Today I shall take you through some unique, interesting and lesser-known facts about the animal kingdom! So, here goes?

The unique

Polar bears are left-handed: The Inupiaq (IN-yoo-pack) have lived with polar bears over the past several thousand years in the icy wastelands on the North Slope of Alaska. According to the Inupiaq elders, polar bears are left-handed. We urbanised folk don?t get many chances to find that out, but when you do, remember to duck to his right and avoid his lethal left!

No two zebras have stripes that are exactly alike: Their stripes are as unique to them as your fingerprints are to you. According to zoologists, while zebra stripes make zebras indistinguishable to other animals, these stripes actually help zebras recognise one another and distinguish who?s who in a zebra herd. Every zebra has a slightly different arrangement.

Do dogs sweat? Dogs have the ability to sweat, but in places that are a little different from humans. Their skin and armpit areas don?t contain sweat glands like ours do. Dogs only have sweat glands on the pads of their feet. Therefore, the only way they have to cool off is through panting and through their feet.

Dolphins sleep with one eye open: Dolphins do sleep, but not quite in the same way that people do. They sleep with one half of the brain at a time and with one eye closed. Dolphins rest this way on and off throughout the day, switching which side of the brain they shut down.

During these periods, everything inside the dolphin slows down, and the mammal moves very little.

A giraffe can clean its ears with its 21-inch tongue: It is commonly known that the giraffe is the tallest animal in the world, sometimes reaching a height in excess of 18 ft. Along with its long neck, the giraffe has a very long tongue, more than a foot-and-a-half long, with which it can clean its ears!

Basenjis don?t bark: Basenjis have been bred for thousands of years to be silent hunters, and do not bark like regular dogs because their voice box is narrower and more uniform in diameter than most dogs. But Basenjis are not mute and express themselves by growling, howling, whining and screaming.

The unbelievable

Ants don?t sleep.

At the end of the Beatles? song A Day in the Life, an ultrasonic whistle audible only to dogs was recorded by Paul McCartney for his Shetland sheepdog.

Cats have more than 100 vocal sounds, while dogs only have about 10.

When a giraffe?s baby is born, it falls from a height of six feet, normally without being hurt.

A woodpecker can peck 20 times a second.

An elephant can smell water three miles away.

The blue whale?s whistle is the loudest noise made by an animal.

Fishes talk to each other. Some of them communicate by making noises in their throats by rasping their teeth, others use their swim bladders to make sounds.

A rat can last longer without water than a camel.

A cheetah does not roar like a lion, it purrs like a cat (meow).

A flamingo can eat only when its head is upside down.

A snail can sleep for three years.

Oysters can change from one gender to another and back again depending on what is best for mating.

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