Innholdsfortegnelse for May/June 2016 i Ask Science and Arts Magazine for Kids and Children

Life can be hard out in the wild. Animals sometimes break bones or get cuts and bruises. They’re attacked by blood-sucking parasites and disease-causing germs. Sometimes they eat poisonous plants or bad food. Yet wild animals stay pretty healthy. How do they do it? Here are some of their tricks. Tip #1 Spit on It Have you ever seen your dog or cat lick its wounds? Why do they do it? It probably feels good, but it’s good medicine too. Licking cleans a wound, and saliva contains chemicals that kill germs. For many animals in the wild, spit is great medicine for cuts and scrapes. Even a human being will suck on a cut finger. Now you know why. Tip #2 Keep It Clean To avoid disease, many animals practice…

With keepers to feed them, vets to cure them, and no predators to eat them, animals in a zoo usually live much longer than animals in the wild. Zoo life is safe, but it can also be boring. In the wild, survival is a full-time job, what with finding food, taking care of babies, and steering clear of all the things that might want to eat you. Compared with their wild cousins, says one zoo veterinarian, zoo animals are unemployed. Scientists observing animals in their natural environments realized that some zoo animals were doing all sorts of unnatural things those species don’t do in the wild. Tigers paced back and forth endlessly. Elephants bobbed their heads up and down. Gorillas vomited up food then ate it again. Monkeys groomed to…

Ms. Polly Proper Dear Polly, I have an appointment with a wrasse to have my gills cleaned. From what I’ve heard, I have to dance first. But I’m such a klutz! I’m terrified I’ll look like a clown fish. Two Left Fins in the Indian Ocean Dear Lefty, The wrasse wriggles to show he’s open for business. Then you shake your fins to let him know you’re there to get clean and not to get a meal. If you don’t dance, there isn’t a wrasse in the sea who would dare get near your teeth. I suggest you learn a basic fin-head-fin-tail step, in the interests of hygiene. Happy Dancing! Polly Dear Polly, I recently picked up a few hitchhiking fleas. Ever since, I’ve been feeling sick, weak, and itchy.…

Little lost elephants may not be common in your neighborhood, but they are in Kenya in East Africa. And the best thing to do there is call the David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust. They’ve been rescuing orphan elephants and successfully reintroducing them to the wild since 1977. Raising a baby elephant is a big responsibility. Like people, healthy elephants can live 70 years or more. And when young, they need a lot of care. Babies two years and younger need almost constant attention. After that, young elephants begin doing some things on their own but still need to be with their families. Teenagers are more independent, but elephants aren’t considered fully adult until they’re over 30 years old. So taking in a stray elephant is a longterm commitment. It’s hard work…

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