THE LIVING WORLD

• Rainforests cover less than 2% of Earth's total surface area but they are home to about half of it's plants and animals.
• Arctic Tern  performs the largest known annual migration.
• Tropical and subtropical rainforests present examples of how a hot ,steady climate promotes remarkable diversity in plant growth.
• One in every 113 men,women and children is a refugee.
• War and Violence cost global economy 13.6 trillion dollar in 2015 according to the Global Annual Peace Index.Worldwide 65 million people were forced to  flee their homes last year.
• One of the oldest animals in the world live in the ocean.The oldest 507 year old was an ocean quahog(Ming,scientific name Arctica islandica) found on a seabed near Iceland in 2006.
• The oldest tree in the world is 4148 years old Methuselah, a bristle corn pine in California .
• The oldest rock fragment in the world is a tiny zircon crystal dating back 4.4 billion years,found in Australia.
• The oldest known fossils of cyanobacteria found in rocks in western Australia , belongs to 900 million years back.
• The oldest mountain range is the Appalachian Mountains.
• Oldest oceanic crust found under the Mediterranean Sea.
• The oldest water  located 2 miles under Ontario, Canada,  in Kidd Mine,the deepest base metal mine in the world.The water here  is 2 billion years old. 
• The oldest human fossil found in Ethiopia in 2013.It was 2.8 million  years old.
• The Dragonflies are able to determine if an insect is prey or not within 500th of a second.They are able to do this because they can see 300 images per second.
• Tiny eel like aquatic critter is known for it's ability to detect approaching storms.
• They have swim bladder attuned to changes not only in water pressure but also barometric pressure . They become more active due to changes in barometric pressure .They are known as weather fish.
• Whiskers are sensitive and accurate that seals can even hunt while blind folded.Whiskers follow trails of fish swimming up to 600 feet away.
• African giant pouched rat has a super-sniffer that we humans use to find out buried land mines.
• Specially trained rats can locate land mine with their keen sense of smell and even walk over the land mines without triggering them.They are so efficient that they can 2000 square feet in twenty minutes.It would take a human with a metal detector 4 days to search the same area.
• The Penguins have to see well on land to find breeding sites and in water to find food  and avoid predators.  They are able to do this with the help of a flattened cornea.The flattened cornea refracts light less than a human eye does.Coupled with their eye muscles that allow them to change the shape of the eyes ' lense penguins can focus in and out of water with ease. 
• Beetles are everywhere.But Jewel Beetles (belonging to Buprestidae family)are different.Their distinct and beautiful colours are notable.They can detect fires up to 7 miles away using infrared receptors.The thoracic infrared organs pick up radiation emitted by forest fires.This is a useful trait since the beetle requires recently burned wood to lay their eggs.
• Humans and cats are roughly the same when it comes to hearing things on the lower end of the sound spectrum, cats hear better than we do when it comes to higher pitched sounds.Cats can hear 1.6 octaves higher than us.(one octave above a dog).
• Mantis shrimp can detect a range of colours. Because it's eyes have up to 16 photoreceptors .A male is able to know that the female is ready to mate by seeing the biofluorescence. Its wavelength matches that of the detected shrimp's eye pigments. 
• Dogs are anecdotally considered reliable indicators of Earthquakes.Their keen sense of hearing alerts them to impending temblor. Ancient Greeks have noticed dogs behaving strangely before earthquakes.
• Hamsters communicate each other  at ultrasonic frequency.The sense of hearing of hams is so good that they are able to hear on the ultrasonic frequency.
• World's biggest shell fish lives in coral reefs.giant clams grow well over one meter long  - big enough to bathe in it's shell.

People live in forests.300 million people live in forests worldwide.
Deforestation kills wildlife,reduces oxygen,damages soil,pollutes atmosphere and finally messes up our world.
Australia is the driest inhabited continent on Earth.
Bushfire spread across the continent from December 2019 onwards. It lasted for months with devastating effects. Plant ecosystems as well as livestock and other wildlife were lost in huge numbers.

