Funny Weird Amazing Facts!!

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MISS SCORPIO

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This'll catch you lot off guard!


In Seattle, Washington, it is illegal to carry a concealed weapon that is over six feet in length.

In seventy-five years the human heart pumps 3,122,000,000 gallons of blood, enough to fill in oil tanker over 46 times!

In Scotland, Irn-Bru is a soft drink that is more popular than Coca-Cola. When McDonalds opened in Glasgow and did not sell Irn-Bru, it was considered an insult, and the restaurant was subsequently boycotted.

After spending hours working at a computer display, look at a blank piece of white paper. It will probably appear pink.

All of the clocks in the movie "Pulp Fiction" are stuck on 4:20.

In Salem, Massachesetts sleeping in the nude in a rented room is forbidden, even for married couples.

In Shakespeare's time, mattresses were secured on bed frames by ropes when you pulled on the ropes the mattress tightened, making the bed firmer to sleep on. That's where the phrase, "goodnight, sleep tight" came from.

In the ancient Greek city-state of Sparta, if a man was not married by age 30, he would not be allowed to vote or watch athletic events involving nude young men.

In playing poker, there is one chance in 500 of drawing a flush.

In Shakespeare, Rosalind, the heroine of "As You Like It", has more lines than any of Shakespeare's female characters. Cleopatra comes in second with 670 lines and third place belongs to Imogen ("Cymbeline"), with 591 lines.

In Scituate, Rhode Island it is illegal to keep a flock of chickens in your motorhome if you live in a trailer park.

In Saratoga, Florida it is illegal to sing while wearing a bathing suit.

All mammals have tongues.

Alexander H. Stephens was Jefferson Davis's Vice President of the Confederacy during the Civil War.

Alekthophilia is the love of chickens.

Adding sugar to coffee is believed to have started in 1715, in the court of King Louis XIV, the French monarch.

According to an Old English system of time units, a moment is considered to be one and a half minutes.

According to a recent survey, more Americans lose their virginity in June than any other month.

According to a global survey in 1997 by Durex Condoms Canadians are the world's fourth worst lovers. The worst three slots belong to South Africa, Russia, and Poland.

Absolutely pure gold is so soft that it can be molded with the hands.

Abraham Lincoln's ghost is said to haunt the White House.

Abraham Lincoln had to go across the street to the War Department to get news from the battlefield because there was no telegraph in the White House.

About a third of all Americans flush the toilet while they're still sitting on it.

About 80% of the city was burned in the Great Fire of London in 1666.

About 75% of the people in the U.S. live on 2% land.

About 70% of Americans who go to college do it just to make more money.

About 55% of all movies are rated R. About 500 movies are made in the US and 800 in India annually.

About 24% of the total ground area of Los Angeles is said to be committed to automobiles.

About 200,000,000 M&Ms are sold each day in the United States.

Abe Lincoln's mother died when the family dairy cow ate poisonous mushrooms and Ms. Lincoln drank the milk.

ABBA GOLD has been in the UK charts for over 280 weeks, thats over 5 years!

A typical American eats 28 pigs in his/her lifetime.

A total of 63 errors were made in the 1886 World Series.

A teaspoon of neutron star material weighs about 110 million tons.
Posted 28 Jan 2008

The tiny droplets of water that make up fog are so small that it would take seven thousand million of them to make a single tablespoonful of water.

The fogs, which are more common in winter, occasionally cause havoc with air travel by lingering into the early afternoon.

In Australia, Canberra wins the title of the 'foggiest' capital city with an average of 47 fogs each year.

Sea fogs persist for more than 120 days a year on the Grand Banks, Newfoundland, Canada.
Posted 28 Jan 2008

In May 1962, strong westerly winds resulted in such a thick dust haze in Sydney, that Bankstown Airport had to close for almost 4 hours.

In Australia's capital cities dust storms are somewhat of a rarity, but have, nonetheless, been responsible for causing significant inconvenience to city life.

In Australia, the most severe dust storms usually occur across the dry interior of the continent during the summer months.
Posted 28 Jan 2008

A storm blanketed Worcester, MA, with 7.5 inches of snow, a record snowfall total for so early in the season for that location.

A tropical wave, later to become Tropical Storm Isabel, struck Puerto Rico. As much as 24 inches of rain fell in 24 hours, and the severe flooding and numerous landslides resulting from the rain claimed about 180 lives.

