Introduction

MONGOOSE
The mongoose is a favorite family pet in Asia because it is such an effective snake killer. About 3 feet [9 dm] long, the mongoose weighs about 10 pounds [4.5 kg]. It has short legs, yet is a fast runner and quick in movement. This little creature is gentle around people, and was clearly designed to protect them from poisonous snakes. Even if a cobra bites a baby mongoose, the venom will not bother it. Venom antibodies are in mongoose body, blood, and nerve cells. Although it may never have seen a dangerous snake until fully grown, yet a mongoose will instantly know to attack and kill that snake, and how to do it.

CATS' EYES-The eyes of a cat, and many other animals, are able to see well when it is too dark for humans to see hardly anything. One reason is the reflective layer of cells, just below the light receptors in the retina. As it enters the eye, if a particle of tight (called a photon) misses a light receptor, ft is reflected back-from the back side through the light receptor cells for a second chance to be seem The eyes of animals, with such a reflective layer, shine in the dark when a flashlight is turned toward them. Most of these are animals which are nocturnal; that is, they prefer to be active at night.

BATS-Bats are classified as mammals and are the only flying mammals in existence. They sleep during the day in caves and come out at night to hunt for food.

Specialized features enable the bat to fly, yet all those features had to be placed there together in the beginning. Its pelvic girdle is rotated 180° to that of other mammals. That means it is backwards to yours and mine. The knees bend opposite to ours also. This is ideal for bats, but an impossible situation for evolutionary theory to explain. The pelvis, legs, knees, and feet of a bat are structured so that they can sleep, while hanging upside down at night from rocks and trees.

Young bats have special infantile teeth with inside tooth hooks on them. These allow the immature bats to hold onto the thick hair on their mother's shoulders. Without those juvenile teeth, few bats would survive to adulthood. It would be equally hazardous to the bat race if the babies lacked the instinct to grip the fur with their teeth.

The sonar abilities of bats surpasses man's copy of ft. In a darkened room with fine wires strung across it, bats fly about and never touch them. Their supersonic sound signals bounce off the wires and return to the bats, who then make use of echolocation to avoid them.

(There is a true bird, the oilbird, which flies in and out of dark caves using similar echolation structures. Using sonar, porpoises and whales do the same thing in the water.)

Bats have complicated flaps of skin around their nostrils, and special structures in their ears, which they use to emit and receive high-frequency sound waves. The bat emits bursts of sound of frequencies up to 32,000 per second. Yet we cannot hear these sounds, or anything else above 12,000 waves per second. We can be thankful that we cannot hear those sounds, for it would make a terrible racket all night longs

This sonar system of the bats is more efficient and sensitive, ounce for ounce, watt for watt, than man-made radar and sonar.

Using their echo location method, bats easily find flying insects in the dark, and thousands are caught every nights A bat will catch hundreds of soft-bodied, silent-flying moths, gnats, and other insects in a single hour.

The bat, Nlctophllus geoffroyl, can detect fruit flies 100 feet [304 dm] away by echo location. It will catch as many as five in one seconds

Another species of bat, the horseshoe bat of Europe, has elaborate "leaves" on its nose, which act as a horn to focus its orientation sounds in a narrow beam. Turning its head from side to side, the beam sweeps out, scanning the area before ft.

Incredibly, another species of bat uses its sonar to locate fish underwater) This type of bat only eats fish and can locate them below the surface of the water with its sonar!

There is a problem of physics here: Although this bat has a well-developed system of frequency-modulated ("FM") sonar, sound loses much of its energy in passing from air into water, and from water into air. The high-pitched sounds must go from the air into water, echo off the fish, return through the water, then into the air and back to the bat. How can these bats locate underwater fish using this system? Apparently they succeed by flying close to the water as they emit their bursts of sound.

The bat is able to hear sound frequencies of 150,000 cycles per second, whereas man can only hear 15,000 cycles per second. The bat emits sounds of 70,000 cycles per second, at a rate of 10 impulses per second while at rest, and up to 100 impulses per second when in flight.

High-frequency waves are transmitted through the mouth (or nostrils in some bats) from a specialized larynx, and the echoes are picked up by large and specialized ears.

A special, small muscle is in each outer ear. These muscles contract-and automatically shut the ears just before ft emits a sound, and then open them to receive the echo! That is high-tech! Imagine trying to coordinate those ear muscles with 100 squeaks per second made by the mouth!

The randomness of harmful mutations is supposed to have made all that?

This sonar has marvelous discriminatory capacities, but why this is so is not understood by researchers. In a bat swarm, cave, or out in the night air, a bat can identify its own sound-from among thousands of sounds emitted by other moving bats! It has the ability to detect its own signals even though they may be 2,000 times fainter than background noises!

