Fishy and Slimy Things
A look at the Amazing World of Animals with this emphasis
on the gooey things found in water and swamps. 

• The largest animal ever seen alive was a 113.5 foot, 170-ton female blue whale.
• Catfish have 100,000 taste buds.
• Tapeworms range in size from about 0.04 inch to more than 50 feet in length.
• Goldfish lose their color if they are kept in dim light or are placed in a body of running water, such as a stream.
• A female mackerel lays about 500,000 eggs at one time.
• An iguana can stay under water for 28 minutes.
• Snakes are immune to their own poison.
• The turbot fish lays approximately 14 million eggs during its lifetime.
• The fastest -moving land snail, the common garden snail, has a speed of 0.0313 mph.
• All clams start out as males; some decide to become females at some point in their lives.
• At 188 decibels, the whistle of the blue whale is the loudest sound produced by any animal.
• Certain frogs can be frozen solid then thawed, and continue living.
• Snails produce a colorless, sticky discharge that forms a protective carpet under them as they travel along. The discharge is so effective that they can crawl along the edge of a razor without cutting themselves.
• The anaconda, one of the world's largest snakes, gives birth to its young instead of laying eggs.
• The poison-arrow frog has enough poison to kill about 2,200 people.
• The "caduceus" the classical medical symbol of two serpents wrapped around a staff - comes from an ancient Greek legend in which snakes revealed the practice of medicine to human beings.
• The poisonous copperhead snake smells like fresh cut cucumbers.
• It takes a lobster approximately seven years to grow to be one pound.
• Sharks apparently are the only animals that never get sick. As far as is known, they are immune to every known disease including cancer.
• The Pacific Giant Octopus, the largest octopus in the world, grows from the size of pea to a 150 pound behemoth potentially 30 feet across in only two years, its entire life-span.
• The Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History houses the world's largest shell collection, some 15 million specimens. A smaller museum in Sanibel, Florida owns a mere 2 million shells and claims to be the worlds only museum devoted solely to mollusks.
• The world record frog jump is 33 feet 5.5 inches over the course of 3 consecutive leaps, achieved in May 1977 by a South African sharp-nosed frog called Santjie.
• There are around 2,600 different species of frogs. They live on every continent except Antarctica.
• A chameleon's tongue is twice the length of its body.