Intro to Mammals
Explain what animal habituation is.
Habituation is the process by which animals get used to people.
Which sense does a dog use most?
Smell
What color is polar bear skin?
Black
What special sensory organ do cats have?
Whiskers
What do most female marsupials have that other female animals do not?
a pouch
Tell what it means to be prey and a predator?
A predator eats other animals and prey is eaten by other animals.
What do we call the male and female leader of the pack?
Alpha male and alpha female
Which is more likely to carry rabies: a raccoon or skunk?
Raccoon
Which cat cannot retract its claws?
Cheetah
Where do most marsupials live?
Australia
What is a safari?
a journey across a stretch of land, usually made to observe or hunt wild animals.
What is a digitigrade?
An animal that walks on its toes
What is a plantigrade?
an animal that uses the entire bottom of the foot to walk.
What is an apex predator?
An animal is an apex predator if the other animals around it do not consider it to be their typical prey.
How is the Tasmanian devil like a hyena?
They are scavengers that consume every part of the animal.
Have there always been predators and prey?
No.There were no predators and prey in the Garden of Eden.
What four major kinds of teeth do mammals have?
incisors, canines, premolars, molars
What do bears do instead of hibernating?
How is the spotted hyena different from other hyenas?
Most hyenas are peaceful scavengers, whole spotted hyenas are fierce, apex predators.
How many species of marsupials live in North America?
Just one: the Virginia Opossum
What is a zoonotic disease?
Illnesses transmitted between animals and people
How can you tell a skull of a mammal from the skull of a reptile?
Mammals have a lower jaw made only of one bone, reptile's lower jaw is made up of several bones.
reptiles can only move their jaw up and down whole mammals can also move side to side.
Name the main way to tell the difference between a black bear and a brown bear.
Brown bears have a hump above the shoulders. Black bears are also smaller than brown bears.
What kind if homes do creatures from the family Herpestidae create for themselves?
They dig underground tunnels.
Explain the defense mechanism of the Virginia opossum.
It "plays dead" hoping most animals will think it has been dead too long to be a healthy meal.