300 Fascinating Animal Facts

Here are 300 Fascinating Facts about Animals

The slowest fish is the sea horse, which moves along at about 0.01 mph (0.016 km/h).
Millions of trees are accidentally planted by squirrels that bury nuts and then forget where they hid them.
The lifespan of a bush baby is 14 years.
Some lions mate over 50 times a day.
The Big Five is a group of animals of Africa: cape buffalo, elephant, leopard, lion and rhino.
There are no ants in Iceland, Greenland, and Antarctica.
Before they’re even born, sand tiger sharks eat their twin brothers and sisters!
Jellyfish evaporate in the sun. They’re 98% water.
A rooster is simply a male chicken.
Pikachu is a mouse-type Pokémon.
There’s a spider in Brazil whose bites can cause an erection that lasts for hours!
The swan has over 25,000 feathers on its body.
African elephants have bigger ears than Indian elephants.
There is no record of a human being attacked by a healthy wolf.
Hummingbirds are the only birds who can fly backward.
Dolphins can eat up to 30 pounds of fish a day.
Moose have very poor vision. Some have even tried to mate with cars.
A full-grown bear can run as fast as a horse.
Hyenas regularly eat the feces of other animals.
Frogs cannot swallow without blinking.
A giraffe has the same number of bones in its neck as a man.
Tiger Day is the last Sunday in September.
There is no visual difference between male and female herons.
Heron’s eggs have a greenish-blue pale color.
You are more likely to be killed by a champagne cork than by a poisonous spider.
All dolphins have a different whistle.
Scientists had to go 45 million years back in history to find the elephant’s oldest ancestor.
Female harp seals get in groups to have their babies once mating season is over.
When giraffes age, their fur darkens.
A group of frogs is called an army.
Tigers can see 6 times better at night than humans.
Starfish don’t die of old age.
A male gorilla can eat 40 pounds of food a day.
A group of whales is called a pod.
Both male and female caribou grow antlers.
Alternate American names for the Elk are the moose and the Wapiti.
The scales of a crocodile are made of keratin, the same substance that hooves and fingernails are made of.
Crocodiles eat stones.
Crocodiles have brains no larger than a cigar.
Cheetahs were trained by men for hunting as long as 3000 BC.
Horses can’t vomit.
African elephants only have four teeth to chew their food with.
The Catholic church once declared that beavers can be eaten on meat-free Fridays, as they’re semi-aquatic.
Apiphobia is the fear of bees.
The average dolphin eats one-third of its weight on food each day.
Goats and octopus’ pupils of their eyes are rectangular.
There are approximately 450 million goats around the world.
Dalmatians are completely white at birth.
Suriphobia is the fear of mice.
There are over 210 breeds of goats in the world.
A polar bear’s outer fur is called ‘guard hair’.
An adult lion’s roar is so loud; it can be heard up to five miles away.
There is a shark called ‘goblin shark’ which has only been seen around 50 times since its discovery in 1897.
Frogs don’t drink water. They absorb water through their skin.
The male goat is called a “buck” or “billy”.
The female goat is called a “doe” or “nanny”.
A baby goat is called a “kid”.
Dog nose prints are as unique as human fingerprints and can be used to identify them.
Ailurophobia is the fear of cats.
Ichthyophobia is the fear of fish.
Female bald eagles are 25% larger than males.
There are an estimated 400 million dogs in the world.
Goats were the first animals to be used for milk by humans.
The U.S. has the highest dog population in the world. France has the second-highest.
There are over 2700 types of snakes in the world and they live in deserts, forests, oceans, streams, lakes.
Cows from different areas have a different moo accent.
It costs approximately $10,000 to train a federally certified search and rescue dog.
The color red doesn’t really make bulls angry; they are color-blind.
A herd of unicorns is called a blessing.
The oldest recorded elephant lived for 82 years.
According to records, there are 50 million monkeys in the world!
Goats are quite agile creatures and in some cases, they can jump over 5 feet.
In 2006, 253 fish species were listed as critically endangered.
The hippopotamus’s skin is protected by its own pink oily secretion known as ‘pink sweat’.
The Tyrannosaurus Rex went extinct 65 million years ago.
The Irish deer is the largest deer to have ever existed. It went into extinction approximately 7,700 years ago.
National Dance Like A Chicken Day falls on May 14th every year.
The sailfish can swim at the speed of 109 km/h, making it the fastest swimmer.
The crocodile’s tongue is unmovable, as it is attached to the roof of its mouth.
Greyhounds are the fastest dogs on Earth and can run at speeds of 45 mph.
The Basenji is the world’s only bark-less dog.