Before leaving the bat, consider the arctiid moths. This small moth avoids being caught by bats by producing sounds which are believed to confuse the echos which return to the bats!

POLAR BEAR-The polar bear has special coarse pads of fur on its feet to keep them from freezing as it walks on the ice. They also enable it not to slip. Nine feet [29 km] tall and weighing 1,000 pounds [454 kg], it can easily run 18 miles per hour on ice.

Diving into the ocean, R swims in water that is extremely frigid. Because it contains salt, ocean water does not solidify into ice until it is 26°F [2°C]. So it is very cold water! Yet the bear has no difficulty maintaining a body temperature of 99°F [37°C]. In addition to excellent fur, he has an inner 3 inch [7.62 cm] layer of fat. This fat not only keeps him warm, but helps him keep his 1,000 pounds [454 kg] afloat.

GIRAFFE-Charles Darwin wrote in his Origin of the Species, that the giraffe was just a regular animal that grew a long neck to reach the higher branches. Poor Charlie did not know much about giraffes! There is far more to a giraffe than merely "a long neck"!

The giraffe has the most powerful heart in the animal kingdom. This is due to the fact that it has double the normal blood pressure. This high blood pressure is required to pump blood all the way up to its brain.

The giraffe's blood pressure is two or three times that of a healthy man, and probably is the highest in the world. Because the giraffe has such a long neck (10-12 feet (30-37 dm] in length), its heart must exert an immense force to pump blood through the carotid artery to the brain. The giraffe's heart is huge; it weighs 25 pounds [11 kg], is 2 feet [61 cm] long, and has walls up to 3 inches [7.62 cm] thick.

In contrast, the brain of any animal is a very delicate structure and is not able to stand high blood pressure. What happens when the giraffe bends over to take a drink from a pond? Obviously, we hate here an impossible situation. High pressure is needed to get blood to the brain, yet that very pressure should destroy the brain when it lowers its head to the ground.

Four carefully thought-out design factors nicely solve this problem: (1) The giraffe has in his jugular veins a series of one-way check valves. These immediately close as soon as the head is lowered! But there is still a large amount of blood in the carotid artery; too much. (2) That extra blood Is immediately shunted to a special spongy tissue, located near the brain and filled with small blood vessels, which absorbs it. In addition, (3) the cerebrospinal fluid, which bathes the brain and spinal column itself, produces a counter-pressure to prevent rupture or capillary leakage. Last but not least, (4) the walls of the giraffe's arteries are thicker than those of any other mammal.

SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST
The theory Of evolution is based on the idea that, in any given environment, only a certain organism will succeed and all others will fail and die out.

The monkey is said to have developed a tail so it can climb trees better, but the gibbon, manx cat and bear climb trees and they have no tails. The domestic cat climbs trees and has a tail, but does not use n for that purpose.

The horse has uncrowned teeth, long legs, and a bushy tail so it will be "fit for survival." The cow grazes in the same field and has crowned teeth, shorter legs, and a tail with a tuft on the end, and does just as well.

Why does the female duke of burgundy butterfly walk on six legs, while its mate only walks on four?

Evolutionists say that plants evolved berries to aid seed distribution by animals. Why then are some berries poisonous?

The queen ant produces worker ants which are sterile and thus unable to pass on improvements to offspring-nor receive them from their ancestors) How then could the worker bee evolve? The queen produces all the bees. (More on this in chapter 40.)

Cats descend trees tail first, but leopards survive just as well as the only member of the cat family that descends head first. Why then did the others "evolve" the pattern of going down tail first?

Evolutionists maintain that feathers evolved for the purpose of flight. Why then do such birds as ostriches and penguins not fly? How can bats fly, when they have no feathers?

Why do insects and birds which are in identical environments-have different colors?

BEAVER-The American beaver dams up the water to form artificial ponds, and prepares fortresses in them in which it can overwinter with its family.

These dams are not essential to the beaver's existence, for there are beavers in Europe which do not go through all the complicated procedures required to make dams; they just do not make them at all.

Cutting down trees, the beaver limbs them and uses them to build a dam. In order to get trees from a farther distance, it builds canals to float the timber down to the pond it is making. Sometimes large stones are placed as part of the foundation of the dam. In the course of time, the dam may stretch to as much as 300 feet [914 dm] in width, and be from 6 to 8 feet [18-24 dm] in height.

The weight of water in these dams can be considerable, so the beaver will, when it thinks it necessary, prepare an upper and lower dam to take pressure off the main one. In this way, if too much rain falls, the main dam is more likely to be protested. The lower dam catches the overflow and covers the base of the larger dam, and thus partially counterbalances the water pressure in it.

The upper dam is higher up in the valley above the main pond. The beaver senses when there is likelihood of flood problems, and it is then that this earnest worker constructs the higher one. The upper dam will always be constructed oversize, in order to hold an extra amount of water; more than would normally flow into it.