A second early season snowstorm produced eleven inches at Wilkes Barre PA and 26 inches at Auburn NY. All the mountains in the northeastern U.S. were whitened with snow.

Thunderstorms developing ahead of a cold front produced large hail in southeastern Wyoming during the afternoon, with tennis ball size hail reported at Cheyenne. Strong winds ushering the cold air into the north central U.S. gusted to 59 mph at Lander WY.

A record early season snowstorm struck the Central High Plains Region. The storm left up to nineteen inches of snow along the Colorado Front Range, and as much as a foot of snow in the High Plains Region.

Thunderstorms produced high winds and locally heavy rain in the southwestern U.S. One thunderstorm in west Texas produced wind gusts to 86 mph at Dell City completely destroying an airport hangar.

Tropical Storm Emily, which formed in the Carribean the previous afternoon, caused considerable damage to the banana industry of Saint Vincent in the Windward Islands.

A storm produced 28 inches of snow at Colorado Springs CO.

Showers and thunderstorms produced locally heavy rains in central Wyoming, and snow in some of the higher elevations. Casper WY reported 1.75 inches of rain in 24 hours, and a thunderstorm north of the Wild Horse Reservoir produced 1.90 inches of rain in just forty minutes.

Afternoon and evening thunderstorms produced severe weather in Oklahoma and west Texas. In Oklahoma, a thunderstorm at Seiling produced three inches of rain in one hour, golf ball size hail, and wind gusts to 60 mph which collapsed a tent at the state fair injuring nine persons.

Thunderstorms can generate gusts of wind that can develop additional thunderstorms 100 miles away.

The Empire State Building has been struck by lightning a dozen time in a single storm.

A government study showed that one small thunderstorm held more than 33 million gallons of water.

Supercells are the most dangerous types of thunder storms.

An exceedingly great storm struck eastern New England causing extensive coastal damage from Massachusetts to Maine, and the highest tide in 47 years.
Posted 28 Jan 2008

The second in a series of unusual October storms hit southern California causing widespread thunderstorms. Santa Maria was drenched with 1.13 inches of rain in two hours.

A great storm struck New England. The storm reportedly was predicted twelve months in advance by a British officer named Saxby. Heavy rains and high floods plagued all of New England, with strong winds and high tides over New Hampshire and Maine. Canton CT was deluged with 12.35 inches of rain.
Posted 28 Jan 2008

Hurricane Emily crossed the island of Bermuda during the early morning. Emily, moving northeast at 45 mph, produced wind gusts to 115 mph at Kindley Field. The thirty-five million dollars damage inflicted by Emily made it the worst hurricane to strike Bermuda since.

Cool Canadian air prevailed across the central and eastern U.S. Toledo OH reported a record low of 27 degrees. Limestone ME received an inch of snow. Warm weather continued in the western U.S. Boise ID reported a record high of 87 degrees.

The western U.S. continued to sizzle. Afternoon highs of 85 degrees at Astoria OR, 101 degrees at Tucson AZ, and 102 degrees at Sacramento CA, equalled October records. It marked the fourth time in the month that Sacramento tied their record for October.

Cold Canadian air invaded the north central U.S. bringing an end to the growing season across those states. Unseasonably warm weather prevailed in the southwestern U.S. Phoenix AZ reported a record high of 105 degrees.

Afternoon highs of 103 degrees at Long Beach CA and 105 degrees at the Los Angeles Civic Center were the hottest since September records were established in 1963. Fierce Santa Ana winds accompanying the extreme heat resulted in destructive fires.

A black frost over most of New England kills unripened corn in the north resulting in a year of famine.

Unseasonably warm weather prevailed across Florida. Afternoon highs of 92 degrees at Apalachicola and 95 degrees at Fort Myers were records for the date.

In the midst of a hot September for Death Valley, California, the afternoon high was 104 degrees for the second of three days, the coolest afternoon highs for the month.

Santa Ana winds brought fires to Los Angeles County, and to points south and east. Half a million acres were consumed by the fires, as were 1000 structures. Twenty firemen were injured.

Unseasonably warm weather continued in the western U.S. In California, afternoon highs of 96 degrees at Redding and Red Bluff were records for the date.

Dense fog contributed to a 118 vehicle accident on I-94, just south of Milwaukee WI. It was the seventh day of an eight day stretch of dense fog. At the time of the accident the visibility was reportedly close to zero.

