A list of interesting and quirky facts about animals

1) Although cats meow with people, cats rarely meow at each other. It seems that the ‘meow’ is mostly reserved for us humans.

2) The old belief that bulls become agitated if they see the colour red is nonsense. Bulls are in fact colour blind.

3) Turkey has been associated with the traditional Christmas dinner for a long time now, but did you know that in the middle ages it was not uncommon to find a swan or a peacock on your plate.

4) When you think of the most dangerous animal in Africa; lions, crocodiles, rhinos and tigers come to mind. However, surprisingly, hippopotamuses kill the most people, by running them over and trampling their victim to death.

5) Litter in the form of plastic, such as discarded plastic bags kills 100,000 birds and marine animals every year.

6) A cow performs on average 40,000 jaw movements per day. That’s even more than a London cab driver would perform in the course of one taxi journey!

7) Don’t ever be afraid of a toad jumping at you. Yes, they can hop, but they can’t jump like a frog can.

8 ) If you are ever unlucky enough to get snapped up by a saltwater crocodile; whilst you are being twisted and thrashed around in the water to the tune of breaking ribs, spare a thought on how to escape. Apparently, you should poke your thumbs into the croc’s eyes and twist your thumbs around. Easier said than done I suspect.

9) The hydra, which is a close relative of the jellyfish can perform a neat trick. If you cut it in half, within a few days it will grow again to it’s normal size.

10) Cats can be either right-pawed or left-pawed, so next time you attempt to play a game of darts with your cat, please keep this in mind.

11) The poor old swordfish has shrunk! :0 In the North Atlantic the size of a freshly caught swordfish is just a third of the size of the impressive whoppers caught back in the 1960s.

12) Whereas a human being would store fat around the belly area, or around the thighs for women, the Tasmanian Devil stores body fat within its tail. So if you happen to see one with a very thin tail, the chances are that its unhealthy, so you’d be doing a good deed by throwing it a few scraps of food.

13) If you thought that the domesticated cat was sleepy, spare a thought for desert snails, who sometimes sleep for up to four years.

14) What animal drinks salt water? The answer is the humble seagull, because its glands are dedicated to filtering out the sodium.

15) Cockroaches will eat practically anything, even Marmite. But there is one food that it won’t eat, which funnily enough is the same food my greedy Labrador won’t eat too, and that  food is . . . the cucumber.

16) Who says that dogs don’t get a ticket to heaven. Dogs are mentioned in the Bible fourteen times in total.

17) What animals walked on tippy-toes? Well, you may be surprised to know that most dinosaurs walked on their toes.

18 ) Most tropical fish keepers in North America may be surprised to hear that around 95% of the tropical fish they buy actually come from Florida.

19) Which is the fastest moving snake that you’d have to put on some speed to avoid? It’s the Black Mamba, which can slither along at a respectable seven MPH.

20) I think you’ll agree that birds seem to be pretty busy all the time foraging for food. This is because on average, a bird must eat half its own weight of food per day. Those flapping wings must burn some serious calories, so the niche is open for someone to develop a flapping arms diet for humans.

21) If you have more than one cat, it may help to bear in mind that cats that are of the opposite sex generally get along much better than if you have several cats of the same sex.

22) What is the world’s smallest mammal? The answer can be found in Thailand. It is the Thai bumblebee bat which weighs less than a penny.

23) How do you stop your cat from scratching your furniture to sharpen its claws? The answer is by spraying distilled vinegar over your furniture items. The drawback however is that your house will smell of vinegar.

24) Sandpaper was once made from shark skin, as a shark’s skin is made up of tiny teeth.

25) Cats need taurine which is not present in dog food. So before you consider feeding your cat and dog from the same bag for convenience

26) Alligators, as well having reflexes that are 4 times faster than a human can also climb trees and outrun a human too.

27) What can help the humble cow produce more milk than average? The answer, surprisingly, is classical music.

28 ) Bats when exiting a cave will always exit to the left. And there are no traffic lights involved.

29) Ever had a bird hit your window? I think most people have seen this at least once in their lifetime. The fact is that around a thousand birds per year come a cropper and float up to bird heaven by hitting windows too hard.

30) Swans are owned in England by the Queen.

31) What snake has the longest fangs in the world? The answer is the Gaboon Viper. This snake has fangs that can be as long as two inches long.

32) Starfish are lacking one thing that is hard to imagine not having, and that is a brain.

33) Most people view a black cat crossing your path as bad luck. However, in certain parts of Japan this is actually seen as very good luck.

34) The ancient Greeks are often seen as an advanced race that came up with many innovations. There is however room for error in everything, as they believed that a zebra was the result of a random passionate encounter between a horse and a tiger.

35) A hippopotamus’s sweat is actually pink in colour when secreted during hot weather.

36) What would be the biggest ever animal witnessed alive in the world? The answer is a 113.5 foot long one hundred and seventy ton female blue whale.

37) A mole is an industrious little digger as it can dig a tunnel up to three hundred feet long in just a single night.

38 ) Has an animal ever been hanged for murder? The answer is ‘yes’, in Erwin Tennessee. It’s a good job elephant serial killers are not common.

39) A dog’s hearing is impressive, but a cat’s hearing is even more effective. Certainly more effective than a human’s hearing too.

40) Don’t stress your duck out in attempt to encourage it to lay an egg for you, as ducks will only lay eggs in the morning.

41) You won’t often find a Koala drinking water. Imagine the time it would take in addition to eating all day? The fluids for the koala are taken from the eucalyptus leaves that they are so fond of.

42) A hermit crab may outlive some humans, as it can live for up to seventy five years.

43) Any single person eager to meet their soulmate should spare a thought for the female ferret who is undoubtably under more pressure, as if she does not find a mate when she goes into heat it can cause her death.

44) Cats purr when they are contented, but also when they are in pain or deeply distressed.

45) The king cobra, as everyone knows is deadly. I personally once met a man whose friend cut off his thumb after being bitten by a King Cobra on the tip of his thumb. To further underline the severity of a King Cobra’s bite, it can kill an elephant in under four hours.

46) If your cat rolls over and exposes its belly for you. This is a sign that your cat trusts you, not that it is planking for a Facebook photo.

47) In Lop Buri, Thailand, which is known for its large population of wild, city dwelling monkeys, there was once a problem of monkeys swiping slurpees from 7-Eleven customers.

48 ) Mosquito repellents don’t actually repel mosquitos. Instead, the spray acts to block out the sensors of the mosquito that it has so it doesn’t realise you are there.

49) Baby sharks are independent with a capital ‘I’, for as soon as they are born, they swim away from their mothers immediately.

50) Flamingoes can live up to an impressive 80 years old. So pay respect to the worldly wise flamingo, as it may be older than your grandparents.

I hope you enjoyed this list and if you have any more interesting facts about animals please leave a comment 🙂

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