The beaver's lodge is made in the main pond and is placed half in and half out of it, with two entrance holes, leading into tunnels usually 7-10 feet [21-30 dm], which open under water. The lodge has a low dome on it, with walls 4-5 feet [1215 dm] thick, made of earth, mud and sticks. The dimensions inside it is about 7 foot by 8 feet [21x24 dmj by 1 foot, 4 inches high [40.64 cm]. -Just the right size to keep the beavers warm in wintertime.

BLUE WHALE-The largest creature which has ever lived on our planet-is still alive: the blue whale. It can reach a length of 100 feet [30 m] and weigh up to 170 tons [154 mt]. That is 340,000 pounds [154,224 kg], or the weight of 2,267 people weighing about 150 pounds [68 kg] each. This fantastic creature has seven stomachs and eats a million calories a day. Its tongue, alone, weighs more than an elephant! It has eight tons [7 mt] of blood and a 1,000-pound [453 kg] heart to pump it. Lastly, the blue whale is one of the longest-living animals, for it can live 120 years.

KANGAROO -The marsupials are the pouched mammals. Two of the best-known of these is the American opossum (the only marsupial in North America) and the Australian kangaroo.

An egg develops inside the mother marsupial, and when it is born it is no larger than a bean! R is blind, deaf, hairless, and looks somewhat like a tiny worm. A newborn opossum is smaller than a honey bee, and six will fit in a spoon. There are 12-15 in each litter.

Emerging from the birth canal, this baby ought to drop onto the ground and die right there. But

no, it holds tightly to the fur of its mother, and slowly crawls a sizable distance over to the pouch. We are told that the mother often does not even know when her baby is born, so she does nothing to help It in its journey.

Moving slowly, it makes the trip with difficulty, but eventually it arrives and crawls into the pouch. Why does it know to hang onto the mother and crawl to the pouch? How does it succeed in doing it? How can a worm successfully accomplish the task?

Down into the pouch it goes, and there it fastens onto a nipple. Having done so, the nipple enlarges, locking the little creature tightly to it. There it remains for many months in its warm, safe home as it eats and grows. A wombat will remain thus attached to its mother for half a year until it grows to the size of a mouse.

The red kangaroo (Megalela rufa) can make two kinds of milk simultaneously: milk suitable for the new-born young in one gland and, in the other gland, milk for a young kangaroo that is already out hopping along beside it much of the time! The two kinds of milk differ considerably in nutritional proportions.

Earth Wolf-This is the South African "earth wolf." It looks like a regular wolf, but only eats insects! It loves termites and will eat 200,000 of them in one night!

With its long tongue, it can lick above its eye or under its chin. A sticky saliva is on this tongue, and the wolf uses it to catch the insects-and clean its face afterward. At night when the termites come out of their rest, the wolf catches and eats them, and claws into the nest as well. Its teeth and fangs are used only to protect itself against other animals which might try to attack ft. Otherwise, it does not use its teeth for any foods

Oryx-The oryx is an antelope which lives in the hot deserts of Africa and Arabia. It has long curved antlers and travels in herds of 6 to 12 animals. But when it is time to bear young, several herds will unite for greater protection, with about 60 animals in each herd. The oryx has its young only during the rainy season. If it did not do this, it would not have enough water to nurse its babies properly.

It lives in the desert where the heat can rise to 110°F [43.3°C]. A thermostat is in its nose and as the temperature rises, the oryx gets hotter and it begins breathing more heavily to cool its blood. That nasal thermostat is used to increase blood how to many small nasal veins where the blood is air-cooled before going to the brain. Most animals only have one artery to the brain, but the oryx has several.

CAMEL-The camel was designed to live where there is little food and less water. It has one of the most efficient water conservation systems of any animal. The camel can go two weeks without water. Both the large bowel and the kidneys conserve water in the body. 

The camel's digestive system extracts 40 times as much water as does the digestive tract of a cow. Its kidneys are far more efficient in water removal than are other animal kidneys. Even its nose is designed to catch and condense water in air about to be exhaled. When food is scarce, the camel can change part of its wastes back into usable protein! Last, but not least, the camel can readjust its body temperature by a full 12°F! Few animals could survive such a temperature change inside their bodies.

LEMMINGS-These look like short-tailed relatives of the field mice. They live on the bare tops of mountains in northern Europe and also on the Arctic tundra.

Every so many years, their numbers grow to such an extent that there is not enough food for them all. When this happens, suddenly they will march to the sea. Hordes of them will swim across rivers, travel across plains, and climb over mountains. On they go until they reach the ocean. Plunging in, they begin swimming, and soon drown.

This is an emergency means of keeping down the population. It is necessary to protect the environment from contamination from dying mice..