Floodwaters roared through a migrant labor camp near the town of Picacho AZ flooding fifty cabins and a dozen nearby homes. 250 migrant workers lost their shelters. The month was one of the wettest Octobers in Arizona weather history.

Seattle WA received four inches of rain in 24 hours, a record for the city.

Excessive flooding was reported along the Mississippi River and all over the Midwest, from Ohio to the Milk River in Montana. In some places it was the worst flooding of record.

A big early season lake effect snowburst on the lee shores of Lake Erie and Lake Ontario produced 47 inches at Governeur NY and 48 inches just south of Buffalo.
Posted 28 Jan 2008

A hurricane struck South Florida drowning 124 persons stranded in the Florida Keys.

Morning fog in the central U.S. reduced the visibility to near zero at some locations. Morning lows of 28 degrees at Rockford IL and 24 degrees at Waterloo IA were records for the date. Afternoon highs of 92 degrees at Hollywood FL and Miami FL were records for the date.

The journal of John Winthrop recorded that a mighty tempest struck eastern New England. This second severe hurricane in three years blew down many trees in mile long tracks.

Baseball sized hail killed 246 people in India in 1888.

One lightning bolt has enough electricity to service 200,000 homes.

The Empire State Building gets struck by lightning on the average of 500 a year.
Posted 28 Jan 2008

On average, a hen lays 300 eggs per year.

Nine egg yolks have been found in one chicken egg.

A mother hen turns her egg approximately 50 times in a day. This is so the yolk does not stick to the shell.

To produce a dozen eggs, a hen has to eat about four pounds of feed.

The largest chicken egg ever laid weighed a pound and had a double yolk and shell.

A chicken with red earlobes will produce brown eggs, and a chicken with white earlobes will produce white eggs.

A chicken is 75% water.

In the U.S., approximately 46% of the chicken that is eaten by people comes from restaurants or other food outlets.

Hens will produce larger eggs as they grow older.

A chicken loses its feathers when it becomes stressed.

A chicken once had its head cut off and survived for over eighteen months, headless.
Posted 28 Jan 2008

Butterflies get their name from the yellow brimstone butterfly of Europe that is first seen in the early spring or "butter" season.

Female Queen Alexandra butterflies, from Papua and New Guinea, are the largest in the world, some with wingspans larger than 26 cm.

Butterflies and moths are found on all land masses except Antarctica.

The atlas moth, one of the largest silk moths, can be mistaken for a medium-sized bat when flying.

There are over 2,000 species of butterflies in the rainforests of South America.

Butterflies belong to, alongside with moths to an order called Lepidoptera.

The fastest flying butterfly is the Monarch, which has been clocked with a speed as high as 17 miles per hour.

Butterflies are further divided into 30 orders, the main basis of classification being their wing structure.

The main features of butterflies have in common are:
6 legs
one pair of antennae
a segmented body in which three body parts, a head, a thorax and an abdomen can be distinguished.

Night butterflies have ears on their wings so they can avoid bats.

A butterfly's taste sensors are located below their feet.

The color in a butterfly's wings does not come from pigment. The color is produced prism-like by light reflected by their transparent wing scales.

The largest butterfly is the Queen Alexandra's birdwing butterfly from Papua New Guinea. The wingspan of the butterfly can reach to be almost one foot.

A butterfly has to have a body temperature greater than 86 degrees to be able to fly.

A butterfly can see the colors red, green, and yellow.
Posted 28 Jan 2008

The original name for the butterfly was 'flutterby'!

Butterflies belong to INSECTS, which is the largest, most varied group of animals.
Posted 28 Jan 2008

Wasps that feed on ferment occasionally get drunk and pass out.

Tarantula wasps paralyze tarantulas and lay a single egg on the still living spider; when the egg hatches, the wasp larva has fresh food.

The female yellow jacket wasp lays both fertilized and unfertilized eggs. Female workers develop from the fertilized egg and male drones develop from the unfertilized egg.
Posted 28 Jan 2008

Bees fly an average of 13-15 mph.

A bee travels an average of 1600 round trips in order to produce one ounce of honey; up to 6 miles per trip. To produce 2 pounds of honey, bees travel a distance equal to 4 times around the earth.

Honeybees visit about 2 million flowers to make one pound of honey.

