These tiny creatures can wipe out anything in their path. Army ants are HUNTERS and they roam around from place to place looking for food.

What they look like: Army ants grow to be about 1 inch. They can be dark brown or black. They have very large and strong pincerlike jaws. The males have wings.

What they eat: Anything they can subdue in their path. They eat other insect, snakes and small animals such as baby birds. The whole colony will overtake the smaller animal and eat it. The ants send out special scouts to look for food. When they find it the go and tell the others. They leave a special smell that the others can follow.

Where they live: Army ants like warm tropical temperatures. They can be found in the lowland forests of South and Central American and the some of the southern points of North American. India and Malaysia has a similar species.

How they breed: They lay eggs. They can lay up to 120,000 a one time. The LARVAL STAGE takes 23 – 33 days and the PUPATION STAGE 10-15 days.

Special Characteristics: Army Ants live in huge colonies. There are worker ants (most of the ants are workers), soldiers and a queen. The ants travel in stages. When they are migrating they go on the march and stop to rest at night. One neat trick the ants do is to make a nest with their bodies so the queen and the babies can rest. When they are not marching they are in the STATIONARY phase. This is when they make a nest and the queen lays her eggs.

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Order: Chiropetra Family: Noctillionidae Genus & Species: Noctillio leporinus

The bulldog bat is also known as the fisherman bat because they fish for their dinner. They are called the bulldog bat or mastiff bat because their face resembles bulldogs or mastiffs.

What they look like: The bulldog bat is also called the Mexican bulldog bat. It has saggy cheek pouches and folds of skin on its face that makes the bat look like a tiny bulldog. This interesting creature grows to be between 4 and 6 inches long. Bats have long forearms and the bulldog bat’s can be up to 4 inches when stretched completely out.

Only part of the bat is covered with short reddish-brown fur - its head, shoulders and midback. The rest of it is hairless. Its WING SPAN equals almost 1 foot but yet it only weighs about 2 1/2 ounces.

What they eat: The bulldog bat mostly eats fish although they do it insects do. The bat finds the fish by ECHOLOCATION. This is a type of radar. The bat sends out a sound that bounces off the fish or insect. The bat knows where the food is when the sounds bounce back to them. When the bulldog bat knows where a school of fish is he watches the water for ripples.

He tucks tail skin up between his legs as he heads down towards the water. As he skims over the water his claws trail just under the water and he scoops up fish. If he catches a fish he pops it into his mouth. When he lands he chews it into small pieces which he puts in his jaw pouches. He will take them out and chew them again later before swallowing them.

Where they live: Bulldog bats live in the FOREST and MANGROVE SWAMPS in Central and South America. You can find them from Mexico down to Argentina. They can also be found on the island of Trinidad and the Antilles.

How they breed: Bats do not MATE for life like some animals do. They live together in groups in a ROOST. They mate in the winter. The mother bat is pregnant for 16 weeks. The baby cannot see when it is born and has no hair. It is carried around by its mother for the first two weeks. When the baby bat is only 20 days old it can fly on its own.

Special Characteristics: The bulldog bat has long pointed ears. The tip of its nose sticks out over its nostrils. It has a TAIL MEMBRANE which can be lowered or folded up.

COOL FACTS

Activities
1. Add the bulldog bat to your animal notebook. It will go under MAMMALS You can make another divider if you like for the order CHIROPTERA
2. Get a blank copy of a world map. Mark where the bulldog bat lives on your map.
3. Read a fun book about bats.
4. Draw a bat and label the body parts. This book will help you.
5. Bats keep insects away. Put up a bat house.

What they look like: Canaries are beautiful little song birds. Today they are seen more as a pet then in the wild. You can buy a canary at pet shop. You might choose a pure yellow canary or a red factor canary. A crested Norwich canary has head feathers that look like a small dark cap. In the wild they are darker. Canaries that live in the wild have an upper body that is gray-brown. There breast is yellow-green and so is their rump. The female is always less colorful than the male. They are tiny birds – about 5 inches long.

What they eat: Canaries eat mostly seeds. They enjoy vegetable pieces and nuts too. Canaries have a special groove in the side of their mouth. They put nuts inside the groove then they use their lower jaw to crush the nut. Once the nut is crushed they remove the outside and eat the meat inside. If you own a canary you will purchase what he needs at the pet store.

Where they live: Most canaries live in homes in cages. But they can still be found in the wild in the Azores, Madeira and the Canary Islands. Wild canaries like to live in gardens, forests or orchards where there is plenty of fruit and seeds.

