sex, are identical quadruplets that develop from a single egg and share a single placenta while in the womb. Armadillos are the only mammals in which multiple young develop from a single egg with regularity.

18. The Nine-banded Armadillo is a distant cousin of the sloth and the anteater and is also the state small mammal of Texas.

19. The Nine-banded Armadillo primarily eats animal matter. This consists of ants, small reptiles, amphibians, birds and dead animals. It will also eat fruits and berries. 

20. Like most insect eating mammals, armadillos have a very long, sticky tongue to slurp up bugs as quickly as possible. They also are equipped with strong claws to tear open ant nests. Their cousins, the anteaters, have very similar tongues and claws.

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Hookah Facts

Hookah Facts

Smoking a hookah is smoking tobacco.

What is a Hookah and Shisha? 

A hookah is a water pipe used to smoke tobacco through cooled water.  The tobacco is heated in the bowl at the top of the hookah and the smoke is filtered through the water in the base of the hookah.

Alternate names for hookahs include: water pipe, goza, hubble-bubble, borry, arhile, and narghile. 

Shisha is the tobacco smoked in a hookah.  It is a very moist and sticky tobacco that has been soaked in honey or molasses.

There are a variety of shisha flavors including apple, plum, coconut, mango, mint, and strawberry.

History of Hookahs?

The hookah tradition, dating back at least 500 years, originated in the Middle East regions of the world. Countries cited for the first use include Egypt, India, and Turkey.

Smoking the hookah is one of the oldest, most popular Turkish traditions.

The tradition has traveled to the United States and today there are more than 300 hookah establishments in the U.S.

Myths and the Truths 
MYTH #1: Hookah smoke is filtered through water so it filters out any harmful ingredients.
TRUTH #1: Smoking tobacco through water does not filter out cancer-causing chemicals. Water-filtered smoke can damage the lungs and heart as much as cigarette smoke.

MYTH #2:  Inhaling hookah smoke does not burn the lungs, so it is not unhealthy.
TRUTH #2: The hookah smoke does not burn the lungs when inhaled because is cooled through the water in the base of the hookah.  Even though the smoke is cooled, it still contains carcinogens and it is still unhealthy.

MYTH #3: Smoking hookahs are healthier than smoking cigarettes.
TRUTH #3: Hookah smoke is just as dangerous as cigarette smoke.  Hookahs generate smoke in different ways: cigarette smoke is generated by burning tobacco, while hookah smoke is produced by heating tobacco in a bowl using charcoal.  The end product is the same-smoke, containing carcinogens.

MYTH #4: Smoking a hookah is not as addictive as smoking a cigarette because there is no nicotine.
TRUTH #4: Just like regular tobacco, shisha contains nicotine.  In fact, in a 60-minute hookah session, smokers are exposed to 100 to 200 times the volume of smoke inhaled from a single cigarette.

MYTH #5: Herbal shisha is healthier than regular shisha.
TRUTH #5: Just like smoking herbal or “natural” cigarettes, herbal shisha exposes the smoker to tar and carcinogens.

MYTH #6: Shisha tobacco contains fruit, so is healthier than regular tobacco.
TRUTH #6: Tobacco is tobacco, no matter how you look at it.  Shisha is often soaked in molasses or honey and mixed with fruit, but it still contains cancer-causing chemicals and nicotine.  Stick to traditional methods of getting fruit -eat an orange.

Quick Facts 

1. Compared to a single cigarette, hookah smoke is known to contain:
Higher levels of arsenic, lead, and nickel
36 times more tar
15 times more carbon monoxide

2. Smoking a hookah requires taking longer and harder drags, increasing levels of inhaled nicotine and carcinogens in the lungs.

3. The longer the hookah session, the more nicotine and toxins one takes in.

4. A 45 to 60 minute hookah session exposes the smoker to approximately the same amount of tar and nicotine as one pack of cigarettes.

5. Sharing mouthpieces without washing them can increase the risk of spreading colds, flu, and infections-even oral herpes.

6. Health risks of smoking hookahs include cancer, heart disease, lung damage, and dental disease.

7. Do not think that if you are just visiting a hookah bar, that you are in the clear.

8. There are still high levels of damaging second hand smoke to all who are present. 

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LITTLE KNOWN LINCOLN FACTS

LITTLE KNOWN LINCOLN FACTS

Abraham Lincoln “Honest Abe”

1. At 6 foot, 4 inches, Abraham Lincoln was the tallest president.

2. Lincoln was the first president to be born outside of the original thirteen colonies.

3. Lincoln  was the first president to be photographed at his inauguration.  John Wilkes Booth (his assassin) can be seen standing close to Lincoln in the picture.

4. There are no direct descendents of Abraham Lincoln even though he had 4 sons.

5. During the Civil War, telegraph wires were strung to follow the action on the battlefield.  But there was no telegraph office in the White House, so Lincoln went across the street to the War Department to get the news.

6. The contents of Lincoln’s pockets on the night of the assassination weren’t revealed until February 12, 1976.  They contained two pairs of spectacles, a chamois lens cleaner, an ivory and silver pocketknife, a large white Irish linen handkerchief, slightly used, with “A. Lincoln” embroidered in red, a gold quartz
watch fob without a watch, a new silk-lined, leather wallet containing a pencil, a Confederate five-dollar bill, and news clippings of unrest in the Confederate Army, emancipation in Missouri, the Union party platform of 1864, and an article on the presidency by John Bright.

7. Lincoln was the only president to receive a patent, for a device for lifting boats over shoals.

8. Lincoln’s son, Robert, who was in Washington when his father was killed, was also on the scene when President Garfield was shot in 1881, and when President McKinley was assassinated in 1901.