During honey production periods, a bee's life span is about 6 weeks.

Just a single hive contains approximately 40-45,000 bees!

Honeybees are the only insects that produce food for humans.

About 8 pounds of honey is eaten by bees to produce 1 pound of beeswax.

Beeswax production in most hives is about 1 1/2% to 2% of the total honey yield.

The average hive temperature is 93.5 degrees.

Queens will lay almost 2000 eggs a day at a rate of 5 or 6 a minute. Between 175,000-200,000 eggs are laid per year.

The speed at which honey bees fly is at 15 miles per hour.

The sole purpose of a drone bee is to mate with the queen bee.

Bees from the same hive visit about 225,000 flowers per day. One single bee usually visits between 50-1000 flowers a day, but can visit up to several thousand.

Honeybees have hair on their eyes.

A colony of bees have to fly almost fifty-five thousand miles and tap two million flowers to make one pound of honey.
Posted 28 Jan 2008

A honey bee strokes its wings about 11,500 times a minute.

Bees can communicate with other bees by dancing. Their dance can alert other bees as to which direction and the distance nectar and pollen is located.

It takes 12 honeybees to make one teaspoon of honey.

In one trip, a honey bee visits about 75 flowers.

In one day, a queen bee can lay up to 1500 eggs in one day.

In a lifetime, on average a honey bee produces 1/12th of a teaspoon of honey.

Honeybees use the sun as a compass which helps them navigate.

A honey bee has four wings.

A bird called the bee eater in areas of Africa thinks that riding around on the backs of other animals is fun!

The honeybee has to travel an average of 43,000 miles to collect enough nectar to make a pound of honey!
Posted 28 Jan 2008

Certain female species of spiders such as the Australian crab spider, sacrifice their bodies as a food source for their offspring.

Some male spiders pluck their cobwebs like a guitar, to attract female spiders.

Fried spiders taste like nuts.

The largest spider ever was the Megarachne which had a diameter of 50 cm. The fossil was found in Argentina.

The bite from a black widow spider is not automatically fatal. In fact, less than 1% of all people bitten by this spider run the risk of dying, and most of them are saved with the use of antivenin.

The skeleton of a spider is located on the outside of the body.

Spiders usually have eight eyes, but still they cannot see that well.

There are about 34,000 species of spiders.

Spiders have claws at the ends of their legs.

Only the female black widow spider has a poisonous bite. The male spider's venom is not poisonous and it does not attack its prey.

Of the 35,000 species of spiders, only 27 species are known to have caused human fatalities.
Posted 28 Jan 2008

Ants don't sleep.

When the only queen ant dies, so does the entire colony, because no new workers are born.

The study of ants is called Myrmecology.

For every human in the world there are one million ants.

The brain of an ant has about 250,000 brain cells.

The sense of smell of an ant is just as good as a dog's is.

Ants can lift an object up to fifty times their body-weight and carry it over their heads. They don't do this with their feet, but with their mouths.

A leaf-cutter ant queen mates only once - just before establishing a new colony. She can then keep the sperm viable for up to 15 years and produce as many as 300 million offspring.



Posted 28 Jan 2008

Scientists have actually performed brain surgery on cockroaches.

German cockroaches can survive for up to one month without food and two weeks without water.

A cockroach can change directions up to 25 times in a second.

If a cockroach breaks a leg it can grow another one.

The earliest fossil cockroach is about 280 million years old – 80 million years older than the first dinosaurs!

Cockroach can live up to nine days without its head.
Posted 28 Jan 2008

Many insects can carry 50 times their own body weight.

If all the insects in the world were put on a scale, they would out weigh all creatures.

For more than 3,000 years, Carpenter ants have been used to close wounds in India, Asia and South America.

The longest insect is a walking stick that can reach a length of 33 centimeters.

The eggs of walking stick insects are among the largest in the insect world. Some eggs are more than eight millimeters long.

A scorpion can have up to 12 eyes.

A caterpillar grows roughly 27,000 times its size when it first emerges as an egg.

Locusts can eat their own weight in food in a day. A person eats his own body weight in about half a year.

Monarch caterpillars shed their skin four times before they become a chrysalis, growing over 2700 times their original size.

The common garden worm has five pairs of hearts.

About 80% of the Earth’s animals are insects!

There is only one insect that can turn its head -- the praying mantis.

A flea can jump 130 times its own height.