PROPORTIONAL FACTS-An animal's proportions required advance planning, for its structure and shape has to match its size and weight. If a fly was the size of a dog, its legs would be crushed. If a dog was the size of a fly, it could not maintain body heat. No insect the size of a man could, in earth's gravitational field, walk, fly, run, or even crawl an inch.

All things being even, a small animal must have a faster metabolism than a large animal. Otherwise it will not be able to replace all the energy it is so quickly using up. A shrew or hummingbird must constantly be eating or either will die of starvation within a short time, while a large animal could go without food for longer periods.

WONDER NET-Many creatures have the "wonder net." This is a special arrangement of blood vessels that some animals use to conserve heat.

A man standing with his bare feet in cold water would not survive long, but a wading bird can stand in cold water all day, and the whale and seal swim in the arctic with naked fins and flippers, continually bathing them in freezing water.

All such warm-blooded creatures have to maintain a steady body temperature. Yet how do they avoid becoming sick when the cold continually presses against their thinly-insulated extremities?

They use what scientists call the "countercurrent exchange." It is a method of heat exchange used in industry. In animals it is called rate Irablle, or "wonder net." The blood in one vessel flows in the opposite direction to that of an adjacent vessel, and in this way warm blood passes on its heat to the colder blood. It is similar to a double layer of circulating blood.

SLOTH-The sloth has no soles on its feet, for it does not need them; it hardly ever stands on the ground. Spending most of its life in the trees, it likes to hang upside down from the branches! In order to rest, move, and sleep suspended from trees, several factors in a sloth need to be different than other mammals. Yet, because it has them, it is obvious that the sloth can only be happy_ when hanging upside down from trees.

Here is another example of careful design: All other mammals have fur which hangs downward from the top, but the hair of the sloth has a part running along his bottom sides, thus causing the hair to hang opposite to the other mammals. In this way, rain runs right off this upside-down creature.

FEET, SMELL, AND TEETH-The horse has a single hard hoof so it can run on the hard ground of the plains. The cow has a split goof, so it can walk on much softer ground without inking in. Its two hoofs spread and give better support. The caribou's hoof is even wider, so it will not sink into the snow. But during the winter, the inner part of the hoof shrinks; leaving a sharp outer edge which prevents slippage on the ice.

Night animals will not be able to see as well, so they have a better sense of smell than most of the animals roaming about in the daytime.

When a squirrel, rat, or beaver wishes to cut something with its chisellike front teeth, the lower jaw is slid forward. In this position, its grinding teeth will not meet. In order to grind up what it has cut off, it slides its jaw backward again. In this position, the cutting teeth fit into a vacant space behind the upper incisors, and the grinding teeth match each other.

POLAR BEAR-The polar bear has a head shaped in such a way that its eyes, ears, and nose remain above water as it swims. The feet are much larger than those of other bears, so it can walk on snow. There is webbing between those large feet, so it can swim. The soles of the feet are covered with hair, which prevents slippage on the ice.

RAT-The rat has 16 teeth; 12 molars to grind and 4 front incisors to bite food, crack hard corn, and chew through wood. the top two front incisors go behind the bottom front teeth. The very hard outer tooth coating, called enamel, is found only on the front of the incisors. Therefore the back sides of them are ground down by the top teeth to a razor-sharp edge.

Engineers at General Electric Corporation wanted to design self-sharpening saw blades. So they studied a rat's front teeth in order to figure out how to do it in the very best way. Then, on a metal lathe, they copied the design and prepared a saw blade that has the same angle in relation to the metal it is cutting. As it slices through the metal, small pieces of the blade are cut away by the metal, thus always keeping the blade sharp. That self-sharpening blade lasts six times longer than any other blade they had previously been able to make.All because researchers studied the front teeth of a rat.

RIBLETS-You do not know what a riblet is? It is not an animal. Airlines in the United States are saving $300,000 a year because of riblets. Here is the story behind them:

Scientists at NASA tried to figure out how certain water creatures could swim so rapidly. They studied porpoises and sharks for months. The friction of the porpoise's body as it moves through the water ought to be great enough to slow it quite a bit. Yet the amount of drag that should be present-simply was not there! Given the drag of the water and the amount of flipper motion, something was enabling the porpoise to swim much faster through the water than it ought to be able to swim.

Then the experts figured it out: riblets. These are small triangular-shaped groves on the outer surface of the porpoise's skin. They are also found on fast-swimming sharks, but never on the slow ones. These grooves run from front to back. As the water touches the body, it is carried along in those riblets, and this reduces the amount of frictional drag as the large creature swims rapidly through the water.

NASA's Langley Research Center developed the riblets and tested them in wind tunnels. They then asked 3M Company to manufacture riblets in large, flat vinyl sheets. When these sheets were placed on the outside of large airplanes, the resulting savings were immense. It now costs airline companies a lot less in fuel to fly a jet liner a given distance.

