Very Interesting facts about Squirrels

Squirrel is one of the cutest animals on this planet. But there are very few facts which we know about them. This article will try to give you some insights about this wonderful animal.

The word “Squirrel” comes from the Greek word Skiouros which means shadow tail. They belong to the order rodentia. Click here to know more about orders of class mammalia.

They are found naturally in every continent except Australia (now introduced by humans) and Antarctica. Usually they live in trees and the holes created by the trunk.

Like all other members of the rodent family they have a large incisor which never stop growing through out their life.

Squirrels have a special liking for nuts. Apart from nuts they also like to eat small insects, leaves, tree bark, roots etc.

There are 200 species of squirrel around the world. Among all African pigmy squirrel is the smallest. The full height of the species is 10 centimeter only and can weight just 10 gm. The largest squirrel is the Alpine Marmot which can reach up to 73 centimeter and can weights 5 to 8 kilos.
Being a mammal they have sweat glands but those are present only in their feet.

They have strong and long muscular hind legs and small front leg. The hind legs help them to jump up to a distance of 20 feet.They have 5 toes in their back feet but only four on their front. Their thumbs have not developed properly and the paws have padding (like cats) inside.

While falling from a height they use their tail both as balance and as a parachute.

They show camaraderie while living in a group. This feature is prominent if a group comes under any type of danger. They produce alarming sound to the group to alert them from possible danger.

The outer coating of a squirrel is filled with soft and silky fur. This is one of the reasons why they appear so cute to us. They also have a very large (compared to their body size) eye. This justifies their excellent vision which is very essential for tree living.

They have a gestation period of 44 days. Baby squirrels are blind at the time of birth.

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Seahorse: A Very Interesting Animal

Seahorse is very popular animal. There are a lot of interesting feature associated with a seahorse. Here in this article we will try to bring out some of those.

The biological name of sea horse is Hippocampus. This means horse caterpillar.

Though it is hard to believe but sea horse is a fish. Like many of the other fishes they breathe through gills and use swim bladders to control buoyancy. Seahorse is classified under class Actinopterygii where most of the bony fishes are present. Unlike any other fishes they have neck, a stout and a long tail. The neck of a sea horse is flexible.

They use their prehensile tail to hold on to grass or other weeds and prevent from being washed away by water currents.

The sea horses have independently movable eyes with excellent eye sight. The meaning is that they can look forward and backward in the same time.

In sea horse the skeleton is outside of the body (Exoskeleton) whereas in other fishes it is inside. They do not have any tail fins; though they possess other fins. They do not have any scales either.

Unlike fishes they like to rest in one area. They are not known for their swimming abilities and use only their dorsal fin for this purpose. Unique feature of their swimming is unlike any other fish which swims horizontally, it swims vertically. The dwarf sea horse is the slowest fish in the world (top speed is about 5 ft per hour).

There are more than 50 species of Seahorse. The size varies from 1 to 15 inch depending on the species.

The food for a sea horse ranges from sea plankton to crustaceans. They use their stout as vacuum cleaners for getting food. Some of the species can blend into the surrounding very easily. This camouflage helps them to defend themselves against predators.

They do not have any stomach.

One of the unique features of a sea horse is that the male becomes pregnant and give birth to the young ones.
During pregnancy they release same type of hormones that pregnant mammal females do. Male sea horse posses a brood pouch and females use a depositor to sent her eggs into the pouch.

It was believed that they are monogamous animal and they pair for life but later studies have proven this wrong. Though, the sea horse will stay with the same mate though out the breeding season. Before breeding they display courtship. Both male and female sea horse changes their colors during this period.

In China, seahorse is consumed and also used in medicine for their conceived medicinal values.
Baby sea horses are known as Fry.


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Poison or Venom: Find is the difference

Biologically speaking poisonous animal and venomous animal is not the same thing. Though both of
them contains dangerous amount of toxins, the basic difference between the two lies is the delivery mode. The venomous animals refer to those who can actively deliver the toxin in to the victim’s body whereas the poisonous animals can not perform this due to lack of delivery mechanism. You will only get the toxin only if you touch, smell or eat them. Poison also tends to spread over a larger area or the body whereas venom is typically produced and stored in a particular place of the body. A venom gland is generally present in venomous animals where the toxins get stored till it needed.