The fiddler crab can grow a new claw when it loses one of its own.

The Jungle Nymph Stick is one of the heaviest insects. In Malaysia they are often kept by people who feed them guava leaves and use the droppings to make tea.

Posted 28 Jan 2008

The male ladybug is usually smaller than the female.

During hibernation, ladybugs feed on their stored fat.

Ladybugs make a chemical that smells and tastes terrible so that birds and other predators won't eat them.

A female ladybug will lay more than 1000 eggs in her lifetime.

There are nearly 5,000 different kinds of ladybugs worldwide and 400 which live in North America.

Bed bugs prefer to hide in cracks and crevices during the daytime and come out to feed on the host's blood at night, usually while the host is sleeping.

The biggest bug in the world is the Goliath Beetle which can weigh up to 3.5 ounces and be 4.5 inches long.

Adult bed bugs are about 1/4-inch long and reddish-brown, with oval, flattened bodies.

Lady Bugs really are not bugs. They are actually beetles and their correct name is The Ladybird Beetle.

Related species, such as the bat bug and bird bug, prefer to feed on bats, birds, and other wild hosts, but will also feed on humans if the opportunity arises or the preferred host dies or leaves the roost.

The common bed bug, whose preferred host is humans, is rarely encountered, presumably because of improvements in sanitation.
Posted 28 Jan 2008


The heaviest insect in the world is the Goliath beetle from Africa. A big male can weigh up to 100 grams.

There are more than 300,000 species of beetles, making them the largest order of insects in the world.

The metallic-colored wing covers of some beetles are used for jewellery.

Posted 28 Jan 2008

A flea can jump 150 times its size. That is the same as a person able to jump up 1,000 feet in the air.

A dragonfly has a lifespan of for to seven weeks.

A housefly can only ingest liquid material. They regurgitate their food to liquefy the food that they are going to eat.

A house fly's feet are 10 million times more sensitive than a human tongue.

The amount of blood a female mosquito drinks per serving is five millionths of a liter.

Dragonflies can fly up to 50 miles per hour.

Only female mosquitoes bite humans. Male mosquitoes live on natural liquids from plants and other resources.

One of the most dangerous insect in the world is the common housefly. They carry and transmit more diseases than any other animal in the world.

Most fleas do not live past a year old.

The itch from a mosquito bite can be soothed by cutting open a clove of garlic and rubbing it on the bite.

Mosquitoes prefer children over adults.

Mosquitoes are attracted to the color blue more than any other color.

A mosquito flaps its wings 500 times a second.

The average life span of a mosquito is two weeks.

The Arctic tern flies an average of 22,000 miles a year!
Posted 28 Jan 2008

The lifespan of a firefly is about seven days. During these days, they are busy trying to find a mate.

Out of every 1,000 Mosquitoes, one female carries a disease that could be fatal to humans.

There are more than 2,400 flea species in the world.

There are approximately 2,700 different species of mosquitoes.

The dragonfly has not changed over the last 300 million years.

Some mosquitoes can beat their wings 600 times a second. A midge fly holds the record, with a wing beat of 1046 times a second.

The average housefly lives for one month.

The fastest known insect is a dragon fly that has been clocked at 58 kilometers an hour.

Flies can "taste" with their feet.
Posted 28 Jan 2008

Bats always turn left when they leave their caves.

Frog-eating bats identify edible frogs from poisonous ones by listening to the mating calls of male frogs. Frogs counter this by hiding and using short, difficult to locate calls.

Bats sleep during the day and feed at night. The place that bats sleep in is called the "roost."

Bats emit ultrasonic sounds to communicate with each other.

Bats always turn left when exiting a cave.

African heart-nosed bats can have such a keen sense of sound that they can hear the footsteps of a beetle walking on sand from six feet away.

Giant flying foxes, which are a type of bat, that live in Indonesia have wingspans of nearly six feet.

Vampire bat saliva has been responsible for many advances in research into stroke recovery.

The flying fox of Africa has a wingspan of fifty inches!

The flying fox is a bat with a wing span over five feet.

The world's smallest mammal is the bumblebee bat of Thailand, weighing less than a penny.
Posted 28 Jan 2008

A female ostrich shows remarkable ability to recognize her own eggs even when mixed in with those of other females in their communal nest.

Ostriches are so powerful that a single kick at a predator, such as a lion, could be fatal.

