World of Animals Book of the Animal Kingdom

Thanks to its various natural habitats, we share our planet with a startling array of creatures and critters. Each species has evolved over time to cope with environmental challenges and changes to the landscape – all in the pursuit of survival. While some didn’t make it, others thrived, and today the animal kingdom is populated with all manner of land, air and sea-dwelling characters. This newly revised edition of Book of the Animal Kingdom offers insight into the lives of some of the most fascinating among them, with in-depth profiles, amazing facts, and stunning illustrations and photography. From butterflies to flapjack octopuses, dragonflies to Komodo dragons, get ready to embark on a tour of the animal kingdom, animal-by-animal.…

In the fourth century BCE, Aristotle divided the world into animals and plants. The word ‘animal’ comes from the Latin animalis and means ‘having breath’. Animals were all the living creatures that moved and breathed, while plants were the ones that stayed put. For over 2,000 years the living world was divided into just these two kingdoms. After the invention of the microscope and later the electron microscope, scientists came to recognise that single-celled organisms couldn’t really be classified as animals or plants. Bacteria and another type of single-celled organism called Archaea are now counted as fundamentally different groups of their own. That leaves animals, plants and fungi as fairly recent evolutionary offshoots from the larger group of organisms with a cell nucleus, called the eukaryotes. The animal kingdom consists of…

When it comes to parenting, the animal world presents something of a mixed bag. There is the kangaroo that carries a tiny joey in its pouch, the male seahorse that does most of the legwork and even the cuckoo that leaves its chicks to be raised by other bird species. But the award for Best Mother surely goes to the lioness. Proud, protective and proactive, lionesses can seemingly raise a whole brood of cubs without even breaking a savannah sweat. Lions are the only big cats to live in social groups, known as prides. This includes just a few males and around 12 females, along with all of their young. As the only truly social big cats, the pride operates a rather distinct pecking order. “Most prides have what we call…

It has a freakishly long finger You must have noticed that long third digit while you were gawping at this unfortunatelooking creature. That’s no deformity: the aye-aye’s spindly finger is an essential part of its hunting arsenal, as it pokes deep into the hole it makes in a tree and hooks the juicy insect larva out. When it’s not hunting for insects, the finger is great for draining coconuts and pulling the flesh out. People thought it was a rat This strange creature is from the same order as humans, apes and monkeys (primates) but back in the 19th century, animal classification was a little more slapdash. The aye-aye has distinctly rat-like features, with its pointed face and large ears, but it also has the colouring of a squirrel, as well as a…

Otters are amazing creatures. Not only are they some of the cutest animals out there but they’re also playful, mischievous, and we’re only just starting to understand how intelligent they are. They can clutch rocks firmly in their paws to use as tools and smash apart crustaceans or pick up sticks to prize open clams. They can solve basic puzzles such as stacking cups of varying size, they play fight with one another, and use muddy riverbanks as waterslides repeatedly for nothing else other than pure enjoyment. Aside from incredible intelligence, they’re unbelievable hunters and some of the most well adapted predators on the planet. The sea otter, for example, can hold its breath for up to eight minutes while frantically darting around beneath the surface at a speed of 14.5…