Cockatiel

• Cockatiel, common name for a small, crested parrot native to Australia that is a popular pet. It is also known as a quarrion, weero, cockatoo parrot, or crested parrot. Cockatiels are gentle and affectionate birds that make good companions, especially when kept as solitary pets. Their soft call consists of a long, rolling kweel-kweel, but they can be taught to whistle basic melodies or speak simple words.

• Cockatiels in the wild live throughout Australia, but they are found mainly in the interior regions. They prefer open fields with groups of trees or bushes and a nearby water source. Australia bans the commercial export of this bird species. Cockatiels purchased as pets in other countries are the offspring of captive birds.

• From beak to tip of tail an adult cockatiel is a small bird, ranging in length from 29 to 34 cm (11 to 13 in) and weighing 75 to 125 g (3 to 4 oz). Male cockatiels (cocks) are larger than females (hens). In the wild, cockatiels display mostly slate-gray coloring. Cocks have a bright, lemon-yellow face and throat with prominent orange cheek patches and dark brown to black eyes.

• The pointed crest of cocks is predominantly yellow, with a grayish-yellow tint at the tip. Their white shoulder and wing patches contrast with a gray body; the beak and feet are also gray. The underside of the tail is black. Hens display similar but more subdued coloring, but the back and rump are a light gray with narrow white stripes. The underside of the tail is also striped with yellow and white markings.

• Genetic mutations and selective breeding have produced eight color varieties in captive cockatiels, described as pied, pearl, cinnamon, fallow, silver, lutino, whiteface, and albino. The pied cockatiel may be predominantly white or gray, with an irregular pattern of yellow, white, or gray feathers.
  

• The pearl cockatiel is primarily yellow with a checkered or scalloped pattern on the back and wings created by feathers with a yellow or white center and darker edges. Cinnamon and fallow cockatiels are both brown in color, with fallow a lighter brown than cinnamon. The silver cockatiel has metallic gray coloring and red eyes.
  

• The lutino cockatiel is mostly white or yellow, with dark red eyes, while the whiteface cockatiel is mostly gray and white with no yellow or orange. Albinos result from the combination of whiteface and lutino coloring. Combinations of these eight color variations are also common.

• In the wild, cockatiels band together in flocks of 12 to 100, but they may also occasionally travel in pairs. They are nomadic or migratory birds that follow the availability of food and water. Their diet consists of grains, fruits and berries, seedling grasses, and seeds.
  

• Cockatiels forage on the ground but are quick to fly up into trees to avoid birds of prey, their most common predators. Because large cockatiel flocks may devour fields of crops, some farmers consider cockatiels as pests.

• In northern Australia, the cockatiel mating season occurs from April to June; in southern Australia, cockatiels breed from August to December. During courtship, the cock displays his white shoulder patches to the hen, and he may drum his feet on the ground or a tree branch. If the hen flies away, the cock follows and repeats his display.
  

• Nests are built in hollow trees, usually eucalyptus trees, near fresh water. Both cock and hen take turns incubating the four to seven eggs, which hatch in about three weeks. Cockatiels are one of the few species of parrots in which both sexes share brooding responsibilities.

• Cockatiels do not display adult coloring until after their first molting (seasonal shedding of feathers) at six to nine months. They reach sexual maturity between 6 and 12 months. Cockatiels have an average life span of 12 to 15 years.

• Scientific classification: Cockatiels belong to the family Cacatuidae of the order Psittaciformes and are classified as Nymphicus hollandicus

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Angler

• Angler, common name for any of about 265 related saltwater fishes having appendages resembling fishing rods or lures with which they entice their prey. The common anglerfish is found along the coasts of Europe and North America from the British Isles and Nova Scotia to Barbados.

• Up to 1.5 m (about 5 ft) long, they live on the ocean floor, creeping along on modified pectoral fins in search of food. With a huge mouth and distensible stomach, an angler can swallow other fish as large as itself. In the United States certain anglers are also known as goosefishes and are often marketed under the name monkfish.
  

• Other groups of anglers include batfishes, frogfishes, and sea toads.

• One of the most unusual aspects of anglers is their reproductive behavior. In many species of deep-sea anglers, the male is less than one-tenth the size of the female and lacks her characteristic lure. The parasitic male attaches himself to the body of his mate by biting through the skin of the female host.
  

• The circulatory systems of the two fish then join, with nutrients from the blood of the female thereafter providing the male angler with his only source of nourishment. Anglers are the only fish that exhibit this type of extreme sexual dimorphism.

• Scientific classification: Anglers make up the order Lophiiformes. Those known as goosefishes make up the family Lophidae in the suborder Lophioidei, including the common anglerfish, or European goosefish, classified as Lophius piscatorius.
  