Ostriches stretch out their neck and lay their head on the ground to keep from being seen, hence the myth that ostriches hide in the sand.

Ostrich is the largest and heaviest living bird. It is unable to fly and does not posses a keeled sternum (breastbone) common to most birds.

Ostriches can run up to 70km/hr(40 mph) and can outpace most pursuers, such as lions, leopards, and hyenas.

Ostriches do not bury their head in the sand.

When fully grown an ostrich has one of the most advanced immune systems known to mankind.

Ostriches have the best feed to weight ratio gain of any land animal in the world. They are successfully farmed in at least 50 countries; from the coldest climates of Alaska to the equatorial areas of central Africa.

Ostriches are not an endangered species; there are at least 2 million worldwide.

Ostrich meat resembles beef in its appearance and is cooked almost the same way.

Ostrich meat is a red meat and is very low in cholesterol, calories and is almost fat free.

Ostriches produce the strongest commercially available leather in the world and some of the most beautiful feathers.

Ostriches skeletons and fossils have been found which date back over 120 million years; ostriches are a true dinosaur.

There are 3 main species of ostriches of which only one, the Struthio Camelus Domesticus (the African Black), is found in captivity.

Ostriches cannot fly.
Posted 28 Jan 2008

The ostrich is a member of the ratite family of birds.

One ostrich egg equals up to 24 chicken eggs. And it takes approximately 2 hours to boil!

The ostrich has two toes on each feet which gives it greater speed.

The fastest running bird is the Ostrich, which has been clocked at 97.5 kilometers per hour.

Ostriches stick their heads in the sand to look for water.

An ostrich's eye is bigger than its brain.

Ostriches stick their heads in the sand to look for water.

On ostrich's egg weighs 3 1/2 pounds.

The largest egg laid by a living bird is that of the North African Ostrich. It is 6 to 8 inches in length and 4 to 6 inches in diameter. The smallest is that of the hummingbird. It is less than 0.39 inches in diameter.
Posted 28 Jan 2008

Ducks were once wild until they were domesticated by the Chinese many hundreds of years ago.

Ducks keep clean by preening themselves with their beaks, which they do often. They also line their nests with feathers plucked from their chest.

Ducks' feathers are waterproof. There is a special gland that produces oil near the tail that spreads and covers the outer coat of feathers. Beneath this waterproof layer are fluffy and soft feathers to keep the duck warm.

Ducks provide us with eggs, meat and feathers.

Ducks' feet have no nerves or blood vessels. This means ducks never feel the cold, even if they swim in icy cold water.

A duck waddles instead of walking because of its webbed feet.

Ducks have webbed feet, which act like paddles.

Ducks can live from 2-12 years, depending on the species.

The duck is the smallest of them all and have shorter necks and wings and a stout body.

Ducks are related to geese and swans.

A male duck is called a drake, a female is called a duck. Babies are called ducklings.

All of the Peking ducks in the United States are descendents from three ducks and one drake imported to Long Island, New York in 1873.

A duck has three eyelids.

A duck's quack has no echo.

Some ducks and geese can fly as much as 332 miles a day!
Posted 28 Jan 2008

Hummingbirds cannot become addicted to the nectar you put out in your feeder. They will leave the feeders when they need to.

Hummingbirds eat both nectar and the small insects found near the nectar.

Although male hummers are more colorful than female hummers, female hummingbirds are relatively colorful.

Hummingbirds have split tongues, which they fold into a tube when feeding.

Normal flight speed for a hummingbird is 25 to 30 mph, but hummers can dive at speeds of up to 60 mph.

It takes hummingbird eggs two to 2 1/2 weeks to hatch.

Hummingbird eggs are so small that a penny would completely cover three of them. The usual brood, however, is two eggs.

Hummingbird nests average about 1-1/2 inches in outside diameter. A penny will almost fill the inside diameter.

Only ten species of hummers have significant ranges north of Mexico. Only the ruby-throated hummingbird ranges east of the Mississippi.

In the eighteenth century, when Swedish naturalist Carolus Linnaeus devised the scientific classification system still in use today (kingdom, phylum, class, order and family) hummingbirds were assigned their own family: Trochilidae, from the Greek trochilos, meaning small bird.

When early Spanish explorers encountered hummingbirds they called them Joyas voladoras, flying jewels.

Hummingbirds are native to South America.