The toxin present in both poisonous and venomous animals consists mainly of protein and other neurotransmitters. Depending on their way of work toxins can be broadly classified in two groups:

1.    Hemotoxin: it affects the blood cells and related organs. It can destroy RBC (RBC delivers oxygen through out the body), disrupt blood clotting and can even result in organ failure. The process of death in this type of venom is generally slower than the neurotoxins. Pit viper is one of the snakes which release this type of toxin.

2.    Neurotoxin: Neurotoxin on the other hand attacks the cells of the nervous system. It causes paralysis, respiratory failure and muscular contraction. The death of the victim occurs very quickly if it is injected with neurotoxin. Cobras are typical example of snakes which posses this type of toxin.

Many animals in the animal kingdom are considered poisonous or venomous.

Snakes (not all of them are venomous. Know more about snake by clicking here) such as cobra, rattlesnake, some octopus, lizards, bees, spiders, frogs etc are few of the examples. 

So remember this, the next time you say a snake is poisonous you actually mean that the snake has toxin spread over its body and touching it can cause poisoning; which may not be the case in most of the time.



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Interesting Facts about Jelly Fish

We are all aware about Jelly fish they are very common through out the world. Here is a list of some interesting facts about Jelly Fish:

Though they refer to as jelly FISH; technically they are not a fish as they do not have any fish like features such as gills. They breathe through their skin.

Jelly fish is carnivorous. They feed on crustaceans, fish eggs, planktons, small fish and even other jelly fish.

They are the oldest multi-organ animal. They are living in earth for more than 500 million years. The size of a jelly fish can vary from 1 mm to a few meters in diameter.

They are common in every ocean. Very few of them also live in fresh water.

Jelly fish is famous for their toxicity. Upon touching a jelly fish nematocyst cells pierce the skin of the victim and release toxin inside the body. There toxin levels vary species to species. The venom from a sea wasp (a species of box jelly fish) can kill a man within minutes.

They can reproduce both sexually and asexually. A single jelly fish can release more than 45000 eggs per day. The larva of a jelly fish is called planula larva.

Though it seems odd but more people killed by jelly fish than sharks through out the year.

They lack any skeleton i.e. no skeleton is present externally or internally. Depending upon species jelly fish contains 95-98% water in the body composition. They do not possess any circulatory, digestive, respiratory systems.

Jelly fish do not have any locomotary organ; they move through the water by contracting and expanding their umbrella shaped bodies. 

The life span of a jelly fish can vary from few hours to few months.

Some of them possess light emitting organs (bioluminescent organ) and can glow in the dark.

There are two phases of a jelly fish’s life viz. polyp and medusa. It is the medusa phase (umbrella shaped) that we generally refer to as jelly fish.

Jelly fish is harvested for its collagen. This is used to treat rheumatoid arthritis. Some jelly fish such as blubber jelly fish are edible too. In some Asian countries like Japan and Korea jelly fish is taken as food.

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Interesting Facts about Rhinoceros

Today’s article is about Interesting facts of Rhinoceros. Whenever we think about a Rhinoceros a first thing comes to our mind is their horn/horns. But there are many other interesting facts which we generally don’t know about them. We hope this article will give you some insights about that.

The word Rhinoceros comes from two words: rhino which means nose and ceros meaning horn.

Various types of rhinoceros are found viz. white, black, greater one horned, Javan and Sumatran. Black, white and Sumatran Rhinos have two horns where as Javan and one horned rhinos have only one horn.
Among Rhinos White rhinoceros is the largest. They can weight up to 2500 kgs. They are the largest terrestrial animal after Elephants. Javan Rhinos are the smallest among Rhinos. They can reach a maximum of 900 kgs.

They are herbivorous animal. Black rhinos have prehensile upper lip which helps them to grasp grass. A rhino consumes a lot of plant matter like leaves, grass, bushes etc. and in a normal condition produce close to 50 kgs of dung per day. The unique feature of their dung is that the smell of the dung is different for male female and juvenile.

