Bored and lonely parrots go crazy and pull out their feathers!

   An estimated 50 percent of pet birds engage in “over-preening”, but certain species of parrots are significantly more prone to this problem. Those at particular risk are birds that travel in large flocks when they live in the wild.   
     These birds get lonely without a lot of social interaction.  Without another bird, or at least a person, to keep them company, they behave like a lost wild animal. They get anxious, develop behavioural problems, and yes, pull out their feathers and even pick at scabs. More nomadic bird species like Amazon parrots or macaws are at less risk of this.

There was a prehistoric horse that was the size of a small dog.

          

                Eohippus aka hyracotherium lived between 55 
and 45 million years ago. They averaged 60 cm in length and weighed around 36 pounds. This prehistoric animal has actually been classified in the palaeothere family, which makes it not only an ancestor of modern horses, but also early relatives of rhinoceroses and tapirs.  

           Later on another, now extinct, descendant of hyracotherium called propalaeotherium came about. These animals were even smaller, some only 30 cm (less than 1 foot) in length! These tiny, cat-sized horse-like animals have no modern descendants.

Elephants actually talk to one another

          Elephants actually talk to one another, yet their frequency is so low humans can't hear it.

          This form of communication is called infrasound. Scientists have discovered that these signals from elephants can travel for miles, but humans can only detect them with special equipment. They have also been working on translating the messages from the elephants by using a spectrograph.

A four-year-old has her own art exhibition in New York City!

        This fact will definitely reignite the debate about what art really is - does the product of a kid playing with paint really constitute fine art? The parents of 4-year-old Aelita Andre definitely think so. The precocious Australian artist has reportedly been toddling around on canvases since she was 9 months ago! Now that she’s all grown up at the age of four, 3 of her paintings have sold for $27,000!

        She also has her own art show, “The Prodigy of Color”, at the Agora Gallery in NYC. The twenty-four works on display are priced anywhere from $4,400 to $10,000 a piece. The gallery’s director, Angela Di Bello, actually chose her artwork before she knew the painter’s age! She thought the pieces displayed “great colors, great movement, great composition, and were very playful”, then she found out they had been produced by a child!

There are more Godzilla movies (28) than James Bond movies (22)!

            These are also two of the longest movie series ever. The first James Bond film came out in 1962, making the series nearly 50 years old! The first Godzilla film came out in 1954, so they’ve been making Godzilla movies for almost 60 years! Neither series is over yet either. In fact, new installments in both the Godzilla and James Bond series are slated for 2012 releases.

          The Godzilla film will be in 3-D!  We’ve only counted “official” releases for these series. Technically, there are 29 Godzilla movies if you wanted to count the American movie directed by Roland Emmerich (I'd rather not). There’s also 24 James Bond films if you count the 1967 James Bond parody film Casino Royale with comedian Peter Sellers as Bond and if you count Never Say Never Again, an unofficial James Bond film starring Sean Connery.

Penguins can drink salt water!

        Penguins are pretty awesome, so it shouldn’t be a big surprise that they are capable of drinking and ingesting salt water right? Well, that’s 2/3 right; yes penguins are awesome, yes they are capable of drinking salt water, but no, they can’t ingest salt water. 

        They are able to drink salt water because their supraorbital gland filters excess salt from the blood stream, which is then secreted in a concentrated fluid from the nasal passages. 

        This mechanism was designed to allow penguins to live in the coldest places, like the North and South Pole; both of which are completely surrounded by salt water and usually freeze any fresh water they come into contact with.

As those places melt, so do the penguin’s homes, and soon enough they themselves disappear. Efforts are being made by environmentalists and individuals to ensure that this animal keeps getting to be awesome and to filter excess salt from their blood streams.

Cows listening to music give more milk!

     Having your utter pulled constantly can get a little bit stressful. Sometimes all you need is some nice, classical music to help you relax and “get the juices flowing.” So when farmers play classical or soft music in the cowshed, they receive about 1 extra pint of milk from their cows.

          Some of the most popular hits are Beethoven’s Pastoral Symphony and Simon and Garfunkel’s Bridge Over a Troubled Water.
          Some farmers have even tried using this yield-increasing method on chickens. Supporting this practice is a study carried out by the LCAH Dairies in Linconshire and Bishop Burton Agriculture College in Humberside.

Researchers found that a cow’s milk yield rose by 3% a day when slow music, rather than fast or no music was playing. 

        They came to the conclusion that in much the same way that music helps humans relax, it also helps animals relax. The group is now seeking further funding to continue their research on animal musical therapy.