MOLE-The mole is. not blind, but has good eyes although often hidden by fur. It may not run very well, but it surely can digl A mole's front feet are small spades, with well-designed claws on the ends. Its nose and tail have special nerve endings which can strongly sense vibrations. These vibration sensors obviously were carefully designed, for they have thousands of parts. With them, a mole can actually hear worms and grubs crawling several feet away in solid dirt. The mole is not mining the ground, but is eating the grubs which destroy the plants.

HYENA-When they are not running from lions, packs of spotted hyenas in Africa spend their time watching vultures! They in turn watch the hyena packs. When either finds a dead animal, all gather and eat it together without disturbing one another.

The hyena has a strong stomach acid that is able to digest the most rotten meat, without becoming sick. Yet that strong acid never injures the wall of its stomach.

WEIGHT LIFTERS-A female chimpanzee can lift 1,260 pounds [571.5 kg] with one arm, whereas a man of the same size could only lift about 1/6th as much.

The hero shrew of Uganda, Africa, measures only six inches [15 an], yet it can support a 160pound [72.5 kg] man on its back. No human could survive under a proportionate load.

MANATEE-When Columbus came to America on his second trip (in 1493), he saw mermaids and said they looked ugly. What he saw were manatees. These are the large "sea cows" which feed on vegetation in rivers not far from the ocean. This giant mammal stands on its tail in the water and walks aroundl Seven feet (21 dm] tall, it weighs 1,400 pounds [635 kg], and balances on its tail.

LIGHT SLEEPERS -The giraffe only sleeps half an hour every 24-hour day. The tiny shrew (the smallest mammal in North America) does the same. All other mammals and most other animal life need much more sleep.

OXPECKER-The oxpecker bird lives in Africa and lands on the necks of various grazing animals and drills out burrowing insects and cleans wounds. When it lands on the neck of the giraffe it has a field day. The animals welcome the oxpecker bird for he helps safeguard their health.

PRONGHORN ANTELOPE-The pronghorn antelope in western U.S.A., can run 50 miles [80 km] an hour. It lives where there are hot summers and cold winters, so it has short fur and long guard hairs. In the summer the guard hairs stand up, and in the winter they lay down flat and seal over the fur beneath, keeping it warmer.

The pronghorn has a special signal system that can be seen by other antelope two miles away. A special muscle in its rump pulls white hair over brown hair; a raised, shows brown hair. At a distance, the sudden change to white hair and then back to brown looks like a flashing mirror. This warns other antelope of danger; coyote packs are approaching! One antelope signals and others signal; then all run. As they run the signal keeps flashing on and off for a short time.

HIPPOPOTAMUS-The hippopotamus is the second largest land animal in the works (next to the elephant). It is 14 feet [43 dm] long, 41/2 feet [14 dm] tall, and weighs 4 ton [3,628 kg]. But in the water, it only weighs 116th as much: 1,200 pounds [544 kg].

During the day it sleeps in the river, or walks around underwater, as fish clean ticks and bugs off its skin. At dusk it comes up on land and nightly consumes 150 pounds [68 kg] of grass, traveling as much as 20 miles [32 km] to do so.

SEA OTTER-The California sea otter is a playful creature. It is also a tool user. When it finds a clam or abalone shell for dinner, it picks up both the clam and a stone from the ocean bottom and carries both to the surface. Then, leisurely, it floats on its back and cracks the shell open, using its chest as an anvil. Placing the clam on its strong tummy-the sea otter hits it with the stone, opening it.

SPRINGBOK GAZELLE-
The Springbok gazelle in the Kalahari Desert of Africa is only 3 feet [9 dm] high, but every so often will spring 10-12 feet (30-36.5 dm] straight up! It does this to look for enemies at a distance. This would be equivalent to a 6-foot [18 dm] man jumping 24 feet [73 dm] high.

One guard will spring up periodically, looking for lions and leopards, while others in the herd feed. A white patch on its tail goes up when it spots enemies, and off it runs. Then all the others speed away at 60 miles [96.5 km] per hour.

DESERT BURRO-The desert burro in the American southwest lives in the heat all summer long. Four feet tall, it normally weighs 300 pounds [136 kg], but can lose 75 pounds [34 kg] of water before needing a drink.

Normal blood in mammals is 97 percent water. The desert burro can lose 30 percent of the water in its blood without hurting it. It has special blood cells and a strong heart. If a man lost 6 percent of the water in his blood, he would fall unconscious; 10 percent and he would have a heart attack and die.