They have a very thick layer (In an average about 1.5 cm) of skin. Despite this huge thickness their skin is relatively very sensitive towards sunburn or insect bites. Sumatran Rhino has long hair through their body whereas all the rest of the rhinos are hairless.

They are not known for their eye sight which is usually very poor. But they compensate that with excellent sense of smell and hearing.

The famous horn of the rhinoceros is made up of hairs and not bones. Rhino calves are born without horns. These horns continue to grow through out their lifetime.

Rhinoceros is a perissodactyle animal i.e. only one toe of their feet has modified to became the hoof. So they are much more closely related to horse and Zebra than many others. To know more about animal classification click here.

Though they appear to be a slow moving animal they can reach a top speed of 60 km per hour. If you want to know about all the animals which have amazing speed check out this article.

Male rhinos are solitary animal whereas the female rhinos are much more social and stay in groups. A group of Rhino is called a Crash. Rhinos have a very long (close to 2 years) gestation period. Only elephants in the animal kingdom have a greater gestation period than rhinos.
They can live for a period of 35 to 40 years.

Due to their large size and aggressive nature not many animals hunt Rhinos. However Lions, Tigers, crocodiles and wild dogs have sometimes preyed on baby or sick rhinoceros but humans are by far the biggest threat to Rhinos. It is believed particularly in Asia that Rhino’s horns have medicinal properties. But there are no evidence of this has been found. Among all the species 3 (black, Sumatran, and Javan) have been registered under critically endangered in IUCN Red list.

As for you all rhino lovers to know September 22 has been celebrated as world rhino day.

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Horses: some interesting facts

Horses are very interesting animals; they are a part of human civilization from a very early period. Here in this article we will discuss some interesting facts about them.

Horses are the member of the order perisodactyla in class mammalia. The details of classification can be found here.

The horse has evolved from a small multi-toed creature to a large single toed animal over 55 million years.

They have been domesticated at around 3500 BC.

The male horse is called stallion, the female horse is called mare and the newborn is called a foal.

Foals are born with larger legs (90% of their adult length). Most of them are born at nights. After 1 hour from their birth, they can stand.

Though horses are famous for their galloping movements, there are 3 other types of movement: walk, trot, and canter. They are known for their speed and can reach up to a speed of 70 km/h. they are one of the fastest animals on this planet.

They have a very good sense of balance.

There are 150 different breeds and types of horses found in the world.

Horses sleep only two to three hours in a day. Most of the time, they sleep standing. Though they lay down but it is for short time.

Unlike ruminants, their digestive system is a one way traffic. They don’t re-chew the food particles one it reached the stomach. They can’t burp, vomit or even take breathe with their mouth.

Arabian horses have 17 ribs (one less than other horse breeds), 5 lumber vertebrae (one less than other horse breeds) and 16 tail vertebrae (others have 18).

Horses have 64 chromosomes. They have 205 bones in average. They don’t posses the collar bone like a human.

They have the largest eye of any land animal. The eyes are laterally place and have a 350 degree span. The external ear can rotate 180 degree.

The hoof of a horse is like finger nail and it constantly grows. For a domestic horse it needs to be clipped after 5 to 6 weeks. They have 4 toes in front and 3 toes in the back foot.

Horses are measured in ‘Hands’. Their size varies from breed to breed. Their average size ranges from 14 to 18 hands.

The gestation period of a horse is approximately 340 days.

Horse can breed with donkey. The result of their breeding is Mule (male donkey and female horse) or Hinny (male horse and female donkey).

Horses have an average life span of 30 to 35 years. The age of a horse can be estimated by its teeth.

Horses are herd animals. In the wild they live in herds. The herd is usually dominated by a mare. They are very social animal and are more comfortable living in company than alone. It can be very stressful for a horse to live alone. They can form companionship along with their own species, and other animals including humans.

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Speedsters in Animal Kingdom

You must have heard the line “Speed thrills but it kills”. But in animal kingdom the phrase is not applicable. It is this speed that makes these animals unique and also acts as a survival tool. In this article we will discuss some of the animals with amazing speed. Some of them runs, some swim and some fly. Some even hop. But what ever is their locomotion, they are best at it. 

