MBP - April Fool's Quiz Answers
** SPOILER ALERT **
If you haven't sorted yesterday's April Fool's Day quiz and want to sort the surprising facts from the fun nonsense, stop reading and see yesterday's post!
- TRUE! Many turtles can breathe through their butts. It's a key adaptation for how they survive the winters in our area.
- FALSE - Hoop snakes! I wish it were true (those in doubt are relieved). Alas, no specialized snake species can hold their tails in their mouths and roll down hills to surprise their prey.
- FALSE - Also would be cool. Hummingbirds have not been documenting conserving energy during migration by riding on the backs of larger species such as Branta geese and Sandhill Cranes.
- TRUE! The Pirate Perch has an anus that moves from where one would expect it to be on a fish to it's throat.
- FALSE - All mammals are vertebrates and have full skeletons. No aquatic mammals or rodents lack bones to assist with specialized movements.
- TRUE! Shark stomachs have been found containing surprising items, including a suit of armor, a cannonball, and a bottle of wine. There are some good videos, podcasts, and articles summarize findings (here is an example - https://www.sharksider.com/14-weirdest-things-sharks-eaten/).
- FALSE - The beautiful and native Cow Killer is known for its painful sting ("strong enough to kill a cow!"), but they do not swarm up and attack large mammal prey.
- TRUE! Bolas spiders throw balls of web, emit pheromones to attract specific prey, and have many other amazing facts.
- TRUE! Arctic Terns are the world's longest distance avian migrants, migrating from the Arctic to the Antarctic and back each year. Based on known migrations and lifespan, an individual may fly over a million miles in its lifetime.
- FALSE - Snipe are very real and they are even occasionally hunted, but "snipe hunting" is a popular practical joke to trick the uninitiated into a comical foray into the woods. The hilarious part is that many people then share the punchline that there's no such thing as a snipe! There are totally snipe. They also have wild, zig-zagging flight when flushed, which may be part of the original inspiration for a comically hard hunt.
Bonus (not scored):
Turtles dream in color. As noted, a real question - one of my favorites - that I once received from an elementary school class during a presentation. I did check if turtles have good color vision, so that's a key thing to know. If they didn't, it would be a long shot that would dream that way.
My girls asked me if I would drink wine from a bottle found in a shark's stomach, and then quickly noted, yeah, you definitely would. TRUE!
📸: (c) Wilson's Snipe photo by Jim Stasz - Somerset Co., Maryland (2/16/2010). Photographed but not as far as I know captured with a burlap sack.
🔍 Wilson's Snipe at Maryland Biodiversity Project:
https://www.marylandbiodiversity.com/view/1070
Bill
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