AMAZING FACTS ON EARTH

1. The amount of time a Tardigrade(the hardiest animal ) can exist in a vacuum is 10 minutes.
2. A human being can survive in space unprotected for 2 minutes.
3. Since the launch of Sputnik in 1957 more than 38000 man-made objects orbited the Earth
4. Earth is smoother than a bowling ball.High mountains and deep ocean trenches make up only 1/5000th of the earth's circumference.
5. Currently 22000 man-made objects larger than 10 cm are orbiting the earth.
6. The value of earth's atmosphere based on the price of CO2 ; 1.3 part per cubic meter is 4.3 quadrillion pounds.
7. 8.6million lightnings strike on a single day.
8. Salted water on Earth 97%  and fresh water 3%
9. One litre of sea water 13 billionth's of a gram of gold
10. 90 % of rubbish in the world's oceans is plastic.
11. 99% of living space on Earth is represented by oceans.
12. About one million species live in the world's oceans.Two third are yet to be discovered.
13. Earth is the only planet in the solar system with plate tectonics.
14. Without it carbon would not be consumed and recycled, and the earth would overheat just like Venus.
15. 99% of  earth's  gold lies in its core.It is sufficient to form a 1.5 foot coat around the surface of the earth.
16. The temperature of the earth's core is as hot as the surface of the sun.(5500 degree celsius)
17. Earth rotates 1609 kliometers per hour at the equator.
18. Rare earth elements are not rare.Lutetium , the last abundant rare earth element , is nearly 200 times more common in the earth's crust than gold.
19. A solid iron ball 1500 miles wide sits on the heart of the Earth.Although it is white hot the pressure is so high the iron cannot melt.
20. The weight of the earth's largest crystals found beneath Mexico's Naica mine .It weighs 55 tonnes.
21. The age of bacteria fossils found in Australia is longer than earth's atmosphere has had oxygen.(3.5 billion years)
22. If the earth stopped rotating suddenly and if you are not attached to ground you would fall over for 0.8 kilometer in one second if nothing is on your path.
23. The coldest temperature recorded, in 1983 at Vostok Station,Antarctica.(-89 degree celsius) or ( minus 128.6 Farenheit)
24. The continents are moving 2 centimeters every year.
25. Bee stings are acidic while wasp stings are alkaline.
26. Copper is the only metal that is naturally antibacterial.
27. Chalk is made of trillions of microscopic skeleton fossils of plankton. 
28. There is about 13 billionth of a gram of gold in each litre of sea water.
29. The human body contains enough carbon to provide 'lead ' (which is really graphite) for about 9000 pencils .
30. Lightning strikes produce ozone (O3) and help strengthen the ozone layer. 
31. 20 % of the Oxygen in the atmosphere was produced by the Amazon Rainforest.
32. One bucket full of water contains more atoms than there are in a bucket full of water in the Atlantic Ocean.
33. Occuppying less than one quarter of 1% of the marine environment,coral reefs  are home to more than 25% of all known marine fish species.
34. In 2013 worldwide chemical sales were valued at 3.2 trillion Euros.These substances are vital to our modern lives and our economies,but they can also be dangerous.
35. The chemicals we exploit to assist agricultural production ,develop medicines and produce consumer goods can be dangerous to human health.
36. Bats not only control pests for a wide variety of crops,cotton,various nuts,and rice,but also pollination for some 300 fruit varieties.The value of bats for their services estimated to Texas farmers is millions of dollars.
37.  humans have harvested1,75,000 tons of gold till 2015.
38. Species identified so far is 1.5 million.
39. The radiation hitting the earth is 10,000 times the consumption of energy in the world.
40. 5 trillion plastic pieces float on world's oceans weighing about 2,69,000 tonnes.
41. Some caves are made of a tube of lava.
42. Ice has the power to make rocks crumble.
43. Oceans are so deep that mountains are hidden beneath them.

TODAY IS WETLAND DAY

 ‘Wetlands for disaster risk reduction’, the day will allow countries around the world to increase awareness of the important role of wetlands in safeguarding against natural disasters.