"It's snowing, it's snowing!"
In the snow came a group of little painters.
Chickens draw bamboo leaves, puppies paint plum blossoms,
Duckling draws maple leaves and ponies paint crescents.
No paint, no pen,
A few steps into a painting.
Why didn't the frog participate?
He was asleep in the cave. ”
This text is a catchy text that I read in a chinese textbook when I was in elementary school, and the language is lively and childlike, so that I am now 30 years old, and I still remember this text. And this text is also my enlightenment text on animal cognition in winter, because when I was a child, I knew that frogs were hibernating in winter; it turned out that each animal looked different in the cold winter, and the living habits were also different. Plus when I was a child, there were always chickens and ducks at home, and after school, I could also go to the fields to sprinkle and catch grasshoppers, and the opportunities to contact nature were much more than those of today's children, cold and summer to autumn harvest and winter, these laws of nature, not only learned in textbooks, but also easily felt in life.
But now the children are not necessarily, they are always facing high-rise buildings, facing reinforced concrete, to contact nature can only go to the park, zoo to understand some "nature"; and these "natural" artificial intervention is more, in the zoo animal living environment is given the best state by humans according to their living environment, life habits more or less have some artificial changes, not pure nature, and children to understand the real nature of the animals, the channel is only left from the book to understand. Compared with the animals in the zoo, the animals in nature, they have to pay more efforts in the face of the ever-changing nature, and if they are not careful, they will disappear into nature forever. The most typical is winter. In the cold winter, the climate is extreme, the environment is harsh, so what should the animals do? How do you survive? They do not have a "home" to shield them from the wind and rain, no air conditioning to turn on the "heating", how do they spend the winter and usher in the warm spring?
The "Animals in Winter" published by The Wave Flower Is a Popular Science Winter Animals Are WinterTime Picture Book, a systematic, comprehensive animal wintering science picture book, the author is a famous German natural science writer, illustrator Thomas Müller, the whole picture book divides the animal world into "flying in the sky", "walking on the ground", "swimming in the water", "drilling in the ground" and so on, telling how small animals of different sizes and different characteristics spend the winter. Take the reader closer to the world of animals in winter, learn about and discover the survival skills of hundreds of animals over the winter!
<h1 class = "pgc-h-arrow-right" >, "ground-walking" animals: with thick fur</h1>
"Ground-walking" animals, such as bears, leopards, tigers, lynxes, etc. mammals, they need to maintain a constant body temperature to maintain the functions of the body, so they will reduce the consumption of heat in the winter, because winter for mammals, the danger is fraught, more exercise will consume more energy, bring more crisis. They grow thick long hairs and thick fuzz to ward off the onslaught of the cold. But in the summer, they will remove the hair again, replaced by short hair suitable for the hot summer climate, the two kinds of hair are still different colors, and the body shape will become different from the summer body type. For example, roe deer, rock antelope, etc., are animals that will be moulted for the winter.
There is also a pine mink, which will also grow thick fur in the winter, from dark brown to light brown, and the soles of the feet will also be covered with fluff to keep warm, and it will also reduce the risk of leaving traces in the snow, and the footprints it leaves in the snow are also shallow and not easy to be found by the enemy.
In the case of the lynx, for example, because it grows warm, thick fur in winter to resist the cold, it is hunted by humans - humans hope to use lynx fur to resist the cold.
There are also prototypus, badgers, otters, etc. are animals with thick fur and can have their own way of wintering in winter.
Mueller goes from large animals to small animals, all of which, without exception, have thick fur, but their way of wintering is very different. Each animal with thick fur has its own way of spending the winter and its way of life, which is very suitable for children to understand nature and understand the animal world.
<h1 class = "pgc-h-arrow-right" > ii. "aquatic" animals: winter survival of fish</h1>
It's not just the animals on land that have to survive the winter, but for the animals in the water, it's even more difficult for them to get through the winter, the temperature in winter is too low, maybe the water surface will freeze, there will be less oxygen, and it will also cut off the food source, so how do fish survive the winter?
The fish described in the book "Animals in Winter" are through slow swimming, reducing physical function and movement, relying on the consumption of stored fat in the body to survive the winter, and some will hide in the silt at the bottom of the river for the winter.
For example, the ding tuna will hide in the mud, use the mud to save its body temperature, and survive by consuming fat.
Other amphibians, such as water frogs and forest frogs, also sink to the bottom of the pond and freeze into a hibernating state to spend the winter, and they will use their skin to breathe and maintain life.
<h1 class = "pgc-h-arrow-right" >3, "flying in the sky" animal: birds with feathers</h1>
Not all birds migrate and fly to the warm south for winter, while more birds make their feathers more fluffy and keep the air out of circulation to preserve their body temperature. The down jackets worn by humans are imitations of birds' inventions, and in winter, they are as warm as wearing down jackets.
So where does their food come from? For example, the jay, it will secretly build a winter grain storehouse, bury the acorns in the soil, and in the winter, it will find its own hidden fruit, but it is inevitable that some fruits will take root and sprout
There are also large spotted woodpeckers and barn owls, which will be able to find hidden foods in winter according to their eating habits, such as large spotted woodpeckers eat pine nuts and fir tree seeds, and will also use tree stumps to obtain nut seeds
The barn owl has a sensitive sense of hearing, it looks like an owl, but it is even more powerful, you can hear the small sound of old rats in the snow, as long as the snow is not very thick, it will definitely catch mice!
And these are all wonderful little knowledge points in "Animals in Winter", which are natural knowledge worth discovering and remembering for every child. In the book, Mueller not only tells how animals in winter overwinter, but also conveys to children the sense of responsibility that human beings should have for nature. As the "most powerful and intelligent" primate on earth, human beings have the responsibility and necessity to protect nature.
This is "Animals in Winter", which brings children to know nature, broadens their horizons, and also cultivates children's awareness of protecting nature, so that children can become the next generation of nature guardians.