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Wednesday, March 18, 2015

Ocean Animals For Kids

Most of the vertebrates that live in the ocean are fish.
Some mammals, reptiles, and birds live there, too.
There is only one group of vertebrates not found in salt water.
These are the amphibians.

Fish have always lived in the sea, of course. There are more than 13,000 different kinds, or species, living in the sea. But the mammals found in the sea are descended from land animals.
They have to come to the surface to breathe, because they have lungs, not gills.

Fish in the ocean

Fish come in all sorts of different shapes and sizes.
Some are flat so that they can lie on the seabed without being seen.
Eels have snakelike bodies.
Rays, like the skate, are kite-shaped and seem to fly through the water by flapping their huge “wings.”

Mammals in the ocean

There are three groups of mammals in the sea:

whales and dolphins,
seals and sea-lions, and
some rare sea mammals called sirenians, which include the manatee and the dugong.

There are more than 75 different kinds of whales.
The blue whale is the largest animal that has ever lived. It can grow to be as long as 100 feet (30 meters)!
Whales need to come up to the surface for air, but sperm whales can hold their breath underwater for over an hour!

Dolphins and porpoises are actually small whales. The killer whale is the largest walrus

dolphin.
Have you ever seen bottle-nosed dolphins perform in an aquarium?
They are very intelligent. They communicate with each other by blowing air through their blow-holes to make squeaks, whistles, and clicks.

Seals, sea-lions, and walruses are the only sea mammals that move onto land to give birth to their young. Walruses look like large seals with two long, pointed teeth called tusks.

Reptiles in the ocean

Some turtles and snakes live in the sea.
Like all reptiles, sea turtles are cold-blooded, so they live only in warm waters.
The females come out of the sea to lay their eggs in holes on sandy beaches.
Most sea snakes never leave the sea.
They swim by waving their flattened bodies from side to side and by using their oarlike tails as a paddle.

Birds in the ocean

Penguins spend much of their lives in the sea, often hunting fish, their main food.
Instead of wings, penguins have flippers which help them to swim.
Penguins come to the surface of the water to breathe.
They move onto land to lay their eggs and raise their young.

Pollination definition for kids

Have you ever noticed how pleasant many flowers smell?
They have attractive scents, as well as bright colors, in order to attract insects. Insects use the nectar made by flowers as food.
In the process of getting the food, the insects transfer pollen from flower to flower.
The process of seed formation begins with this transfer of pollen grains from one flower to the stigma of another flower of the same kind.
This transfer is called pollination.
The main insects which pollinate flowers are bees and butterflies.
These insects feed on the sweet, sugar liquid called nectar that is usually produced by special cells in the receptacle.

On its way to the nectar, the insect has to pass the flowers anthers, which are covered in pollen. Some of the pollen sticks to the insects body and then brushes off onto the stigma of the next flower that the insect visits.
A thin tube grows from the pollen grain, down through the style, and into the ovule. A male cell, carried by this pollen tube, unites with an egg, and the ovule starts to develop into a fertile seed.

Wind pollinated flowers

Some flowering plants, such as grasses and hazel trees, dont have any nectar in their flowers to attract insects. These plants need the wind to pollinate them. The wind blows the pollen off the anthers of one flower and onto the sticky stigma of another flower.
The stigma of a wind-pollinated plant can be large and feathery, in order to catch the pollen more easily. Its the wind that takes the pollen from male cones to the ovules of female pine cones, too.

What are annual plants, biennial plants, perennial plants?

Some flowering plants, such as nasturtiums and giant sunflowers, grow and die in the same year.
We call these annuals.
Not all annuals are welcome in our gardens— many weeds are annuals!
Other plants take two years to grow.

We call these biennials.
Flowers such as foxgloves and vegetables such as carrots and parsnips are biennials. In their first year, biennial plants store up food. In their second year, they use the food, flower, and die.

Some plants, such as irises, madonna lilies, and begonias, go on growing and flowering for many years.
We call these perennials.