These data has been taken from Wikipedia. Just to realize how fast they are, consider this: the top speed of human is considered to be 44.72 km/h (as per the world record).

Peregrine Falcon: they are the fastest of all the living animals. Top speed can reach up to 370 km/h or above.

Horse-fly: Male species of horse fly are known to be the fastest insect in the world. They can fly at a speed of 140 km/h.

Cheetah: They are the fastest animal on land. They can reach up to a speed of 90 km/h from 0 within 3 seconds. The cheetah can run best at short burst. The endurance of this animal is very poor. The top speed can reach up to 120 km/h. More on cheetah in this article.

Hummingbird: They are the smallest bird in the world. They can reach up to a speed of 98 km/h.

Ostrich: They are very good runner and can reach a top speed of 95 km/h. the endurance of a ostrich is very good it can run at a speed of 50 km/h for half an hour. They are the tallest and heaviest species among the birds. 

American Antelope: They are the fastest animal if you consider long distance running. They can run at 56 km/h for a distance of 6 km. whereas the top speed of this animal can reach up to 89 km/h and they can continue it for 800 meters.

Greyhound Dogs: They are the fastest among all the dogs. Their top speed can reach up to 75 km/h.

Horse: The top speed of a horse has been recorded as 70.76 km/h. find more interesting facts about Horses here.

Kangaroo: The normal speed of a hopping kangaroo is around 25 km/h. But their top speed can reach up to 70 km/h. More interesting facts about kangaroo in this article.

Zebra: Top speed of a Zebra is about 60 km/h. More on Zebra can be found here.

Leatherback sea turtle: Among the various sea turtles their bodies are the most hydrodynamic. They can swim at a top speed of 35 km/h. you can find more interesting facts on turtles in this article.

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Funny Facts About The Kangaroos

Today’s animal is a very interesting and funny in many senses. They are a part of marsupials. In ancient days this animal was described as an animal whose head is like a dear, who can stand like human and which can leap like a frog. Today’s animal is The KANGAROO.  Let’s discuss some Kangaroo facts here:

Kangaroos naturally can be found only in Australia.

There are 4 types of Kangaroos which can be found:

The Red Kangaroos (Macropus rufus): They are the largest Kangaroo species. Found in arid and semi-arid area of the country.

The Western Grey Kangaroos (Macropus fuliginosus): they are slightly smaller than their other cousins and found only in the southern part of Western Australia.

The Eastern Grey Kangaroos (Macropus giganteus): they are most often seen in the eastern part of Australia and have the largest population amoung the 4 species.

The Antilopine Kangaroos (Macropus antilopinus): their far is some what similar to that of an antelope.

Kangaroos are herbivorous. Tree leaves, shrubs, grasses are their usual food. They don’t drink much water and get most of their water from their food.

Like cow and other ruminating animals, kangaroos have chambered stomach which helps them in digestion.

The average height of a kangaroo can reach up to 8 ft and can weight up to 100 kg.

Their hind leg is much larger and stronger than their fore limb.

The tail of a kangaroo is muscular at the base and it helps keeping balance while hopping.

The primary means of locomotion for a Kangaroo is hopping. This is the only large animal which uses this type of locomotion in their adult stage. The jump can be up to 30 ft in distance. The speed of this type of locomotion can reach up to 60 kmph. They are good swimmers but can not walk backwards.

They are social animal and lives in groups. Usually 10 to 100 kangaroos live in a group. In case of danger, they inform others by thumping their feet into the ground.

Kangaroos give birth to immature babies. A newborn baby can be the size of a rice grain to maximum of a honeybee, which then nursed in their mother’s brood pouch. The newborns stay in their mother’s pouch for 120 to 400 days.

The adult male Kangaroo is called buck and adult female is called doe. The newborns of a Kangaroo are called joeys.

The Kangaroos like all other marsupials have a pouch to rear their young ones.

The gestation period of a female kangaroo is very short 30 to 35 days. As the kangaroo can get pregnant immediately after giving birth, there can be more than one joey in the brood pouch. The milk meant for the newborn are of two types; one for the older one and another for the younger one.

The western grey kangaroos smell like curry.