Denmark has twice as many pigs as there are people.
Dogs can see in color, though they most likely see colors similar to a color-blind human.
Dogs have lived with humans for over 14,000 years.
There are 3,000 kinds of lice in the world.
The life of a housefly is only 14 days.
The lifespan of 75% of wild birds is 6 months.
If you have a fear of chickens, then you actually have Alektorophobia.
A puppy is born blind, deaf, and toothless.
Agrizoophobia is the fear of wild animals.
There are currently over a million animal species on planet earth.
There are over 70,000 types of spiders spinning their webs in the world.
The owl has a small brain.
Snakes do not blink.
A squid’s eye can get as big as a basketball.
A chicken with red ear lobes will produce brown eggs, and a chicken with white ear lobes will produce white eggs.
One survey reports that 33 percent of dog owners admit they talk to their dogs on the phone or leave messages on answering machines while they are away.
The average dog can run about 19 mph.
China has the most goats in the world, they have over 170 Million.
There is only one pink bottlenose dolphin that has been discovered, in an inland lake in Louisiana, USA.
Three dogs were among the Titanic survivors.
Many species of owls have special feathers for flying silently.
An elephant can smell water up to 3 miles away.
The animal on the Firefox logo is not a fox, but a red panda.
Dumbledore isn’t only the Headmaster of Hogwarts; in fact, a dumbledore is an old English term for a type of bee.
Most young fireflies feed on nectar and pollen, although adult fireflies do not need to eat to survive.
79% of pet owners sleep with their pets.
Dogs can see better when the light is low.
In general, Asiatic jerboas have five toes on their back feet and African jerboas have three.
Even though a polar bear’s average body temperature is 37°C; they don’t give off any detectable heat, so they won’t show up in infrared photographs.
Dik-diks weigh between three and six kilograms.
Female polar bears normally start having baby cubs at the age of four or five.
Fireflies are also known as lightning bugs.
Noctule bats fly before sunset, whereas Pipistrelles appear soon after sunset.
Yellowtail is the general name for loads of different species of fish that have yellow tails or a yellow body.
There are roughly twenty-four thousand species of butterflies.
A dik-dik is a tiny antelope that lives in East Africa, Namibia, and Angola.
Hippos attract mates by urinating and defecating.
Butterflies can only see the colors red, green, and yellow.
Dogs are about as smart as a two or three-year-old child.
Butterflies have their skeletons on the outside of their bodies, this is known as the exoskeleton.
Arachnophobia is the fear of spiders.
Polar bears are the world’s largest land predators.
A cheetahs lifespan is up to 12 years in the wild.
Shark corneas are being used in human eye transplants.
Cats have over one hundred vocal sounds, while dogs only have about ten.
Cat owners are 30% less likely to suffer a heart attack.
Barn owls hunt mostly small mammals such as the short-tailed vole.
A ducks quack does echo, it’s just almost impossible to hear.
Baby whales can gain up to 200 pounds per day.
Dogs have a wet nose to collect more of the tiny droplets of smelling chemicals in the air.
Giraffe hearts pump twice as hard as a cow’s to get blood to its brain.
Blue whales have large enough aortas (the main blood vessel) for a human to crawl through.
Some dogs can smell dead bodies under water!
More than 45 million turkeys are cooked and eaten in the US at Thanksgiving.
Bumblebees have hair on their eyes.
Penguins can jump 6 feet out of water.
Goats do not have teeth in their upper front jaw.
Goat’s milk is higher in calcium, vitamin A and niacin than cow’s milk.
Turkeys have a poor sense of smell, but excellent sense of taste.
Cats can hear ultrasound.
Tuna fish can swim 40 miles in a single day.
Baby whales grow to a 1/3 of their mother’s length in the womb.
When a male tiger and female lion mate they make a tigon, when a male lion and female tiger mate they make a liger.
French poodles did not originate in France – they came from Germany.
The breeding age for male goats is between 8-10 months.
Elephants don’t drink through their trunks like a straw.
Back in 1924, a monkey was convicted in South Bend of the crime of smoking a cigarette and sentenced to pay a 25 dollar fine!
Flamingos are pink because shrimp is one of their main sources of food.
The Mayans and Aztecs symbolised every tenth day with the dog, and those born under this sign were believed to have outstanding leadership skills.
After eating, a housefly regurgitates its food and then eats it again.
A mole can dig a tunnel 300 feet long in just one night.
The blue whale is the largest of all whales and is also considered the largest animal to have ever existed in the world.
Giraffes have no vocal cords.
Starfish have five eyes – one at the end of each leg.
There are almost 60 million dogs in the United States.
