- Reaction score
- 9,422
Animals (='.'=)
- Thread starter Bastard Factory
- Start date
- Reaction score
- 5,056
- Location
- Los Santos
Heavy-duty snake. The name anaconda actually refers to the Eunectes genus, but it is most often used to refer to one species, the green or common anaconda. A member of the boa family, Boidae, South America’s green anaconda is the heaviest snake in the world, having the greatest girth in proportion to its length of any snake.
The green anaconda is normally some shade of brownish-green, olive, or grayish-green and patterned with egg-shaped black spots. The Beni or Bolivian anaconda is similar but is found only in a small region of Bolivia. The smaller yellow or Paraguayan anaconda has a pattern of blotches, saddles, spots, and streaks (usually black or dark brown) against a yellow, golden-tan, or greenish-yellow background. The dark-spotted anaconda is about the same size as the yellow anaconda and is brown with large dark spots.
The anaconda lives over a vast area of tropical river systems and swamps in South America, east of the Andes. This hot, humid region with its dense foliage offers excellent habitat for such a large snake, which fits well into this world. The anaconda likes to be in or near water and spends a large part of its time in the murky waters that help to hide, as well as support, its tremendous body.
Anacondas are excellent swimmers and divers. Their eyes and nasal openings are on top of their head, so the snakes can wait for prey while remaining nearly hidden by the water. Anacondas rest and sun themselves along the bank of a river or in tree branches that hang over water along riverbanks so the snakes can quickly drop into the water if needed.The diet consists of wild pigs, deer, birds, turtles, capybaras, caimans, and even jaguars. They are not very active hunters but instead use a “watch and wait” approach as their prey swims by or comes to the water to drink.
Like its boa brethren, the anaconda kills its prey by coiling its muscular body around the creature and squeezing until the prey can no longer breathe. Jaws attached by stretchy ligaments allow the snake to swallow its prey whole. The anaconda often takes its meal into the water, where perhaps the buoyancy helps maneuver the food to the proper position for swallowing. Anacondas can go weeks or months without eating following a big meal.
At the San Diego Zoo, anacondas eat pre-killed rodents and rabbits.
*Please click the green link for further info.
- Reaction score
- 5,056
- Location
- Los Santos
If its size doesn’t give it away, the snapping turtle’s long, serrated, crocodilian tail surely will. Because they can’t pull their heads or limbs into their shells, the snapping turtle can become defensive on land, using its sharp beak and strong jaws to injure attackers.
These omnivores feed on various aquatic plants and invertebrates, as well as fish, frogs, snakes, small turtles, aquatic birds and dead animals (so long as they are relatively fresh). Snapping turtles spend much of their lives in the water, although they are not particularly good swimmers. If you spot one on land in spring or early summer, chances are it’s a female searching for a site to lay her eggs.
Snapping turtles usually live in slow-moving water with a soft mud or sand bottom and lots of vegetation. They prefer shallow water so they can hide under the mud and leaves, with only their noses exposed to the surface to breathe. Snapping turtles often take advantage of artificial structures for nest sites, including gravel shoulders along roads, dams and gravel pits.
Snapping turtle populations are very vulnerable to threats such as hunting, poaching and being hit by vehicles. Since they can take nearly 20 years to reach maturity, removing even a few adult snapping turtles can pose a serious threat to the population. Another threat is loss of habitat due to agriculture, housing and road development. Nests are also vulnerable to human-subsidized predators, such as raccoons, whose numbers are artificially inflated by access to human garbage, crops and other food sources.
Finally, snapping turtles can accumulate many toxins from the surrounding environment over the course of their 70-year lifespan, affecting their health and ability to reproduce. Habitat loss and fragmentation are the main reasons driving species decline, as shortgrass prairie habitats are converted to crop production. Efforts by farmers to reduce the numbers of ground squirrels, prairie dogs and insects means there are fewer burrows available for nesting and less prey to feed on. Moreover, the use of pesticides to eliminate insects, ground squirrels and foxes can poison owls when they eat the carcasses. Of particular concern is the use of Carbofuran, a potent insecticide used to control grasshoppers, one of the owls’ primary food sources. Badgers, foxes, skunks, weasels and snakes can also greatly reduce nesting success by preying on eggs and young, while coyotes and red-tailed hawks prey on adults.
*Please click the green link for further info.
- Reaction score
- 5,056
- Location
- Los Santos
The Great Horned Owl Bubo virginianus is one of Canada’s commonest large birds of prey. The most notable physical attributes are its large size and prominent ear tufts or "horns." A predator that hunts at night, this owl has enormous yellow eyes set in a broad face, a curved beak and claws, and long fluffy feathers. Its coloration tends mainly toward brown or grey-brown, with conspicuous barring. Very dark races occur in British Columbia and Labrador, whereas extreme whiteness is seen in Great Horned Owls from the Northwest Territories and northern sections of the Prairie provinces. As is the general case with hawks and owls, the female Great Horned Owl is considerably larger than the male, averaging about 2 kg to the male’s 1 to 1.5 kg, with a wingspan of about 1.2 m. The only larger owl is the Snowy Owl, a winter migrant to southern Canada, whose maximum weight approaches 3 kg.
*Please click the green link for further info.
- Reaction score
- 5,056
- Location
- Los Santos
Blue whales are the largest animals ever to live on our planet. They feed almost exclusively on krill, straining huge volumes of ocean water through their baleen plates (which hang from the roof of the mouth and work like a sieve). Some of the biggest individuals may eat up to 6 tons of krill a day.
Blue whales are found in all oceans except the Arctic Ocean. There are five currently recognized subspecies of blue whales.
The number of blue whales today is only a small fraction of what it was before modern commercial whaling significantly reduced their numbers during the early 1900s, but populations are increasing globally. The primary threats blue whales currently face are vessel strikes and entanglements in fishing gear.
NOAA Fisheries and its partners are dedicated to conserving and rebuilding blue whale populations worldwide. We use a variety of innovative techniques to study, protect, and rescue these endangered animals. We engage our partners as we develop regulations and management plans that foster healthy fisheries and reduce the risk of entanglements, create whale-safe shipping practices, and reduce ocean noise.Blue whales sometimes swim in small groups but are more often found alone or in pairs. They generally spend summers feeding in polar waters and undertake lengthy migrations towards the equatorial waters as winter arrives.
Blue whales typically swim at about 5 miles an hour while they are feeding and traveling, but can accelerate to more than 20 miles an hour for short bursts. They are among the loudest animals on the planet, emitting a series of pulses, groans, and moans, and it is thought that in the right oceanographic conditions, sounds emitted by blue whales can be heard by other whales up to 1,000 miles away. Scientists think they use these vocalizations to communicate and—along with their excellent hearing—perhaps to sonar-navigate the dark ocean depths.
The primary diet of blue whales is krill—tiny shrimp-like animals, but fish and copepods (tiny crustaceans) may occasionally be part of the blue whale’s diet. When blue whales hunt for food, they filter feed by swimming toward large schools of krill with their mouth open and closing their mouths around the krill while inflating their throat pleats. Once closed, blue whales then push the trapped water out of their mouth with their tongue and use their baleen plates to keep the krill trapped inside.
*Please click the green link for further info.
Similar threads
