Innholdsfortegnelse for April 2017 i National Geographic Kids

Scientists gave species a new of peacock spider the nickname Sparklemuffin. A HONEYBEE HAS THE SAME NUMBER OF HAIRS AS A SQUIRREL: 3 MILLION. THE SUN HAS HOLES IN IT. SNAILS SMELL WITH THEIR LIPS. AN ELEPHANT’S TOOTH IS THE SIZE OF A BRICK. A MUSEUM IN OREGON HAS A COLLECTION OF 300 VACUUMS. There are approximately trillion (3,000,000,000,000) trees on Earth. SCIENTISTS HAVE DISCOVERED A PROTEIN THAT CAN PREVENT ICE CREAM FROM MELTING QUICKLY IN HOT WEATHER. THE PHILTRUM IS THE GROOVE BETWEEN THE TOP OF YOUR UPPER LIP AND THE BOTTOM OF YOUR NOSE. GET MORE!…

PLASMA PLANET Planet Gliese 1214b appears in front of the windshield of your spacecraft. The murky brownish-black world is encircled by smog so thick that scientists haven’t been able to observe the surface of the planet underneath. You’ll be the first person to see it. You dip the nose of your spacecraft down and dive through the haze, squinting your eyes to peer through the mist. As the planet comes into view, you’re surprised to see that Gliese 1214b is made of water. But that doesn’t mean it’s covered with lakes and oceans. Instead, the extreme 450°F heat here turns the water into dark steam. Your windshield fogs up in the hot and muggy conditions. Since this planet doesn’t have a solid surface, you can dive right inside it. As…

1919 The grandson of a slave, Jackie Robinson is born in Cairo, Georgia. He attends the University of California in Los Angeles, or UCLA, where he becomes the first athlete to letter in four sports: baseball, basketball, football, and track. He definitely wins points for that. 1942 At the age of 23, Robinson is hired to play semipro football in Hawaii but is soon drafted into the U.S. Army to fight in World War II. 1945 After the war, Robinson plays a season of professional baseball for the Kansas City Monarchs in the Negro Leagues, an organization made up of African-American players. He finishes the year as the league’s batting champion. 1946 Brooklyn Dodgers general manager Branch Rickey asks Robinson to play for his team. Robinson says yes, making him…

These may be some of the most bizarre stories you’ve ever read—but only three of them are actually true. Can you tell the difference between the real-life headlines and the phony-balonies? ANSWERS ON PAGE 39 1 COUNTRIES BATTLE OVER BIRD POOP CHINCHA ISLANDS, PACIFIC OCEAN Battles have been fought over many things: taxes, oil, spices … poop? Yep. A two-year battle over islands covered in bird poop, or guano, broke out between Peru and Spain during the 1860s. Why the fuss over feces? At the time, guano was in high demand as a fertilizer. And it turns out the dry climate of the Chincha Islands in the Pacific Ocean preserves the guano left by seafaring birds. In fact some guano piles reportedly stood 150 feet tall! Spain wanted to…

1 You just ate the last of the chocolate-chip ice cream in your freezer. What do you do with the container? A. Toss it in the trash can. B. Rinse it out and throw it in the recycling bin. C. Clean it and stash it away for a future art project. 2 Yuck. A couple of your bananas have gone brown. What do you do with them? A. Throw them away. Nothing’s worse than mushy fruit. B. Cut out the brown parts and eat what you can. C. Make a smoothie with them and add the peels to your compost bin. 3 It’s the end of the school year and your backpack is filled with old worksheets. What will you do with them? A. Dump the entire contents of your…

MAGIC SHOW These photos show close-up views of magic trick props. Unscramble the letters to identify what’s in each picture. Bonus: Use the highlighted letters to solve the puzzle below. ANSWERS ON PAGE 39 HINT: What do you call an owl that can do magic tricks? CHECK OUT THIS BOOK!…

Can you believe everything you read? Not always. Sometimes it’s hard to tell the difference between real-life headlines and made-up ones—especially on the Internet. And some people are trying to trick you on purpose. Follow these tips for sniffing out fake news. Does the story come from a newspaper, magazine, or website you’ve never heard of? “Well-known news sources aren’t likely to try to fool you,” says Eric Carvin, social media editor for the Associated Press. “If you haven’t heard of a publication, do some research on how trustworthy they are before you take what they say as fact. Have they been accused of publishing fake news before? Then they may not be reliable.” Is just one newspaper, magazine, or website reporting on the story? “If a story is real,…

DEAR MAX, I get freaked out at night because I hate not being able to see what’s going on. How can I get over it and just get to sleep? SINCERELY, SLEEPY Dear Sleepy, You know what’s scarier than a dark bedroom? A dark ocean. With predators. No wonder Adélie penguins often hunt for krill and fish in Antarctica during the day, even though they can see just fine in the dark. Why? The leopard seal is a penguin predator and active at night. So the birds find dinner while the seals are resting. Luckily you’re safe in your bed without one single leopard seal (or monster) hiding in the closet. But you can always crack the door with the hall light on or flick on a night-light. Then—unlike a…

TOWER OF CRATES My, what a strong ... chin ... you have? Sun Chaoyang holds the record for the heaviest stack of bottle crates stacked on the chin. Weighing nearly a hundred pounds, the tower of crates was stacked onto Sun’s chin during his live attempt of the challenge for a TV show filmed in Beijing, China. His record brings new meaning to the phrase “Keep your chin up.” ROBOT RIDES CAMELS Horse jockeys, beware: Kamel the robot races camels at nearly 25 miles an hour, the fastest robot on record to ride a camel. Camel racing is a sport in some Arab countries but is dangerous for human riders. So robots do the job. Controlled remotely by people following in cars, Kamel and his fellow robots tighten or loosen…

Humans aren’t the only ones who play tricks. Using their stealth and smarts, some animals can fool other critters—and even people. Think we’re messing with you? Read these stories of animal antics to see for yourself. APING HUMANS Keepers at the Cologne Zoo in Cologne, Germany, were prepping breakfast for the orangutans one morning when a surprising noise emerged from the apes’ enclosure. It sounded like a babbling human. Had a visitor somehow gotten into the area? The keepers went to investigate and discovered what was really making the humanlike noise—a female orangutan named Tilda! The ape had figured out how to imitate the rhythm of human speech. “Tilda really grabbed the keepers’ attention,” exhibit curator Alexander Sliwa says. And that’s exactly what she wanted. “She makes these sounds when…

Seeing someone who appears to be walking on a cloud might sound like a dream. But this surreal scene exists—and it isn’t just in your head. It’s a spot in the South American country of Bolivia called the Salar de Uyuni (Sah-LAR DAY Uh-YOO-nee). The walking-on-air effect is actually caused by something totally ordinary: a reflection in a rain puddle. What’s special about the salar— Spanish for salt flat—is that this thin pool stretches for miles, creating a seemingly endless natural mirror. And this astounding optical illusion is just one of the things that makes the Salar de Uyuni so bizarre. HIGH AND DRY The salar is more than two miles above sea level in the Andes Mountains in a region called the Altiplano, Spanish for high plain. Some 40,000…