MARMOT-The marmot is like a woodchuck, but instead is a "rock chuck." It lives under boulders so bears will not get it. When the time comes to dig its den for a long 9-month hibernation in the cold country it lives in, the marmot must know the soil and terrain well. If it makes its winter home in the wrong place, water, draining in, may flood and drown the little creature in the spring before hibernation is ended. The marmot's den is 20 feet [61 dm] below ground, sometimes with a 300-foot [914 dm] tunnel leading to it. So it always stays in high ground, and away from depressions or ravines when digging its winter home.

MAMMALS FROM REPTILES-Any classical evolutionist will explain that mammals descended from reptiles. Consider some of the many differences:

1- The basic structure of mammals is quite different than that of reptiles.

2 - Reptiles breathe in a totally different manner than mammals, for reptiles lack a diaphragm.

3 - Mammals primarily excrete urea, whereas reptiles excrete uric acid.

4 - Mammals have fur (although some, such as whales and elephants have relatively little); reptiles have scales.

5 - Mammals have much larger brains than reptiles have.

6 - Mammals maintain a constant body temperature, but reptiles do not.

7 - Mammals produce milk, but reptilian infants must get their nourishment from the egg.

8 - There are important vertebral differences between mammals and reptiles.

9 - Mammals have different blood. Theirs is nucleated and markedly different in several ways. The blood of reptiles is un-nucleated.

10 - Mammals have three ear bones, whereas reptiles only have one. The inner ear of mammals is much more complex.

11 - Mammals have a palate separating the mouth from the nose cavity; reptiles lack it.

12 - Mammals consistently have a single dorsal aorta (their largest artery). Reptiles have two. How could one circulatory system change into a different one?

13 - Mammals have a complex set of teeth, including temporary infantile ("milk") teeth. Reptiles have single peg-teeth.

COW-There are millions of milk glands in the udder of a cow. Each day it drinks 25 gallons [94.6 liters] of water and produces 5 gallons [18.9 liters] of milk.

People have one chamber in their stomach; cows have four chambers. Grass is ground up by the back grinder teeth and is then swallowed. That grass enters the first chamber (the "rumin"), which is 3/4's of the total stomach area. This holds lots of water. Food churns and ferments at body temperature [102°F; 39°C]. The heat multiplies bacteria which make B vitamins, which help the cow make milk.

There are also many protozoa in the stomach. They were in the water and grass that was eaten. The protozoa are killed by strong stomach acid in the fourth chamber-and become protein for the cow and its milk.

The food now passes into the second chamber (the "reticulum"), where a muscle pushes it back up the throat and the cow, lying on the grass, chews on this "cud" with its mouth. This breaks it up even better. Once again it is swallowed.

Now the cud is sent down to the third chamber (the "omassium"), where moisture is squeezed out of ft. From there it passes into the fourth chamber (the "abelmasson"), where strong acids break the food down for digestion in the intestines. Gallons of water are poured into this fourth chamber.

How could such a complicated stomach mechanism ever evolve?

POCKET GOPHER-This little fellow has big cheeks with pouches in them, which extend from below its eyes down to its shoulders. This is its grocery sack, in which it pokes carrots, potatoes and other food which it finds. It will chew and swallow that food later.

The gopher digs long shallow tunnels, each of which may extend 50 feet [152 dm] or so. When it goes down into its hole, it seals the entrance to keep snakes out. With its long sharp claws, it can dig rapidly. Because the wear on those claws is terrific, they need to be fast-growing. So its front claws grow 20 inches [50.8 cm] a year.

Crawling around through the dirt is hard on eyes, but the gopher has no problem. There is a gland near each eye which produces jelly. This coats the eye, and when it blinks, the dirt falls off. Then the eye is reooated by fresh jelly.

But the gopher does more than crawl,-it runs through its tunnels. And it runs both forward and

backward! As it runs backwards through the dark, curving tunnels, it raises its tail and feels the sides,-and never runs into the wall!

The gopher can both bite and dig at the same time,-and do it without getting dirt in its mouth! This is because its lips are closed behind its teeth.

ELEPHANT- MUCH could be said about the elephant, for it is a large subject-in more ways than one. Its fantastic trunk can pick up an immense log, a tiny child, or a pin! It is also used to hose itself down with water or dust, or scratch its back with a stick! The elephant has a very slow metabolism and heart beat, yet can outrun a man. Its cooling system is in its large ears! Each ear, weighing over 100 pounds [45 kg], are filled with many small blood vessels. To conserve heat, the ears are held close to the body, and to cool off they are held outward. On very hot days they are flapped.

KOALA-This is a 2-foot-tall [62 cm], 20 pound [9 kg] marsupial, which is the Australian "teddy bear." It spends its entire life in the tall eucalyptus trees, eating eucalyptus leaves.