• Sexual dimorphism is characteristic of anglers belonging to the suborder Ceratioidei, often referred to as deep-sea anglers. Other groups of anglers include the batfish family, Ogcocephalidae, the frogfish family, Antennariidae, and the sea toad family, Chaunacidae.

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Ant

• Ant, common name for members of a family of about 11,000 species of insects that live in highly organized societies called colonies. Ant colonies have elaborate social structures in which the various activities necessary for the feeding, shelter, and reproduction of the colony are divided among specially adapted individuals. Ants belong to an order of insects called the Hymenoptera, a group that also includes bees, wasps, and sawflies.

• Some species of wasps and bees resemble ants in that they live in colonies and are therefore said to be social, but ants are the only hymenopterans in which every species is social. Ants are distinguished from other hymenopterans in that they have bent, or elbowed, antennae and an indented abdomen that forms a narrow waist.

• Ant colonies range in size from a few members to many millions of members. Members of an ant colony typically fall into categories known as castes, each with a different role. The majority of colony members are female worker ants that are unable to mate. Worker ants do not have wings and perform most of the work of the colony, including searching for food, nursing young, and defending the colony against ants from other colonies.
  

• Queens are larger than worker ants and are the only females of the colony capable of mating. Queens are born with wings, which they break off after mating. They mate with winged male ants, later using the sperm from the mating to produce fertilized eggs, which hatch to produce more worker ants and a new generation of queens. Aside from mating with the queens, males play no social role in colony life and die soon after mating.

• Ants live on landmasses all over the world, except for the permanently frozen Arctic and Antarctic, the coldest mountaintops, and a few islands. They flourish in soil, rotting wood, leaf litter, dead trees, and living trees in such varied habitats as mountains, deserts, swamps, and human homes. Ants are most abundant in the tropical regions.

• In the rain forests of the Amazon, for instance, ants are so numerous that their total weight is about four times the weight of all the area’s mammals, birds, reptiles, and amphibians combined.

• Ants play crucial roles in the ecosystems in which they live. Many species dig underground nests that have numerous openings and tunnels. Air and water pass into the soil through these passageways, making oxygen and moisture available to the roots of plants. Seed-eating ants remove seeds from plants and transfer them to underground storage chambers within their nests.

• This activity disperses the seeds, so that some of them can sprout in areas that are distant from the parent plants. Ants of many species feed on other insects, which may be either living or dead. In this way, ants reduce the size of some other insect populations and recycle organic matter.

• In turn, ants are a source of food for other animals, such as spiders, other insects, woodpeckers, and blue jays; toads, salamanders, and turtles; and anteaters, armadillos, and aardvarks. A few ant species are considered pests because they sting, invade human houses and yards, or damage wooden buildings.

Ant

Class	Insecta
Order	Hymenoptera
Family	Formicidae
Species	mississipiensis (American)
	sinensis (Chinese)
Conservation Concerns	45 species are at risk due to habitat destruction.
Range	Almost all parts of the world; most abundant in the tropics.
Habitat	Almost all parts of the world; most abundant in the tropics.
Feeding Habits	Most ants are omnivores; they eat plant juices, seeds, fruits, other insects, and honeydew, a sugary liquid secreted by aphids.
Offspring	Only queen ants lay eggs. Ants pass through egg, larva, pupa, and adult stages.
Life Span	Less than six months on average; some worker and queen ants live for several years.

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Ape

• Ape, any of 13 species of large, highly intelligent primates, including chimpanzees, gorillas, gibbons, and orangutans. Apes are sometimes confused with monkeys, but unlike their smaller primate counterparts, apes do not have tails and their arms are usually longer than their legs. Apes live in tropical woodlands and forests of Africa and Asia.

• Despite sharing similar habitats, different ape species show striking differences in behaviors and ways of life.

• At one time, apes were classified as a single group of primates, but today most zoologists divide them into two distinct families: the lesser apes, or gibbons, and the great apes. Gibbons are similar to monkeys, with lithe, slender bodies and extremely agile movements.

• Gibbons spend all of their lives in trees, using their hands like hooks to swing arm-over-arm between branches. Known as brachiation, this method of locomotion is so fast that gibbons can easily overtake a person running on the forest floor.

• The great apes include the gorilla, the orangutan, and two species of chimpanzee: the common chimp and the bonobo (sometimes called the pygmy chimpanzee). Great apes are bigger than gibbons and also much less acrobatic.

• However, they are still good climbers. While orangutans spend most of their life in trees, where they use their long arms and dexterous hands and feet to grasp branches and vines, chimpanzees frequently come to the ground to feed. Gorillas are primarily terrestrial, but even fully grown adult males have been observed clambering among tree branches more than 15 m (49 ft) high.

