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Giraffes grow about 4 feet (1.2 meters) in their first year of life. A newborn giraffe is about 6 feet (1.9 meters) tall at birth and weighs about 150 pounds (68 kilograms). Many young giraffes, called calves, die from lion attacks during their first year of life. Once a giraffe reaches adulthood its height is often enough to protect it from lions. Adult giraffes, however, must still be careful of lions when they are bending down to drink water or rest. Usually giraffes will drink or rest in shifts so that at least one giraffe is always on the lookout for approaching predators. The giraffes‘ height and excellent vision give them a wide view of the grasslands where they live, making it easy to spot predators from a distance. Some scientists believe that other animals—such as zebras, antelope, and wildebeests—often congregate near giraffes to take advantage of their ability to see danger from a distance. The giraffe could be considered the early warning system of the African grasslands.
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Tarantulas give people the creeps because they have large, hairy bodies and legs. While these large spiders can take a painful bite out of a human, a tarantula’s venom has a low toxicity to people. Tarantulas move slowly on their eight hairy legs, but they are accomplished nocturnal predators. Insects are their main prey, but they also target bigger game, including frogs, toads, and mice. Tarantulas are burrowers and typically live in the ground. There are hundreds of tarantula species found in most of the world’s tropical, subtropical, and desert regions. They vary in color and behavior according to their specific environments. A tarantula doesn’t use a web to trap its prey, though it may spin a trip wire to signal an alert when something approaches its burrow. These spiders grab with their legs, inject paralyzing venom, and then bite their prey with their fangs. They also secrete digestive enzymes to liquefy their victims‘ bodies so that they can suck them up through their strawlike mouth openings. Yum! Tarantulas have few natural enemies, except for the parasitic pepsis wasp, which can paralyze a tarantula with its sting and lay its eggs on the spider’s body. When the wasp eggs hatch, the larvae chow down on the still living tarantula. Tarantulas shed their external skeletons in a process called molting. During the process, they also replace internal organs, such as stomach lining, and can even regrow lost legs.
even regrow lost legs. 4:25 A Biting Tarantula and Venomous Death Adder Jack finds

Space explorers go above and beyond on the job. Here are five cool things about these pioneers.
You won’t find baths or showers in space.