The Kangaroo is often used as a symbol of Australia.

As per the IUCN Red List Kangaroos are in the list concerned category. They are hunted for their meat and skin.

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Some interesting facts about Zebras

Today we will discuss some interesting features of ZEBRA.

According to mammalian classification, they are the members of the order Perissodactyla in class mammalia. Zebras are found only in wild Africa.

 

There are 3 species of zebras

Plain Zebra: Equus quagga

Mountain Zebra: Equus zebra

Grevy’s Zebra: Equus grevyi

A Zebra can be of 4-5 feet till shoulder and can weighs up to 350 kgs. Males are slightly taller and heavier than the female. Zebras are social animal and they live in herds.

They are herbivorous, and mainly graze on tough grasses.

The most interesting and unique feature of a zebra is the stripes. They are vertical on head, neck, and main body and horizontal on rear ends and legs. Like human fingerprints, each Zebra has unique stripes. Different species have different stripes. Some species have wider stripes than the other. These stripes make it harder for the predators to separate a single zebra and catch. It has also been proved that these stripes help the Zebra to deter insects which tend to such their blood.

Zebras have black with white stripes and not white with black stripes as it was popularly believed.

Zebras can be very unpredictable in their nature and due to this they are not trained like horses.

They are single-toed hoofed (perissodactyle) animal.

Grevy’s Zebra has been named after French President Jules Grevy.  

Zebras are generally slower than horses in terms of top speed but they possess a greater stamina and that helps zebras outpacing predators.

Zebras have rounded (compared to horses), larger ears and excellent hearing. They have excellent eye sight and also have night vision.

They have acute sense of smell and taste.

Like horses zebras sleep standing up.

The life expectancy of a Zebra is 20-30 years in the wild.

It is a matter of shame that Zebras are still hunted for their skin and meat and still are in endangered category.

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Some Interesting Facts About Snakes

Today we will discuss some important facts about SNAKES!!! Though they are classified as a reptile; it is very difficult resemble them with other reptiles as they have gone through so many structural changes in their life. There is so much misconception about this animal which is a wonderful example of adaptation to the habitat. We hope to clear some misconception about them through this article.

There are more than 3000 species of snakes found in the world. Among them only a few have venom and among those venomous snakes only a few are deadly to men.

Snakes can be found in almost all the continents except Antarctica. A few islands such as New Zealand, Ireland Iceland are devoid of snakes.

The largest size which has been reported is of reticulated python (30 ft), whereas the smallest size is of 4 inches in length (Leptotyphlops carlae).

All snakes are carnivorous. They prey on birds, reptiles, fish, rats etc.

Snakes use smell to track their prey. Their forked tongue and Jacobson’s organ play very important role in this. They can not bite their food so they swallow the whole prey. They have a very flexible lower jaw for this.

Their tongue is very efficient in sampling particles from air, water or ground.

Some snakes like pit vipers, boas, pythons etc have infra red sensitive organs. This allows them to detect warm blooded animals.

Snakes are not slimy like worms. Their skin is covered with dry scales. They use their belly scales for movement.

Snakes keep their eyes open while sleeping. That is because they don’t have movable eyelids.

We all know that snakes shed their scales, this process is called moulting. It serves dual purpose. It gets rid of mites, ticks and other parasites and also get a fresh skin replacing their worn off one.

Unlike humans, the teeth of a snake are constantly replaced with a new one through out his whole life.

The venom of a snake is actually their saliva. Once injected in its prey it causes damage to the cells. Snakes use this to immobilize or kill their prey.

Though there are many type of toxin present in the venom of a snake, the toxin are generally classified in two categories:  Hemotoxin(this attacks the circulatory system of the prey) and Neurotoxin (this attacks the nervous system of the prey).

Most of the snakes lay eggs but contrary to the belief, some species of snakes have found to be viviparous i.e, they nurse their young ones.

For ages snakes have been portrayed as evil. But these wonderful creatures are rather reactive in nature and try to avoid human interactions as far as possible.



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Elephants: Some interesting Facts

Today in this article we will discuss some interesting facts about Elephants, the largest terrestrial (which lives on land) animal. These mammals are the members of order Proboscidea. You can find the main article on Mammalian classification here. They are very important species when we consider their impact on environments. Due to this they are considered as keystone species.