• Chimpanzees and gorillas—the apes that spend the most time on the ground—normally walk on all fours, clenching their hands so that their knuckles take their weight.From physical and fossil evidence, biologists know that apes and humans share a common ancestry.

• In recent years, biochemical analysis has shown just how close this link is—chimpanzees and humans differ significantly in only 2 percent of their genes. This evidence suggests that they diverged from a common ancestor around five to seven million years ago.

• Scientific classification: The gibbons make up the family Hylobatidae and the great apes make up the family Hominidae.

• The gorilla is classified as Gorilla gorilla, the common chimpanzee as Pan troglodytes, the bonobo as Pan paniscus, and the orangutan as Pongo pygmaeus.

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Bean

• Bean, common name widely applied to many plants of the legume family. The seeds and pods of these plants are used for food and forage. The seeds themselves are also called beans and are valuable as food because of their high protein content.

• The term bean is also applied to plants of other families, such as the Indian bean, which is a North American species, and the sacred bean, or Indian lotus (see Lotus). The seeds or fruits of certain other plants, such as the coffee tree and the castor-oil plant, are also called beans.

• The broad bean, also called horsebean or Windsor bean, has been cultivated since prehistoric times and is still the most common bean in many parts of Europe. Various species are cultivated in the United States under the name of vetch.
  

• Most of the beans of the United States and the frijoles of Mexico belong to the same genus. The cowpea, asparagus bean, and hyacinth bean are also cultivated, particularly for forage. The soybean is the common bean of the Orient and has been more widely cultivated in the United States in recent years than have native varieties of bean.
  

• Most soybeans are grown today for their oil, which is used in industrial manufacturing and as fodder for livestock.

• The wild bean of the United States is rarely cultivated. Hundreds of varieties of the common garden bean of the United States are cultivated. The young pods are called string, or snap, beans if green; they are called wax, or butter, beans if yellowish.
  

• The seeds of the older pods are known as shell beans. The small variety is often called navy bean and the large purplish variety, kidney bean.

• For cultivating, beans are divided into two groups: pole beans, or vines requiring a pole for support; and bush beans, erect shrubs of low, spreading growth. Many of the species, notably the common garden bean of the United States, have varieties in both groups, and the groups overlap one another.
  

• Although some of the bean plants are perennials, most of the important cultivated species are annuals and are sown in rich, loose, warm soil after all danger of frost is past.

• The principal disease affecting beans is a form of anthracnose caused by a fungus that attacks the stems, leaves, and pods of the bean. It is most visible on pods, in which it causes deep, dark pits. To prevent the disease, seeds are carefully selected, and care is taken not to spread the fungus from one plant to another during wet weather.
  

• A rust may defoliate bean plants. It first appears as small brown dots containing a brown powder, the spores of the fungus. Later the spots become larger and the spores black.

• Scientific classification: Most beans belong to the subfamily Papilionoideae of the family Fabaceae (formerly Leguminosae). The Indian bean is classified in the genus Catalpa. The broad bean is classified as Vicia faba.
  

• Vetch is classified in the genus Vicia. Most beans of the United States and the frijoles of Mexico are classified in the genus Phaseolus. Cowpeas and asparagus beans are classified in the genus Vigna. The hyacinth bean is classified as Lablab purpureus, the soybean as Glycine max, the wild bean of the United States as Phaseolus polystachios, and the common garden bean of the United States as Phaseolus vulgaris.
  

• The lima, or sugar, bean is generally classified as Phaseolus limensis, although it is regarded by some as a variety of the civet bean, classified as Phaseolus lunatus. The tepary is classified as Phaseolus acutifolius variety latifolius and the scarlet runner as Phaseolus coccineus.
  

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Amphibian (animal)

• Amphibian (animal), animal with moist, hairless skin through which water can pass in and out.

• Nearly all amphibians live the first part of their lives in water and the second part on land—a double life reflected in the name amphibian, which comes from the Greek words amphi, meaning “both,” and bios, meaning “life.”

• Amphibians were the first animals with backbones to adapt to life on land.

• They are the ancestors of reptiles, which in turn gave rise to mammals and birds.

• Scientists recognize more than 4,000 species of amphibians, all of which are members of one of three main groups: frogs and toads, salamanders, or caecilians.

• Frogs and toads are the most abundant of all amphibians, numbering more than 3,500 species. Frogs have smooth skin and long limbs.

• Toads, in contrast, have warty skin and short limbs.

• There are about 360 known species in the salamander group, which also includes newts and mud puppies.

• Members of this group have long, slender bodies ending in tails. Some salamanders live entirely on land, whereas others never leave the water, and still others spend some time in the water and some on land.

• Caecilians, with about 160 species, are the rarest of amphibians.

• They have no limbs and look much like earthworms.

• Most live underground and spend their time burrowing in the soil, but a few are aquatic.
  

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