It’s finally spring (despite the fact that as I write this there’s as much snow on the ground as there has been all winter) and that means that many lucky creatures are just now waking up from their long winter sleep. Deep in burrows or caves, various ground squirrels, marmots, woodchucks, shrews, hedgehogs and bats …
Tag: animals
Bats
In medieval paintings, both angels and demons have wings–but angels have birds’ wings, and demons have bats’ wings. Bats have suffered a serious image problem throughout most of western history. (They fare better in the Orient, where they are often considered a symbol of good luck.) It’s probably got a lot to do with their …
Locomotion
Walking, crawling, hopping, slithering, creeping, gliding, leaping–the ways animals (and people) get from place to place are endlessly diverse. This ability to move is one of the main differences between most animals and most plants, and has a definite survival value, because when the glaciers start pushing south or food or water fails, species that …
Snakes
There are few creatures that evoke such violent reactions from people as snakes. Some people are fascinated by them; at lot more are terrified by them. However you feel about them, I hope you’ll at least agree they’re interesting, because they’re what I want to talk about this week. Here at the Saskatchewan Science …
Luminescence
Glow, little glow-worm, shimmer, shimmer . . . Have you ever wondered why glow-worms shimmer? Probably not, especially if, like me, you wouldn’t know a glow-worm from a tapeworm and wouldn’t care to meet either one. But maybe you’ve seen fireflies dancing in the dark, or, on a more practical note, been thankful for the …