There are 2 types of elephants which are found in the world:

African Elephants (Loxodonta africana): They are much bigger than their Asian counterpart. They are found in countries in sub-Saharan Africa.

 And

Asian Elephants (Elephas maximus): smaller in comparison to the African Elephants. They are found mostly in India, Nepal, and south-east Asian countries.

The trunk of an elephant contains more than 50000 muscles. The trunk in an elephant is the most important part of their body. It helps them in breathing, smelling, grasping, and also in sound production. They can carry up to 2 gallons of water in their trunk.

Though the trunk is very powerful and can lift up to 300 kg with ease, it can also perform delicate tasks such as breaking a peanut shell without damaging the seeds.

The tusk in an elephant’s life performs many works. It helps in digging, fighting, or moving tree-branches. Unlike other mammals their teeth (not the tusk only the chewing teeth) got replaces many a times in their life cycle.

Beside their trunk and tusk one of the characteristic features of an Elephant is two huge fans like ears. Besides hearing, their huge ears help them in body heat controlling. The ears of an elephant contain huge numbers of blood capillaries. It helps them to release the excess heat from their body. Elephants can increase the rate of heat release by increasing the flapping the ears.

The skin of an elephant is relatively thick (up to 2.5 cm) when compared with other animals. The skin of an elephant is so sensitive that it can even sense a fly in their skin. Though in most of the part the skin is thick, back of their ear (also called knuckle) is covered with very thin layer of skin and is also one of the softest part of their body. Elephant trainers control elephants by using this soft part of their body.

Elephants cannot rotate their forearms. It is a fact that their forearms carry 60% of their huge body weight.

They are very slow movers. But can swim for a long distance despite their huge built up.

The brain size of an elephant is largest in the animal kingdom.

Height of a fully grown Elephant can reach up to 13 ft (African elephant) and can weight over 6000kg.

They can live up to 70 to 80 years.

Elephants have been reported to be killed for their tusk. They have also suffered loss of habitat due to human encroachment. The African elephants are listed as vulnerable and Indian elephants referred as endangered species in the list of IUCN red list. Find the detailed list of categories here.

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Squid: Some Interesting Facts

Like octopuses squid are also cephalopods, i.e, their feet originate from their head. We have discussed octopus earlier. today we will discuss squid. If you want to know interesting facts about octopuses, click here.

Till date more than 300 species of squid have been discovered. The size of the normal squids hover in around 50-60 cm. while the giant squid can reach up to 13 meters.

They can swim faster than any other invertebrate.

They have the largest eye in the animal kingdom. The giant squid have the eyeballs of the size of a basketball.

Squid show sexual dimorphism. A mature female is larger than the mature male squid.

They have a very large brain and are considered to be very intelligent.

They possess fins, but unlike any other marine animal, fins are not their primary source of locomotion. They swim backwards i.e, they swim tail first rather than head first.

Unlike other molluscs squid don't have any outer shell covering their body. The hardest part of their body is the beak. The beak is made up of chitin and it is used to kill prey.

They are carnivorous i.e, they eat crusteceans, fish and smaller squids.

Due to their visual similarities, squid are some times mistaken for the octopus. Unlike Octopuses the squid have 10 arms(8 arms and 2 tentacles). Like the octopus they squirt dark ink to distract predators and escape.

Their skin is covered with chromatophores. Due to this they can change their color to match their surroundings. Like fishes they also possess gills.

The giant squid is the largest invertebrate animal in the world. The Humboldt squid is very aggressive and it some times even attacks sharks.

Some squid have bio-luminescent organs in their body due to which they are able to glow in the dark.

The giant squid can grow up to 60 ft and weights up to 1000 lbs. They have a large beak which is very sharp and resists bending. The beak is made up of chitin and it is used to kill its prey.

Squid have three hearts. Their blood contains hemocyanin(a copper rich protein)in place of hemoglobin like ours.

Many species of squid are considered food in many countries.

The life span for a common squid is around 1 to 2 years.

Thanks for reading. I hope you have learned something new and interesting.