As with other marsupials, baby koalas are born looking like tiny worms, then crawl into the mother's pouch. Six months later they emerge and are 8 inches [20.32 cm] long. At that time they crawl out and onto their mother's backs and remain there for another six monthsl

All the food and water of this animal come from eucalyptus leaves (the leaves are 65 percent water). No other animal dares to eat those leaves, for they are poisonous if swallowed. But the koala has a special stomach acid which neutralizes the strong chemicals in eucalyptus oil.

The koala has a special intestine which is able to digest the leaf cellulose. Tiny one-celled protozoa provide the needed digestion. Passing into another chamber, strong acids digest and eat the protozoa.

It is said that man is the ruler of the world "because he has an opposable thumb." The little koala bear laughs at that suggestion, for he has an opposable thumb on each foot,-and two of them on each handl

With but two exceptions, the pouch of every marsupial opens towards its head. The exceptions are the koala and the wombat, which open to the rear.

RIVER OTTER- The otter may be slow on land, but is one of the fastest mammals in the water. The otter has 36 special whiskers attached to nerve pads in its cheeks. As it swims rapidly through muddy water, it can sense the faint shock wave sent out by a passing fish. From that sensation, the otter can tell what type of fish it is and where it went! 

Even if the fish is resting, it will emit electrical currents which the otter can sense. With its paws, the otter digs for crayfish, and can locate them by sensing their body electricity. When the river is covered with ice, the otter will go up beneath the ice and breathe out, and then take the air back in and breathe out again. This keeps melting and weakening the ice. Soon it can break through.

SLOTHS AND ALGAE- In the South American jungles can be found the three-toed sloth and the two-toed sloth. A certain green algae gets onto the coat of the three-toed sloth and lives there. This is helpful to the sloth for it turns him green and hides him from enemies. He looks like a clump of leaves.

In the same forests live the two-toed sloth. A brown algae likes to make its home on him-and turns him the brown color of the tree bark he lives on! He looks like a piece of tree hanging down from a limb.

The difference lies in the structure of the hair on the two sloths. The transverse cracks in the first type of hair seem to attract green algae, whereas the longitudinal grooves in the second type of hair are more favorable to brown algae.

ANTELOPE SQUIRREL- This little desert squirrel lives in the Sonoran desert. When it is hot outside, the squirrel goes down into its underground tunnels to cool off. It has special skin inside its nose that senses moisture. As the little squirrel exhales air, this nasal skin soaks up most of the moisture in that exhaled air-and puts it back into its body! Certain other animals, such as the camel, do this also.

STAR-NOSED MOLE- This little mole has a star the size of a dime on its nose. With that star it is able to sense vibrations in the ground or in the water. As it digs, this mole stops and listens. It can hear the vibrations of an earthworm or similar creature, and identify the direction it is coming from. The mole obtains both its food and water from earthworms.

As with other moles, the star-nosed mole has sense organs in its tail that enable it to run backwards through the curves and sharp turns of tunnels, without colliding with the walls.

Also, as do other moles, the star-nosed mole has a sonar similar to bats. Opening its mouth and emitting a high-pitched squeak, as it runs forward through the tunnels, the returning echoes are sent to its brain, where they are interpreted and tell it what is ahead in the darkness.

KANGAROO RAT- The kangaroo rat (Dipodemys microps) of the American southwest, is able to live on the leaves of the saltbush, Atriplex, which most other creatures avoid. The outer layer of these leaves is very salty in contrast with the tasty inside portion of the leaf. The little rat has special teeth, with which it is able to shave off the salty outside portion of the leaves before eating the inside part.

WHALE-Evolutionists maintain that the whale is descended from land animals. They say this because it is warm-blooded and nurses its young with milk. But those are among the few things which whales have in common with mammals on the land!

The whale has no neck to turn its head, and, because its eyeball is fixed, the whale must move its entire body to shift its line of sight. Its eyeball is ideal for seeing underwater, whereas land animals generally cannot do so. A special sclerotic coat protects its eye at great depths underwater.

Whales produce excellent sonar. They have the ability to detect objects miles away through echolocation. Not only can they locate distant objects, but they can tell if they are neutral, friend, or enemy. According to the evolutionary theory of similarities, creatures with sonar and radar are all related; in other words, one is ancestral to another. So the whale, which according to the theory came from a mammal that crawled into the water,-must have descended from the bat!

The whale's nose and mouth are structured so that no water enters the body under the pressure of fast swimming or depth diving.

Its forelimbs are jointless paddles or flippers; there is no fossil evidence that they evolved from animal arms.

Except around the nose, the whale lacks the hair and fur that land animals have. Instead, it has thick layers of blubber to keep it warm. It has no sweat glands.

The ears of a whale are designed remarkably differently than land animals. Sound is carried to the eardrums through a tube from a point beneath the surface near the eyes. It can hear other whales at a great distance.