In the Caribbean there are oysters that can climb trees.
The swan has over 25,000 feathers in its body.
The sperm whale is the loudest animal. Their clicks have been measured at 230 dB.
Hippo’s sweat is pink.
Whale milk is 50% fat.
In Croatia, scientists discovered that lampposts were falling down because a chemical in the urine of male dogs was rotting the metal.
Approximately 100 people die each year when they are stepped on by cows.
A group of butterflies is known as a flutter.
Worldwide, more people eat and drink milk from goats than any other animal.
Alligators cannot move backwards.
The most popular dog breed in Canada, America, and Great Britain is the Labrador Retriever.
The largest giant squid ever found weighed 8,000 pounds.
Sharks are immune to cancer!
Sharks have been around longer than dinosaurs.
About two-thirds of shark attacks on humans have taken place in water less than six feet deep.
The starfish is the only animal capable of turning its stomach inside-out.
Male dogs will raise their legs while urinating to aim higher on a tree or lamppost because they want to leave a message that they are tall and intimidating. Some wild dogs in Africa try to run up tree trunks while they are urinating to appear to be very large.
A starving mouse will eat its own tail.
Only 5 to 10 percent of cheetah cubs make it to adulthood.
Ferrets sleep around 20 hours a day.
Birds can recognize landmarks, which they use to help them navigate.
A large group of goats is called a herd.
Squirrels cannot see the color red.
The average chicken lays about 260 eggs per year.
You can tell a turtle’s gender by the noise it makes. Males grunt, females hiss.
An elephant’s trunk has around 15,000 muscles. 200 liters of water is drunk from it per day.
The most popular female dog name is Maggie. The most popular male dog name is Max.
A bat can eat up to 1,000 insects per hour.
One million stray dogs and 500,000 stray cats live in New York City metropolitan area.
When young abalones feed on red seaweed their shells turn red.
Small quantities of grapes and raisins can cause renal failure in dogs.
The hippopotamus is born underwater.
Taurophobia is the fear of bulls.
A rodent’s teeth never stop growing.
It takes 3,000 cows to supply the NFL with enough leather for a year’s supply of footballs.
The word “peacock” doesn’t actually apply to both the male and female birds. It’s only the males that are called peacocks, while the females are called peahens.
Hummingbirds beat their wings 60 to 80 times per second.
Only half of a dolphin’s brain sleeps at a time. The other awake half makes the dolphin come up for air when needed to prevent drowning.
Dogs have about 1,700 taste buds.
Oysters can change from one gender to another and back again depending on which is best for mating.
The average length of a Giant Anteater is around 6 and a half foot (2 meters), although about half of this is their long bushy tail.
The placement of the eyes of a donkey enables them to see all four of their legs at all times.
At birth, a panda is smaller than a mouse and weighs about four ounces.
A python can swallow a rabbit whole and may eat as many as 150 mice in a six-month period.
The longest recorded life span of a slug was 1 year, 6 months.
A whale’s heart beats only nine times a minute.
Elephants are covered with hair.
A ‘haw’ is the third eyelid of a cat, which can only be seen when the cat isn’t well.
No two tigers ever have the same stripes, and this is how individual tigers can be identified.
The American Kennel Club, the most influential dog club in the United States, was founded in 1884.
We share 98.4% of our DNA with a chimp.
Fireflies do not bite or have pincers. Fireflies are harmless, they don’t even carry diseases.
Chocolate, macadamia nuts, cooked onions, or anything with caffeine is harmful to dogs.
Goats were the first animals domesticated by man in 10,000 B.C.
Dogs have sweat glands in between their paws.
The fear of animals is called zoophobia.
We share 70% of our DNA with a slug.
The phrase “raining cats and dogs” originated in seventeenth-century England. During heavy rainstorms, many homeless animals would drown and float down the streets, giving the appearance that it had actually rained cats and dogs.
The most poisonous fish in the world is the stone fish.
Killer whales are not whales at all, rather a species of dolphin.
On average, cows poop 16 times per day!
If you cut off a snail’s eye, it will grow a new one.
The ostrich has two toes on each foot which gives it greater speed.
Lonomia obliqua is the world’s deadliest caterpillar.
‘Jaws’ is the most common name for a goldfish.
The most dogs ever owned by one person were 5,000 Mastiffs owned by Kubla Khan.
Every day of the year, 100 whales are killed by whale fisherman.
An elephant can smell water up to 3 miles away.
Deer can’t eat hay.
A skunk will not bite and throw its scent at the same time.
In 2003, Dr. Roger Mugford invented the “wag-o-meter” a device that claims to interpret a dog’s exact mood by measuring the wag of its tail.