How they breed: Canaries breed between January and July. The male canary sings a special song to attract a mate. After the male has a mate he goes out and finds material to make the nest. The female then builds a nest for her eggs. She lays her eggs in nests in bushes or small trees. It takes 14 days for the eggs to hatch. When the little canaries are born they are featherless and cannot see. In about 2 weeks they grow to fly on their own.

Special Characteristics: Canaries are friendly birds. They stay together in flocks. Canaries talk to each other by twittering. If you buy a canary you might want to consider purchasing a friend for him. They have a beautiful song.

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Dingos

What they look like: The dingo looks a lot like the dogs you see everyday. They are usually a reddish gold color but they can be lighter gold, dark brown or black. When they are full grown they weigh about 45 pounds. About 5 feet long they are smaller than a German shepherd. The tip of its tail is white, their teeth and fangs are larger than a regular dog and its ears stand up.

What they eat: Dingoes will eat just about anything. They do much of their hunting at night. Dingoes usually travel and hunt in PACKS but sometimes they hunt alone. Packs will often hunt big animals like kangaroo and sheep. They chase down their PREY. These animals are pests to most ranchers because they kill the flocks. If they kill more than they can eat they bury the leftover and dig it up later when they are hungry. If no food can be hunted dingoes will eat grubs, birds, eggs or anything else they can find.

Where they live: Dingoes live on the continent of Australia. They do not live on Tasmania which is considered part of Australia.

How they breed: Dingoes breed in fall or the early part of winter. The female picks her mate from the pack. Many times she chooses the same mate each year. After about 9 weeks the pups are born. The mother has the pups in the same hidden place each year. The puppies are weaned from their mom after 8 weeks. The mom and dad teach them to hunt.

Special Characteristics Dingoes live in packs. They are actually descendants of domestic dogs brought to Australia and some aborigines keep them as pets. The mothers not only nurse the pups but feed them food that has been digested and regurgitated.

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Elephant Seal

What they look like: The elephant seal gets its name because the male has a large snout that looks similar to an elephant’s truck. They are grayish brown in color. The male seal is very big. Southern males can be as long as 16 feet and weigh over 5,000 pounds. Northern males get up to 14 feet and can weigh up to 5,000 pounds. Females are much smaller – only 10 feet long and weigh between 1,500 and 2,000 pounds.

What they eat: Elephant seals love to eat fish and squid. They can dive deep down into the water and catch fish on the bottom.

Where they live: There are two types of elephant seals. The southern seal (M. leonina) lives in the waters off of Antarctica. The northern seal (M. angustirotris) lives along the coasts of California and Mexico in North America.

How they breed: Elephant seals come ashore to breeding beaches to mate. The maless come first and the pick their territories. The females follow a few weeks later. Here the pups are born from last years mating season. Females usually have 1 pup. The pups are weaned at 4 weeks and the males can mate with the females. The males fight with each other for the right to choose from the females. Because the male seas are so big the females are often hurt during mating season. Some of the pups are killed during the fighting

Special Characteristics: Elephant seals stay in the water most of the time. The come ashore during breeding season and to shed their skin during the late summer. This is called MOLTING. The male puffs up his snout during mating season to attract the females. Moving around on land is not what they do best but they have forelimbs or flippers to help them. In the water they are wonderful swimmers and very graceful and agile.

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What they look like: Heart urchins are about 2 inches long when fully grown. They have a heart shaped shell which is covered in spines. The spines do not stick up but all lay in one direction.

On the bottom of the sea urchin you will see lots of little tubes that are actually feet. The have suckers on the end and the heart urchin can move them in and out.

What they eat: The heart urchin likes to bury itself in the sand along muddy beaches. Here it can eat particles of dead plants which float in the waters. It sucks up everything – sand, silt, and food. Then its stomach takes out the nutrients and gets rid of the rest. You could say the heart urchin eats his way through the sand!

Where they live: Heart urchins can be found almost anywhere there are muddy beaches. On the east coast of the United States and South America, The west coasts of Africa and Europe, one the shores of Australia and some islands off of Asia.

Special Characteristics: Heart urchins love to hide. They stay buried in the sand eating their way through it. It uses its spines to dig into the sand. It also uses these spines to move around and bury itself.

Heart urchins need to breathe. In order to water with oxygen it digs a small tunnel up to the surface. It lines the shaft with mucus which gets hard. It uses one of its extra long tube feet to keep the tunnel open and let water into the sand.

How they breed: Heart urchins breed in the middle of summer. The female releases eggs into the water. The male releases sperm. The water mixes the two fertilizing the eggs. The eggs develop into larvae which float in the water until they settle on the seabed in shallow areas and finish growing into adults.

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