There are a lot of misconceptions, as well as true information when it comes to the world of animals. Some facts are just that-facts. While others are just plain wrong. Here’s a list of the usual “facts” and misconceptions that people always say about our feather, fury, and scaly friends. See if you can figure out which ones are true and which ones are false.
*Sloths are lazy: False: Despite the fact that sloths in captivity do sleep for about sixteen hours ever day, wild sloths don’t normally sleep over ten hours. The rest of their day is spent foraging for food and just trying to stay alive.
*Vultures smell fowl: False: Researchers have found that even though the meals of vultures might reek, the birds themselves actually smell pretty good. Yes, someone actually smelt a vulture, and that someone was Bill Lynch, president of the Turkey Vulture Society, who claims that vultures have a “sweet” aroma about them. And the director of Stillman Nature Center in South Barrington, Mark Spreyer, can back Lynch up, explaining that they smell great thanks to their bald heads. They sit in the sun,” Spreyer says, “and let the ultraviolet light kill any bacteria they might have picked up from their last meal.
*Buffalo once roamed the Great Plains in the millions:True and False: This one was a trick question. Yes, back in the day, millions upon millions (about 40 to 50, though some experts believe it could have been closer to 90 million) bison once thundered over the Great Plains. But the common misconception about this beast has to do with the name: they are bison, not buffalo.
*Elephants never forget:True: Elephants do have great memories, this in credit to their large brains. Because these animals must survive against so many different dangers in the world, including predators like lions and humans, and other natural threats such as droughts, they must be equipped with this large brain, thus their skill to recall places, times, and certain events. Also, because they live with such strong family bonds, they need to be able to tell the difference between each individual in the family, particularly the matriarch who is responsible for leading the maternal herd. The Zoological Society of London as well as the Wildlife Conservation Society both constructed a study in 2008, examining the rate of mortality of elephants during a drought in Tanzania’s Tarangine National Park. During the study they discovered that matriarchs who had led their herds out of the park had a much better survival rate than those who stayed put. The researchers came to the conclusion that it was because of the youth of the remaining elephants, who had been too young to remember a devastating drought that had taken place thirty-five years earlier. Thankfully for the others, the matriarchs had been able to recall the previous drought and the consequences that could occur if they stayed in the park.
*Camel spiders are fierce and fast, they can actually move up to 30 MPH:False: The fastest that a camel spider has ever been able to reach is 10 MPH which, if you think about it, is pretty darn fast for an animal that normally reaches no more than eight inches in length, despite the horror stories of monster-sized arachnids.
*Dominant males always win mates: False: There have been many different incidents throughout the world where male animals had been able to win mates for themselves, including males who were not at all that aggressive. One example is when a biologist at the University of California had discovered that female fruit flies don’t always choose the most powerful males. Another example is from the popular documentary Life from Discovery Channel and BBC, where a male cuttlefish had been able to use brain over bronze. Because he was too small to fight the powerful rival, he merely pretended he was female, and took the other fish’s mate when he wasn’t looking. This was actually a win-win situation for the female, who had been able to lay eggs with the genes of both the powerful stud, and the sly and clever male.
*Before getting a dog spayed, you should let her go into heat and have at least one litter first: False: There is absolutely no evidence that letting a female dog have a litter before getting spayed is at all beneficial. Actually, veterinarians and shelters will advise you to fix your dog the second they are old enough. If you’ve ever been to the humane society or any sort of shelter, you would know why it’s best to get your pup fixed as soon as possible. High populations of animals are overwhelming shelters, thus leading to euthanasia
*Owls are wise:False: Despite the reputation of the owl being one of the wisest creatures of the forest, this couldn’t be further from the truth; they are actually considered one of the dumbest birds, and have brains smaller than their own eyes.
*Chickens are dumb: False: Chickens are one of the smartest animals of the bird family. They have been proven to worry and think about the future, according to a study conducted by the Biophysics Group at Silsoe Research Institute of England. Other studies have discovered that the way the neurons are organized in the brain of the chicken is similar to the way humans’ brains are constructed. In other words, these birds have evolved to a complex level of intelligence.
*Goldfish forget things in two seconds: False: In Australia, a high-school student had trained his pet goldfish to recognize when it was about to be fed using a red Lego. The fish would retain the information for up to a week.
*Bats are blind:False: When people first discovered bats, they might have dubbed these creatures as “blind” because of the way they zoomed around the night sky. The thing is, they’re hunting insects that are zooming about, too. And though bats are blind during their birth, they usually gain reasonable eyesight by the time they are seven days of age. Despite the fact that they aren’t blind, they still hunt at night, so they need some “help” like other nocturnal animals, who do actually possess sharper vision than bats like cats and owls. This is where echolocation comes in handy.
*A cat will always land on its four legs : False: Of course felines are stealthy and can climb high with great balance, and land quite nicely; however, this does not mean that a cat won’t sometimes suffer a bad fall. When this happens, it’s called “High Rise Syndrome.”
*The lion is the “king of the jungle”: False: Lions are awesome and mighty creatures, but a title that would suit them better would be the “king of the savannah,” which is where they live-not the jungle.
*The saliva of a dog is sterile : False : A dog’s mouth is actually filled with bacteria, and doing something such as licking a wound can delay the healing process or even lead to infection.
*Roosters crow only in the morning: False: Roosters crow to help ward off predators, and they will do this whenever they’re threatened … or whenever they just feel like it, which is basically any time of day or night.
Granted all but one of these were false, but over the years people have come up with common misconceptions about animals that are just simply not true, and sometimes it’s more interesting to find out what’s actually fact over fiction.
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Sources:
Animal Planet (www.animal.discovery.com)
Pets 911 (www.pets911.com)
Chicago Wilderness Magazine (www.chicagowildernessmagazine.com)
Camel Spider (www.camelspiders.net)