9. Lincoln and his wife held séances in the White House.  They had a great interest in psychic phenomena.

10.Lincoln was the first president to wear a beard.

11. Lincoln had the largest shoe-size documented.  He wore a size 14!

12. Before Abraham Lincoln was elected president, he served in the Illinois legislature and practiced law in Springfield. Abraham Lincoln is buried in Springfield at Lincoln Tomb State Historic Site.

13. Lincoln was seeing the play "Our American Cousin" when he was shot.

14. A plot was developed to steal Lincoln's body, so a secret society to guard his tomb was formed.

15. Lincoln had a cat named "Bob," a turkey named "Jack," and a dog named "Jib."

John Wilkes Booth

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The Mystery of Easter Island

The Mystery of Easter Island

Imagine arriving on a small island in the Pacific Ocean about halfway between the island of Tahiti and the west coast of South America to find giant rock statues of human-like figures greeting you along the coastline. This is what Dutch sea captain Jacob Roggeveen found when he arrived there in 1722 on Easter Sunday. This is why he called the 64 square mile island Easter Island. This remote island is still inhabited by a small group of people known as the Rapanui.  Easter Island is called the most remote inhabited island in the world. It is about 1,300 miles from the nearest island and about 2,200 miles from Chile. 

The giant statues of Easter Island are called moai and each moai is placed upon a large flat base or altar called ahu. There are nearly 900 of these statues on the island. Archaeologists continue to investigate when the first inhabitants of the island settled there. There is a wide range of dates given for the first settlers on Easter Island, between 400 to 1200 C.E. or even later.  

The oral history of the Rapanui people includes the arrival of a Polynesian king and his family. They spread across the island and formed 8 family groups, each with its own territory. At some later point a new group made up of just men settled on the island. The islanders did not create any moai until several hundred years later. Archaeologists believe the last moai was constructed around 1650. We do know that the Rapanui people continued to erect new moai over a long period of time, hundreds of years. The smallest moai is about 6 feet in height but most moai are between 18 and 23 feet tall. The Rapanui kept making larger moai and the tallest standing moai is a giant 32 feet. An unfinished moai that is still in the Easter Island stone quarry is a whopping 64 feet long. Most of the moai are positioned so they face away from the ocean. 

The moai are supposed to represent ancestors; they were not worshipped as gods. The style of moai changed over time but always depicted the torso of a man; they are just a few female moai. Some moai look like heads; the heads are part of large statues that have been buried by soil erosion over the centuries. Just like at Stonehenge or the Pyramids, how the early people moved the large stones remains a mystery.

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The Mysterious Nazca Lines

The Mysterious Nazca Lines

1. The Nazca were an ancient people that lived in Peru, in South America, about 2,000 years ago. The people are well known for creating the Nazca lines. The Nazca lines are famous all over the world and they can still be seen clearly and easily today.

2. The Nazca Lines are a mysterious wonder of geoglyphs in the Nazca desert in Peru.  A geoglyph is a large drawing on the ground. They are believed to be the artwork of the Nazca Indians who lived in the area between 200 BC and AD 600. The Nazca Lines extend for about 311 square miles (500 square kilometers).

3. The drawings were first discovered in 1927, when a plane was flying across this part of the desert. What is incredible is that because they are so huge, you can only really see them from the air. Today, people travel in small planes and look down on them, but in those days, how did they see them?
It’s a mystery!

4. To create their massive line drawings, the Nazcas made shallow trenches in the desert. They removed the top surface of red gravel and exposed the white earth below to create a color contrast. The Nazcas likely used poles, ropes, and lots of manpower to create the geogylphs.

5. The Lines were re-discovered in the 1920s and were first thought to have been created by the Incas, but it now seems clear that they are the legacy of a much older culture that developed over 2,300 years ago.

6. There are 70 creatures depicted in the Nazca Lines, including a spider, a monkey, a dog, and a hummingbird. The largest creature is a giant pelican that stretches about 919 feet (280 meters) long. There are also humans, plants, and countless straight lines that crisscross the desert. Similar designs can also be found in ancient Nazca pottery.

7. One of the great mysteries surrounding the Nazca Lines is that they are only truly visible from the air. While some lines can be seen from nearby foothills and a nearby watchtower, you have to go much higher up to see what the lines form. The Nazca artists most likely never saw their finished designs.

8. There are several theories about the purpose of the Nazca Lines. Some are far-fetched theories, while others makes sense. Anthropologists, spiritual leaders, and even mathematicians have come up with ideas over the years. Some people think the lines were sacred walking paths with messages to God. Others think they were etched by gods or even aliens. Many believe the lines were giant calendars or maps based on constellations and seasons. The lines may also have been used to indicate water supplies.

The Heron

9. The Nazca Lines have been preserved for thousands of years because the area gets almost no wind or rain. This type of weather results in a lack of erosion.  In 1995, the Nazca Lines were named a World Heritage Site.

10. Like the Pyramids of Egypt and the statues of Easter Island, the Nazca Lines have a timeless ability to captivate our imaginations, just as they might have captivated their creators, the Nazca people. As Maria Reiche, who dedicated more than 50 years of her life studying the geoglyphs, once said, "we will never know all the answers, that's what a good mystery is all about!"

11. Just about everybody has their own pet theory and, to be honest, your opinion will probably be just as valid as anyone else's so by far the best thing is to go and visit the Lines yourself so you can make up your own mind-who knows, something may strike you that no-one's thought of before!

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