 The whale has special breathing equipment so that it can remain underwater for as long as two hours. Which land animal did it inherit that ability from? While down at great depths, its body can withstand immense pressure that would crush any land animal that tried to go down there.

The outer skin is marked with lines not found in land mammals. These lines help streamline water flow, giving it maximum speed for the least effort.

In the mouth of the baleen whale are unique horny plates with fringed edges, that permit it to strain out ocean water-and catch tiny plant and animal plankton-the smallest creatures in the ocean-for food.

The windpipe and gullet separate at about the same point in land animals, but in whales the two are located differently so the baby whale, as it nurses, will not get milk down its windpipe and choke. If a whale choked underwater, it would cough and that would carry enough water down its windpipe to kill it.

PRAIRIE DOGS- Daniel Bernoulie was an 18th century physicist who first stated the principle that the pressure exerted by a moving fluid decreases as the fluid moves faster. Bernoulie's principle may sound complicated to you and me, but prairie dogs understand it well.

These little creatures admirably apply this principle in making their underground tunnel cities.

The burrows have two openings, one at ground level, the other located on a raised mound. They work hard to make that second opening higher than the normal ground level.

Having done this, the Bernoulie principle takes effect and nicely aereates their burrows with fresh air.

ARCTIC HARE- When you follow the tracks of the arctic hare in the snow, they will lead on for a distance and then stop. The tracks end! Did it take flight?

Carefully examining the track, you will see that the hare has doubled back on those same tracks. Following it back, you will find that after about a fourth of a mile, the doubling back tracks end entirely. The hare is gonel

Scanning about, you will see that, 12 feet [37 dm) away, the tracks begin again, leading off in a different direction. Who taught the arctic hare to do that?

PORPOISE- The bottlenosed dolphin is also called a porpoise. Some scientists and naturalists call it by the one name and some by the other.

The porpoise has a special valve in its air hole which closes when it submerges. In this way, no water goes into its lungs. Lacking that single feature, the porpoise (and all whales) would quickly die for they could catch no food without drowning.

Coming to the surface, it exhales 90 percent of the air in its lungs, whereas people only exhale 15-20 percent. This enables the porpoise to remain underwater longer.

It has 40 special valves in its bronchial tubes, and these close so the air in its lungs cannot escape while it is underwater, opening its mouth and catching and swallowing fish.

Porpoises do not breath automatically as we do, and so they cannot sleep as we do. Each breath of air must be purposely taken. If they became unconscious, they would fall to the ocean floor and perish.

Porpoises get hot while swimming but they cannot sweat or pant, so there are extra blood vessels in their flippers and tail which, through heat exchange, release heat off into the water.

As with whales, there are stripes or corrugations etched into the skin of porpoises that enable it to swim faster with the same amount of effort than they otherwise could. Accuracy in directional swimming is also improved by this means. The resultant reduction of water resistance makes it possible for porpoises to sustain speeds that are about ten times more than otherwise would be possible with the same muscle power.

Porpoises are very powerful creatures and crush vicious barracudas with one snap of their jaws, and kill deadly sharks merely by ramming them with their snout. It is sonar that enables them to be able to plan at a distance and win the battle with those terrible creatures. Yet porpoises are intelligent enough to know that man will not hurt them (?), and they have never been known to attack people.

You have probably read that careful research indicates that the porpoise is the most intelligent water creature in the world, and probably equal in intelligence to the larger dogs. Dogs, in turn, are more intelligent than most any other animal. Chimpanzees are considered the most intelligent of the animals.

Porpoises use sonar (sonar = "sound navigational ranging") to locate food and enemies. They emit high-pitched squeaks, which rapidly travel outward, bounce off fish, reefs, and other surfaces, then return. Porpoises can even measure the size and distance of the fish with this technique. They probably can identify them as do whales with their sonar.

Porpoises have a special region in their head which contains a specialized type of fat. Scientists call it their "melon," for that is its shape. Because the speed of sound in the fatty tissue of the

melon is different than that of the rest of the body, this melon is used as a "sound lens" to collect sonar signals and interpret them to the brain. It focuses sound, just as a glass lens focuses light. The focused sound produces a small TV screen "sound picture" in the porpoise's mind-showing it the unseen things ahead of it in the murky water.

It has been discovered that the composition of this fatty lens can be altered by the porpoise in order to change sound speed through the melon-and thus change the focus of the lens to accord with variational factors in the surrounding water!

There is also evidence that tie composition of fat varies in different parts of the melon. This technique of doublet lens (two glass lenses glued together) is used in optical lenses in order to overcome chromatic aberrations, and produce higher-quality light lenses. The porpoise appears to be using a similar principle for its sound tense system!

You have just completed

Chapter 32 THE MARSUPIALS AND MAMMALS 
NEXT— 

Chapter 33 Evolution and Society Part 1