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01
"Bat toes are specially designed to relax in a locked position. This means that when bats are clinging on to the roof of a cave or tree, they are actually relaxing their feet. It takes energy to release their grip and open up their little toes before taking off to fly in the night"
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02
"This is the astounding 'Babysitter' bone bed containing multiple, exceptionally preserved baby Psittacosaurus dinosaurs. What was most astonishing was that the larger animal wasn't sexually mature, meaning it wasn't the parent, suggesting communal child-rearing behavior, hence the find's name."
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03
"When you tickle rats, they laugh. Their voices are so high-pitched that you need special equipment to hear them, but once you do, you can hear their laughter right away."
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04
"Arctic Foxes Are 'Ecosystem Engineers' Who Grow Beautiful Gardens. Organic waste from the foxes & their kills make the area surrounding their dens more fertile, leading to almost three times as many dune grasses, willows & wildflowers to sprout up, compared to the rest of the tundra."
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05
"Hippos were thought to 'sweat blood'. A thick red substance containing hipposudoric acid, which is red, and norhipposudoric acid, which is orange oozes from glands over its skin helping to control body temperature , and acting as a sunscreen and antibiotic."
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06
"Black-footed ferrets are among the most endangered and rarest mammals native to North America. In fact, the species was declared extinct in 1979, however, in 1981 a residual wild population was discovered in Wyoming. This ferret, born in 2020, was the first ever U.S. endangered animal to be cloned."
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07
"Polar Bears are born with Pink Tongues, which after a few months turn a darker Blue/Black color. (Photo Credit: Rick Little - Instagram)"
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08
"The tufted coquette is a hummingbird that breeds in eastern Venezuela, Trinidad, Guiana, and northern Brazil. The male, pictured here, has a rufous head crest and a coppery green back with a whitish rump band that is prominent in flight. Tufted coquettes are known for being quite approachable."
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09
"European bee eaters are richly colored birds native to Europe, western Asia and Africa. They usually live in colonies and prefer to have close contact with each other, often huddling together on a common perch in groups like this for comfort and warmth."
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10
"The Chrysilla volupe is a species of spider native to India, Sri Lanka, Nepal and Bhutan. The male has purple and golden iridescent scales on its legs, and its body has red, orange and iridescent blue coloration. Here is a male Chrysilla volupe on a leaf in India."
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11
"Although zebras have black skin, they typically have more white hair than dark. Each hair grows from a follicle comprised of melanocyte cells, however, the follicles that make up the stripes of white hair in zebras have "turned off" melanocytes. This foal is an exception: brown fur and white spots."
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12
"The hummingbird clearwing is a type of sphinx moth that can be easily confused with a hummingbird as they both feed on flower nectar in a rather stationary position while rapidly beating their wings. One tell-tale difference though is that the moths are typically about half the size of hummingbirds."
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13
"The American kestrel, North America's smallest falcon, is a fierce predator that used its notched beak to sever the spine of prey [OC]"
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14
"Tefflus is a genus name of African ground beetles in the Carabidae family which have distinctive longitudinal carinae (ridges) on their abdomens. One particular subspecies found in southern Africa, Tefflus carinatus violaceus, has remarkable coloration and ornate patterning."
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15
"The Egyptian Mau is a short-haired cat breed, and it is one of the few naturally spotted breeds of domesticated cat. Egyptian Maus are known for being among the fastest of the domestic cat breeds owing to their long hind legs. The adult cats have green eyes, but kittens tend to have amber eyes."
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16
"Chrysochroa fulgidissima is an iridescent species of beetle popularly called a "jewel beetle", and it is native to Japan and Korea. It is known as Yamato tamamushi in Japanese (???????). Properly, it is a metallic woodboring beetle of the family Buprestidae."
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17
"The term "black panther" is an umbrella term that refers to the 14 species of wildcat that can have melanism.Dark fur provides them great nighttime camouflage, but may impair visual communication between melanistic cats."
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18
"Big Bertha is the oldest cow to have lived. She died just 3 months short of her 49th birthday. In her lifetime, she managed to have 39 calves, and helped raise thousands of euros for charity!"
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