Adult female Ruby-throated Hummingbirds are 15-20% larger than adult males.

The only bird that can fly backwards is the Hummingbird.

A hummingbird's heart beats 615 beats in a minute.
Posted 28 Jan 2008

Hummingbirds flap their wings between 50 and 70 times a second!
Posted 28 Jan 2008

Some species of the parrot have become endangered. Thousands are brought to Europe and North America as pets. Many of these die making this journey.

Parrots have a wide range of articulations. Wild parrots do not imitate. Only pets will mimic people and noises they hear. The African gray parrots are the best mimics.

Parrots are hole nesters. They build their nests in holes in trees, termite mounts, rock cavities, or ground tunnels. A few exceptions will build stick nests.

More than 90 percent of the parrots imported into the United States are probably wild caught.

It is thought that two million parrots alone are legally or illegally traded each year.
More than 1.8 million parrots legally entered the international trade from 1982-1988 of which 80 percent were imported into the United States.

Recent figures suggest that 40 percent of these species are threatened primarily by habitat destruction, 17 percent primarily by trade, 36 percent by a combination of the two causes and 7 percent by other factors.

At least 30 percent of the 140 parrot species found in the Western Hemisphere are now threatened with extinction.

An additional 25,000 parrots die of suffocation, starvation, inhumane treatment while being transported to the Texas border.

An estimated 25,000 wild parrots, caught or plucked from their nests in Mexico, are smuggled across the Texas border each year.

Every year, approximately 250,000 parrots are imported to the United States to satisfy a demand for exotic birds as pets.

It is estimated in the year 2000 there were 60 million birds in 6.13 million homes.

In 1990 there were 11 million pet birds living in 5.1 million households in the US
By 1996 the number of pet birds had grown to 40 million while the number of homes remained fairly consistent at 5.9 million.

In the wild, Macaws and Cockatoos can fly 500 miles per day in search of food!
Some parrot vocalizations can be heard for up to 1 mile!

Wild parrots live in the forest of tropical zones including South America, Australia, and New Guinea. A few live in Africa and mainland Asia.

Larger parrots such as the macaws and cockatoos live more than 75 years.
Posted 28 Jan 2008

Smaller parrots live 10 to 15 years.

Parrots have large heads and short necks.

Some American parrots are mostly blue or yellow.

Most parrots are predominantly green, especially the ones from South America.

Parrots weigh from just a few ounces to 3½ pounds.

Parrots range in size from the pygmy of the South Pacific which is only 3½ inches long to the hyacinth macaw which is about 10 inches long. Much of its length is in its long tail.

Parrots are divided into groups such as cockatoos, lories, lovebirds, macaws, and parakeets.

Three hundred and twenty-eight different species of parrots live on the Earth.

There are 315 species of parrot in the world.

Parrots cannot eat chocolate because it is poisonous to their body.
Posted 28 Jan 2008

The Barn Owls hearing is so highly developed that they can hunt for their prey in total darkness.

The world's smallest owl is the elf owl which weighs 1.5 ounces and is the size of a sparrow.

Owls swallow their prey hole because they have no teeth. After approximately 12 hours they cough up the feathers, bones, and fur in a shape of a football pellet.

Owls have no teeth.

Male owls weigh less and are smaller than female owls.
Posted 28 Jan 2008

The strike of the eagle talon is so powerful that it's force is twice that of a rifle bullet.

Whenever a Bald Eagle migrates south it always goes to the same spot and when it returns north it always goes back to the same spot.

Sub adult eagles that have not yet made a breeding territory are believed to wander more.

Adult eagles usually stay near their nesting territory as the supply of food and weather conditions will allow.

Bald Eagles are the national symbol of the United States

Eagles have great eyesight that helps them see for one to one and a half miles away. (Thus the term eagles eye) They can dive at 100 miles per hour. Their eyesight and diving ability help them catch food.

Bald Eagles help man by catching rodents and rabbits that destroy grain fields.

Bald Eagles can fly with 8 pounds of food.

Bald Eagles normally eat fish. Sometimes they will eat snakes and smaller birds.

There are approximately 7,000 feathers on an eagle.

Pound for pound, an eagle's wing is stronger than the wing of an airplane.

An eagle can kill a young deer and fly away with it.

An eagle's nest located in Maryland, USA reportedly weighed about 3,000 pounds.
Posted 28 Jan 2008

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