Hippopotamuses are large mammals found in sub-Saharan Africa. Their name comes from the Greek word for “river horse” because they’re often found in water, which helps them stay cool in the hot, tropical climate where they live.
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Scorpions are arachnids and have eight legs like their cousins—spiders, mites, and ticks. They can quickly grab an insect with their pincers and whip their telson, the poisonous tip of their tail forward and sting their prey. They use their poison to kill prey and to defend against predators. Scorpions look like small lobsters and may be the first animals to move from water to land hundreds of millions of years ago. They have been around since before the age of the dinosaurs. Fossils of scorpions from Scotland hundreds of millions of years ago show that their appearance hasn’t changed over the millennia, but they are now half the size of their ancient ancestors. Only 30 or 40 species around the world have strong enough poison to kill a person. Each species has a special type of venom that works well against a chosen prey. Scorpions typically eat insects, but when food is scarce, they can slow their metabolism to as little as one-third the typical rate for arthropods. This technique enables some species to use little oxygen and live on only one insect per year. Such survival skills allow scorpions to live in some of the planet’s toughest environments. Researchers have even frozen scorpions overnight, only to put them in the sun the next day and watch them thaw out and walk away. However, they are burrowing animals, so in areas of permafrost or heavy grasses, where loose soil is not available, scorpions may not be able to survive.
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When a great white shark is born, along with up to a dozen siblings, it immediately swims away from its mother. Born on the east and west coasts of North America, the south of Africa and southwest Australia, baby sharks are on their own right from the start. Their mother may see them only as prey. At birth the baby shark is already about 5 feet (1.5 meters) long; as it grows it may reach a length up to four times that. The pup (which is what a baby shark is called) will live its life at the top of the ocean’s food chain. But before it grows larger, the pup must avoid predators bigger than it is—including other great white sharks. Many baby sharks do not survive their first year. Young great white sharks eat fish (including other sharks) and rays. As they grow, the sharks’ favorite prey becomes sea mammals, especially sea lions and seals. Sharks count on the element of surprise as they hunt. When they see a seal at the surface of the water, sharks will often position themselves underneath the seal. Using their tails as propellers, they swim upward at a fast sprint, burst out of the water in a leap called a breach, and fall back into the water with the seal in their mouths. They can smell a single drop of blood from up to a third of a mile (0.53 kilometers) away. Sharks don’t chew their food; they rip off chunks of meat and swallow them whole. They can last a month or two without another big meal.
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Female black widows are shiny black, with a red-orange hourglass pattern on their abdomen. Male black widows are not black, but brown or gray with small red spots. Black widows are poisonous arachnids—animals that have a skeleton outside their body, a segmented body, and eight jointed legs. They are not insects. Their deadly poison is said to be 15 times stronger than rattlesnake venom. Black widows use a silk-like substance to weave tangled-looking webs, typically close to the ground in covered or dark places, such as near drain pipes or under logs. The female hangs upside down in the web to await her prey, exposing her bright markings as a warning to potential predators. The black widow senses vibrations to the web. When an unlucky intruder gets trapped, the spider immediately begins weaving its glue-like webbing around it. Insects such as flies, mosquitoes, or even larger prey like grasshoppers are typically caught. Once captured, the black widow injects its victims with poison, paralyzing them. The tips of the black widow’s legs are coated with an oily substance that prevents the black widow from getting caught in its own web. Adult male and female black widows live solitary lives, meeting only to breed. The female black widow lays approximately 200 eggs. The eggs incubate for some 20 days in a small, round papery sac that’s attached to the mother’s web. After hatching, the baby spiders stay in the cocoon for up to one month. Three species of poisonous North American spiders carry the common name black widow under the genus Latrodectus. Each species occupies a distinct region of North America, as their names suggest: Eastern black widows (L. mactans), northern black widows (L. variolus), and western black widows (L. hesperus). These three species have very similar physical and behavioral characteristics. The name “black widow” comes from the female’s habit of eating the male after mating.

 The female black widow is approximately 1.5 inches (38 millimeters) long. The male is about half the female’s size.

 The black widow is prey for birds and other spiders. Although poisonous, the black widow is not considered aggressive unless threatened. In fact, the male black widow is reclusive and hardly ever seen by humans. While the black widow’s poison is rarely fatal to humans, it can cause severe pain and nausea.
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The mountain lion goes by many names, including cougar, catamount, panther, red tiger, deer tiger, and puma. This cat can be found throughout much of South and North America. The mountain lion used to be found all over the United States, but now is primarily seen in the western U.S. An endangered subspecies of mountain lion also remains in Florida. These felines are comfortable in many different habitats and, aside from humans, have the widest geographic range of any land mammal in the Western Hemisphere. In North America, mountain lions eat mainly deer, but they also eat smaller animals, such as mice and rabbits. These cats have a poor sense of smell, but have excellent vision and hearing that help them hunt in the early morning and evening hours. Their powerful hind legs enable them to jump as far as 40 to 45 feet (12 to 13 meters). This carnivore stalks its prey until an opportunity arises to pounce. Mountain lions “cache” their prey, or hide it under leaves and soil, where they can come back and feed on it over the course of several days. Mountain lions don’t roar, but females have a loud scream, which is believed to attract males. Females have an average of two to four cubs per litter and give birth in a den. The cubs are born with spots, which usually disappear by the time they are roughly nine months old. Their eyes also change from blue to yellow by the time they reach 16 months old. By 18 months, the young cats leave their mom to go fend for themselves. Because of their size, strength, and predatory skills, mountain lions are considered one of the “big cats.” Tigers, leopards, cheetahs, and jaguars are also part of this grouping. Take the big cat quiz to see how much you know about these fierce felines. Then, just for fun, see which wild cat you’re most like with our personality quiz.
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From extra-fluffy fliers to chatty chirpers, these owls are utterly outstanding.
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Get the inside scoop on how these brown bears pack on the pounds to prepare for winter, and see before-and-after pictures of fat bears!
signal critters from deer to birds to bears that it’s time to gather food and find