The African Giant Snail – The Largest Snail On Earth

The African giant snail, also called as the giant tiger land snail, is the largest snail from its family. The Giant Ghana snail is native to the forest of Ghana, Africa. Those snails are hermaphrodites, like almost all pulmonate gastropods. The shells of these snails grow s to  18 centimeters of length with a  diameter of 9 centimeters, however, there are also bigger examples.

Those snails lives in tropical condition where they do not have natural enemies. Each of those gigantic snails  lays up to twelve hundred eggs per year  that causing a big problem in natural habitat for the other, normal size snails that we have used to.

The size does matter in this case, the Giant Tiger snail demolish around 500 kinds of plants and they also eat the stucco and paint on buildings. Those things cause that the local tree snails  are threatened or to become extinct.

Image sources from Flickr: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11.

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Biggest and smallest islands

Biggest and smallest islands

The largest island in the world is Greenland. Australia is considered a continent because it has unique plant and animal life. Antarctica also is a continent – larger than Europe and Australia. Greenland, although quite big, shares the habitat features of Northern America.

The smallest island in the world – according to the Guinness Book of Records – is Bishop Rock. It lies at the most south-westerly part of the United Kingdom. It is one of 1040 islands around Britain and only has a lighthouse on it. In 1861, the British government set out the parameters for classifying an island. It was decided that if it was inhabited, the size was immaterial. However, if it was uninhabited, it had to be “the summer’s pasturage of at least one sheep” – which is about two acres.

 
A lot of standing room – not much else.
This is Bishop Rock, the world’s smallest island.

Going by the above parameters, most of the 179 584 “islands” around Finland and the almost 200 000 around Canada would not match Indonesia as the country with the most islands. In fact, Indonesia consists only of islands – 13 667 of them, 6000 of which are inhabited.

The remotest uninhabited island is Bouvet Island in the South Atlantic. The remotest inhabited island in the world is Tristan da Cunha. It is in the South Atlantic, 2575 km (1600 miles) south of St Helena, which is an island a few hundred kilometres (miles) off the coast of South Africa. Tristan da Cunha has no TV but it has one radio station. The population totals 242 and they only have 7 surnames (last names) between them, so they are all related. Tristan da Cunha does have a capital, called Edinburgh of the South Seas.

The smallest independent island country is the Pacific island of Nauru. It measures 21,28 sq km (8.2 sq mi). (Only the Vatican City and Monaco are smaller countries.)

Of the 6 billion+ people in the world, one out of ten lives on an island (600 million). Which is not so hard to imagine when you consider that more than 200 million people live in Indonesia alone – and some 60 million live in Britain, the only island connected to a continent (through the Chunnel).

“In the 13th Century, people convicted of a serious crime were taken out to Bishop Rock and left there with bread and water to be ravaged by the sea. Or so history suggests. Today the rock is better known as the point where record-breaking attempts to cross the Atlantic are started and finished.” – Diver Magazine

 
Iceland, ironically, is quite green – as this graphic depicts.

Over one third of Iceland is volcanically active and loaded with lava fields. Iceland is far enough north to be entirely covered by ice, like Greenland to the west of it, but the magma below the surface heats the rock above, keeping it “green.”

 
Greenland is the largest island in the world
- other than its name suggests, is covered in ice
- although some of it is melting.

Lighthouses

See:World Biggest  

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The size of the sun in comparison

It is the fire of life. It can be kind but it can get angry. But it never throws its weight around. It is the sun. And although it is 330,000 more massive than earth and contains 99.8% of the mass in our solar system, it is small in comparison with some other stars.
The sun never cease to amaze us with its theatrics, its lava flares dancing across its surface in a ballet of nuclear fusion, sometimes leaping millions of miles into the air. And although the sun is big, its intense heat and light makes it difficult to capture good images with normal instruments. So NASA scientists use an Helioseismic and Magnetic Imager and an Atmospheric Imaging Assembly detector to view the ultra-violet (UV) and extreme ultra-violet lithography (EUV) wavelengths released by the sun. The resulting images are spectacular.

Full disk image of the sun. Ain’t it beautiful?!

Full disk image of the sun as taken by NASA Solar Dynamics Observatory, which orbits 22,300 miles above earth.

Earth in comparison to the sun
Earth’s distance from the sun varies between 91.4 million miles – in January – and 94.4 million miles – in July. The average distance of 92,955,887.6 miles (149, 597, 870.7 kilometers) is called 1 astronomical unit (AU), a measurement that is used to report distances to other planets and stars as well. In short, it’s not a weekend drive.

NASA puts the size of earth to the sun in perspective like this: Suppose the radius of Earth were the width of an ordinary paper clip. The radius of the sun would be roughly the height of a desk, and the sun would be about 100 paces from earth.

Earth size in comparison to the sun and other planets: 

(Hey, we’re small but we’re beautiful!)
The size of the sun in comparison
Our sun is one of billions in the entire universe. It also is fairly small in comparison with other big stars. In fact, our sun is classified as a G2 dwarf star. Sirius, the brightest star in the night sky, is twice as massive as the sun and 25 times more luminous. And Sirius is dwarfed by Pollux, which is eight times the radius of the sun. And Pollux is dwarfed by Arcturus, which is almost 26 times the size of the sun.

It’s a big, big universe
But there are bigger stars yet. When compared to Antares, our handsome sun is a mere pixel on a map. And Antares is not even the biggest star. That title is thought to belong to a star called VY Canus Majoris. It is about 2,000 times the size of the sun, or more than twice the size of Antares.

Sun in comparison to Antares:

 Note that it VY Canus Majoris is the biggest in size but not mass. The currently known most massive star is thought to be WR 102ka – known as Peony Nebula Star – at about 175 times the mass of the sun.
How big is the universe?

The Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe calculated the age of the known universe at 13.7 billion years old, based on its radius of 13.7 billion light years. And it is growing bigger every day, at a speed of 71 km/s/Mpc. The size of the whole universe is estimated to be 78 billion light years. If you start traveling today at 60 miles per hour (100km/h) you’ll get to the end of your first coffee stop, the end of one light year, in nine trillion years. Then you just keep going for another 77 billion light years. Or you could stay here, look after our beautiful planet… and enjoy the sun.

See: Link

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Soft drink inventions

The term “soda water” was coined in 1798. The soda fountain was patented by Samuel Fahnestock in 1819, with the first bottled soda water available in 1835. The first ice-cream soda was sold in 1874 in the US. The first cola-flavored beverage was introduced in 1881. Coca-Cola was invented in 1886 in Atlanta, Georgia by Dr. John S. Pemberton. Pepsi-Cola was invented by Caleb Bradham 12 years later. In 1929, the Howdy Company introduced  its “Bib-Label Lithiated Lemon-Lime Sodas,” which became 7 Up, which was invented by Charles Leiper Grigg. Red Bull was introduced by Austrian Dietrich Mateschitz and Chaleo Yoovidhya, from Thailand, in 1987. It is based on the Thai drink called Krating Daeng which means red bull.
The first diet soft drink, called the “No-Cal Beverage” is launched in 1952. Aluminum cans were introduced in 1957 and two years later the first diet cola went on sale.

The pull-ring tab was invented in 1962 and the re-sealable top in 1965. Plastic bottles were first used for soft drinks in 1970. The Polyethylene Terephthalate bottle was introduced in 1973. The stay-on tab was invented in 1974.
The most popular beverage in the world is tea.

See: Soft drink inventions

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Role of oxygen in breathing

For thousands of years people did not know why we breathe air. Plato and Aristotle believed that nutrients from food were burned in the heart, making the flame that brought warmth and life to the body. They thought that the air that we breathe helped to keep the fire controlled. Oxygen was discovered to be a chemical element, and vital in breathing, by 18th century scientists such as Joseph Priestley, Carl Wilhelm Scheele and Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier. It was Lavoisier, who is regarded as the founder of modern chemistry, who named oxygen.

Oxygen is necessary for the chemical reactions inside a cell. (The word oxygen is from the Greek meaning acid burning.) These cellular respirations break up nutrients from food and set free the energy for driving the cell’s life process. A pretty important process considering you breathe up to 23 000 times a day.

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What is the difference between Frogs and Toads?

Frogs and Toads

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One of the most common questions is, "What is the difference between Frogs and Toads?"
Most are surprised to hear that all Toads actually are Frogs!

Frogs Generally speaking, though, when we think of frogs, we generally picture what are called "True Frogs".... members of the family Ranidae, containing more than 400 species. These frogs have the characteristics of: two bulging eyes strong, long, webbed hind feet that are adapted for leaping and swimming smooth or slimy skin (generally, frogs tend to like moister environments) Frogs tend to lay eggs in clusters. Frogs from this family can be found on every continent except Antarctica. They are referred to as the "true frogs" because of their generalized body form and life history: the so-called generic frog.  Members of this family include the bullfrog, common frog, green frog, leopard frog, marsh frog, pickerel frog, and wood frog.

Toads The term toads tends to refer to "True Toads".... members of the family Bufonidae, containing more than 300 species. These types of frogs have are characterized by: stubby bodies with short hind legs (for walking instead of hopping) warty and dry skin (usually preferring dryer climates) paratoid (or poison) glands behind the eyes The chest cartilage of toads is different also. Toads tend to lay eggs in long chains. (There are some toads (genera Nectophrynoides), however, that are the only types of anurans to bear live young!) True Toads can be found worldwide except in Australasia, polar regions, Madagascar, and Polynesia, though Bufo marinus has been artificially introduced into Australia and some South Pacific islands. Besides Bufo, the family includes 25 genera, all of which, like the frogs, are anura!

Images are from the clip art archive on ftp.funet.fi. The physical distinctions, however, can easily get blurred because sometimes the features appear mixed or less obvious, and certain species even legitimately fall into both categories. It is not uncommon, for example, to find a warty skinned frog that isn't a toad, or even a slimy toad! Even the more invisible stuff like cartilage structure has been found to sometimes fit both categories!

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Cows burps and global warming

Cow burps and global warming

Although a cow has no upper front teeth, it grazes up to 8 hours a day, taking in about 45 kg (100 lb) of feed and the equivalent of a bath tub full of water. A healthy cow gives about 200,000 glasses of milk in her lifetime.
A cow has four stomachs: the rumen, reticulum, omasum and abomasum. The rumen is the largest stomach and acts as a fermentation chamber. The abomasum is last of the four and is comparable in both structure and function to the human stomach.

Cows and global warming
With all its grazing and many stomachs, it is no wonder that cows are one of the main contributors to the hole in the ozone layer. Apart from CFC, the biggest culprit is hydrocarbon emissions from cars and cows. Yes, cows! Cows release some 100 million tons of hydrocarbon annually – by releasing gas. To give you an idea of how much gas a cow emits: if the gas of 10 cows could be captured, it would provide heating for a small house for a year.
But unlike what you think, cows release hydrocarbon mostly by burping.

Cow factoids
The average lifespan of a cow is 7 years. The oldest cow ever recorded was Big Bertha. She reached 48 in 1993. She also holds the record for producing 39 calves.
There are more than a billion cattle in the world, about 200 million in India.
Cows that are called individually by name and cows that are played classic music to provide more milk.
Twelve cows are known as a “flink.”
Also see Netvet’s big cow site

See: Facts about Cows

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