Category Plants & Animals

Dolphins and seahorses live in water. A dolphin looks like a fish, but it isn’t. A seahorse doesn’t look like a fish. But it is.

How can you tell if an animal is a fish? All fish have a backbone, and all fish have gills. Gills are openings on a fish’s head that are used for breathing.

Most fish are covered in scales. Scales are little round or diamond-shaped pieces of hard skin.

And nearly every fish has fins on its belly, on its back or sides, or as part of its tail.

If it has gills, scales, and fins and lives in the water, it’s a fish!

In early spring, a female frog lays thousands of eggs in a lake or pond. A few days or even a few weeks later, tiny wiggly tadpoles come out of the eggs.

The tadpoles swim about, nibbling at all plants. They still breathe with gills, like fish. But lungs for breathing air are growing in their bodies.

In time, the tadpoles grow little legs. Many tadpoles are eaten by fish and water insects.

After several months, the tadpoles can leave the water and breathe air with their lungs. They are now young frogs. Their short, tadpole tails shrink away and vanish.

By summer’s end, the frogs are fully grown. During winter they will hibernate at the bottom of the pond. In the spring, the females will lay new eggs.

The life cycle of many frogs takes the animals from egg to tadpole to frog in a matter of months.

How frogs and toads are like lions and tigers? They hunt for living things to eat. But these amphibians use the tongue, not sharp claws and teeth, to catch food.

Frogs and toads eat insects and worms and smaller frogs and toads, too. Big bullfrogs will eat small turtles, snakes, mice, and birds.

Frogs and toads eat only things that move. An insect might be safe right in front of a frog or toad if it didn’t move. But if the insect makes even the tiniest wiggle, the frog or toad will see it and gulp it down.

Many kinds of amphibians, including frogs and toads, use their long, sticky tongues to catch food. If an insect comes near it, the amphibian will slowly move closer and closer until – snap! Its tongue shoots out and pulls the insect into its mouth.

Some frogs are among the most poisonous animals. The brightly coloured arrow poison frog of the Amazon is only about 2.5 centimetres long, but its skin is deadly to predators.

Picture Credit : Google

Can you think of an animal that lives in the water when it is a baby and on land when it grows up? That’s right, a frog!

Frogs belong to a group of animals called amphibians. Like reptiles, amphibians are cold-blooded. But unlike reptiles, an amphibian lays eggs that are soft and have no shells. These eggs dry up easily, so amphibians must lay them in water or wet places. Most baby amphibians are born in the water. They look like baby fish, and they breathe with gills like a fish.

When most amphibians grow up, their gills disappear. Then the amphibians come on land to live. They breathe with lungs as birds, dogs, and people do.

If it is cold-blooded, and lives the first part of its life in the water and the second part on land, it’s an amphibian.

Alligators and crocodiles are large reptiles. The largest crocodiles can reach 7 metres long! Alligators are smaller but still larger than lizards. Alligators and crocodiles usually live in shallow water in warm places.

Both of these reptiles are covered in tough, scaly skin. They have long snouts with many sharp teeth. Their jaws are very strong.

Alligators and crocodiles have a long tail plat pushes them through the water. Their webbed feet help them steer. Their eyes and nostrils are on top of their head. This lets them hide just under the water. An animal that gets too close will be dragged down into the water and eaten.

Both alligators and crocodiles usually eat birds, fish, and turtles, which they swallow whole. Crocodiles sometimes eat large animals, such as wildebeests. Crocodiles and alligators have both attacked and killed people. But attacks on people are rare.

A garter snake wiggles through the grass. Its skin has dried up and a new skin has formed beneath it. So the snake rubs its mouth against a tree trunk. The skin around its lips splits and opens up. But this doesn’t hurt the snake. Now its wrinkled old skin hangs from the tip of its tail.

Soon the snake comes to some rocks. With a twist of its tail, the snake crawls on, but the old skin stays behind. Away crawls the snake in the shiny new skin that grew beneath the old one.

Every few months a snake grows too big for its skin. Each time, it gets rid of its old skin by crawling right out of it.

Lizards cast off their skin, too. Because of their legs, however, they can’t get their old skin off in one piece the way a snake can. Lizards tear off their old skins in bits and pieces.