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Animals

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Fox. Fox is a common name for many species of alert omnivorous mammals belonging to the Canidae family.

Fox

Foxes are small-to-medium-size canids (slightly smaller than a medium-size domestic dog), with a flattened skull, upright triangular ears, a pointed, slightly upturned snout, and a long bushy tail (or brush). Fennec fox. The fennec fox or fennec (Vulpes zerda) is a small nocturnal fox found in the Sahara of North Africa.

Fennec fox

Its most distinctive feature is its unusually large ears, which also serve to dissipate heat. Its name comes from the Arabic word فنك (fanak), which means fox, and the species name zerda comes from the Greek word xeros which means dry, referring to the fox's habitat.[2] The fennec is the smallest species of canid in the world. Its coat, ears, and kidney functions have adapted to high-temperature, low-water, desert environments. In addition, its hearing is sensitive enough to hear prey moving underground.

It mainly eats insects, small mammals, and birds. The fennec has a life span of up to 14 years in captivity. Description Taxonomy Behavior Social behavior An 1876 sketch of a pack of fennec foxes Information on fennec fox social behavior is mainly based on captive animals. Diet and hunting. Arctic fox. The arctic fox (Vulpes lagopus), also known as the white fox, polar fox, or snow fox, is a small fox native to the Arctic regions of the Northern Hemisphere and is common throughout the Arctic tundra biome.[1][3] It is well adapted to living in cold environments.

Arctic fox

It has a deep thick fur which is brown in summer and white in winter. It averages in size at about 85.3 cm (33.6 in) in body length, with a generally rounded body shape to minimize the escape of body heat. They prey on any small animals they can find, including lemmings, voles, ringed seal pups, fish, and seabirds. They will also eat carrion, berries, and seaweed. They form monogamous pairs during the breeding season and usually stay together in family groups of multiple generations in complex underground dens.

Adaptations Arctic fox sleeping with its tail wrapped as a blanket. Deer. The musk deer of Asia and water chevrotain (or mouse deer) of tropical African and Asian forests are not usually regarded as true deer and form their own families: Moschidae and Tragulidae, respectively.

Deer

Terminology The word "deer" was originally broader in meaning, but became more specific over time. In Middle English, der (Old English dēor) meant a wild animal of any kind. This was as opposed to cattle, which then meant any sort of domestic livestock that was easy to collect and remove from the land, from the idea of personal-property ownership (rather than real estate property) and related to modern chattel (property) and capital.[1] Cognates of Old English dēor in other dead Germanic languages have the general sense of "animal", such as Old High German tior, Old Norse djur or dȳr, Gothic dius, Old Saxon dier, and Old Frisian diar.

In South African English, venison is used to refer to the meat of antelope.[6] There are no native Cervidae in sub-Saharan Africa. Mockingbird. The only mockingbird commonly found in North America is the Northern Mockingbird (Mimus polyglottos).

Mockingbird

The Greek word polyglottos means multiple languages. Species in taxonomic order[edit] Darwin and mockingbirds[edit] When the survey voyage of HMS Beagle visited the Galápagos Islands in September to October 1835, the naturalist Charles Darwin noticed that the mockingbirds Mimus thenca differed from island to island, and were closely allied in appearance to mockingbirds on the South American mainland. Nearly a year later when writing up his notes on the return voyage he speculated that this, together with what he had been told about Galápagos tortoises, could undermine the doctrine of stability of species. Notes[edit] External links[edit] Mockingbird videos, photographs and sound recordings on the Internet Bird Collection.

Rabbit. Habitat and range Outdoor entrance to a rabbit burrow.

Rabbit

Hummingbird. Hummingbirds are New World birds that constitute the family Trochilidae.

Hummingbird

They are among the smallest of birds, most species measuring in the 7.5–13 cm (3–5 in) range. Indeed, the smallest extant bird species is a hummingbird, the 5-cm Bee Hummingbird. They are known as hummingbirds because of the humming sound created by their beating wings which flap at high frequencies audible to humans. They hover in mid-air at rapid wing flapping rates, typically around 50 times per second,[1] but possibly as high as 200 times per second, allowing them also to fly at speeds exceeding 15 m/s (54 km/h; 34 mph),[2] backwards or upside down.[3][4] Hummingbirds have the highest metabolism of any homeothermic animal.[5] To conserve energy when food is scarce, they have the ability to go into a hibernation-like state (torpor) where their metabolic rate is slowed to 1/15th of its normal rate.[6] The smallest species of hummingbird weighs less than a penny.

Diet and specialization for food gathering[edit]