George Washington’s teeth were made of elephant ivory, and walrus tusks.
Reindeer milk has more fat than cow milk.
Goats and sheep are seasonal breeders.
Most elephants weigh less than the tongue of a blue whale.
The very first bomb that the Allies dropped on Berlin in World War Two hit an elephant.
A garden caterpillar has 248 muscles in its head.
A moth has no stomach.
Scientists have performed brain surgery on cockroaches.
The flea can jump up to 200 times its own height. This is equal to a man jumping the Empire State Building in New York.
The kangaroo’s ancestors lived in trees. Today there are eight different kinds of tree kangaroos.
A woodpecker can peck 20 times per second.
The great horned owl has no sense of smell.
The Latin name for moose is alces alces.
The earliest European images of dogs are found in cave paintings dating back 12,000 years ago in Spain.
Baby horses can walk and run after just a few hours of being born.
A dog’s shoulder blades are unattached to the rest of the skeleton to allow greater flexibility for running.
Tigers have striped skin as well as their fur.
Hippos can run faster than humans!
A black panther is really a black leopard.
The honey bee has been around for 30 million years.
The dumbest dog in the world is the Afghan hounds.
A cat has 32 muscles in each ear.
The smell of a skunk can be detected by a human a mile away.
There is a butterfly in Africa with enough poison in its body to kill six cats!
Cats have lived with people for only 7,000 years.
A herd of sixty cows is capable of producing a ton of milk in less than a day.
A grasshopper can leap 20 times the length of its own body.
At birth, baby kangaroos are only about an inch long – no bigger than a large water bug or a queen bee.
Cows have one large stomach that is divided into four compartments to go through the different stages of digestion.
An anteater is nearly 6 feet long, yet its mouth is only an inch wide.
The blue whale weighs as much as thirty elephants and is as long as three Greyhound buses.
Just one cow gives off enough harmful methane gas in a single day to fill around 400 liter bottles.
Pear and apple seeds contain arsenic, which may be deadly to dogs.
The flamingo can only eat when its head is upside down.
Animals generate 30 times more waste than humans which is 1.4 billion tons every year.
Ants never sleep. Also they don’t have lungs.
A group of owls is called a parliament.
Even a small amount of alcohol placed on a scorpion will make it go crazy and sting itself to death!
Male rabbits are called “bucks,” females are “does.”
To escape the grip of a crocodile’s jaw, push your thumb into its eyeballs-it will let you go instantly.
It is much easier for dogs to learn spoken commands if they are given in conjunction with hand signals or gestures.
The turkey is one of the most famous birds in North America.
A housefly hums in the key of F.
During World War II, Americans tried to train bats to drop bombs.
Canis lupus lupus is the scientific name for a grey wolf.
The average fox weighs 14 pounds.
The scientific name of the red fox is Vulpes vulpes.
Alligators generally live between 30 & 50 years.
A single elephant tooth can weigh as much as 9 pounds.
If you keep a goldfish in a dark room, it will become pale!
Cows can sleep standing up, but they can only dream lying down.
The sentence “The quick brown fox jumps over a lazy dog.” uses every letter of the alphabet.
A tarantula spider can survive for more than two years without food.
For every human in the world there are one million ants.
If you lift a kangaroo’s tail off the ground it can’t hop – they use their tails for balance.
The only mammals to undergo menopause are elephants, humpback whales and human females.
Blue-eyed lemurs are one of two (non-human) primates to have truly blue eyes.
The bat is the only mammal that can fly.
The leg bones of a bat are so thin that out of the 1,200 species of bats, only 2 can walk on ground. These are the Vampire bat and the Burrowing bat.
Some male songbirds sing more than 2,000 times each day.
Snakes are carnivores, which means they only eat animals, often small ones such as insects, birds, frogs and other small mammals.
In Alaska it is illegal to whisper in someone’s ear while they’re moose hunting.
On average, dogs have better eyesight than humans, although not as colorful.
Deer have no gall bladders.
There is an average of 50,000 spiders per acre in green areas.
The world’s smallest dog was a Yorkshire Terrier, which weighed just four ounces.
Turtles, water snakes, crocodiles, alligators, dolphins, whales, and other water going creatures will drown if kept underwater too long.
Almost half the pigs in the world are kept by farmers in China.
Ostriches can run faster than horses, and the males can roar like lions.
A lion in the wild usually makes no more than twenty kills a year.
The female lion does ninety percent of the hunting.
Gorillas can catch human colds and other illnesses.
A newborn Chinese water deer is so small it can almost be held in the palm of the hand.