Eyes

Insects have what is called a Compacted Eye. 

This eye is made out of hundreds maybe thousands of tiny little eyes. Each of these eyes sees and then sends it's own message to the insects brain.
  We aren't really sure why GOD did it this way but He did.
  Some insects also have what is called a Ocelli Eye. It is such a basic eye that it can only tell light from dark.

This is what a compacted eye sees.

Sorry about the fly. I found the most attractive picture that I could.

  Some insects have these in only one stage of their life and others will have it there entire life.

Back again

Well, it's now time to get back to school.

On an insects head, the exoskeleton's plates are sealed together to protected the insect's brain.
An insect's brain isn't near as big as a humans or as complicated. But still, it's a brain and all brains are complicated.
  The insects brain works a lot lick a humans' brain. It sends messages through the insects nerve cord and the insect reacts.
(A humans nerve cord is protected by a back bone)

The biggest questions is, dose a insect feel pain?
No one is quite sure but studies have shown that the insect probably doesn't feel any pain because if it did it would stop walking or at  lease react somewhat.

Molting

All bugs have to molt so that they can grow.
A insect has a outer shell that is called an exoskeleton. This shell protects the insect from smashing if it falls, and other dangers.
But because the Exoskeleton is so hard the insect has to shed it before growing.
(You will most often see a cicada exoskeleton.)

When the insects exoskeleton gets too small the insect begins to grow a new one under the old shell.
This new exoskeleton produces a chemical that loosens the old shell.
Then the insect begins to take in huge breaths and stretches it's self. This loosens the old shell and then is breaks open and the insect can come out a new insect.

Butterflys

Now there isn't very much to tell about insects in genirol.
 There are a lot of them. The insect population out numbers humans at about a hundred to one, and so I couldn't possibly cover all the insects, besides there really isn't that much to tell.

  Butterfly (I chose them because it's just a short post.), have thoughsands of tiny tiny little scales on their wings and that is why if you ever catch a butterfly by it's wings there is this fine powder left on your fingers.

  These scales help the butterfly fly and give it color.
 The scales them selves aren't colorful but GOD made them just right so that when they catch the light they turn that color.
Each kind of Butterfly has its own kind of scales that catch the light in just the right color.
  The butterfly's colors also help it to hide and defend it's self. 

Bugs

This will be an extremely short post about the difference between bugs and insects.
 Bugs are a kind of insect that has wings that are thick at the base of the wing and thinner at the tip.
A water strider would be considered a bug, but a dragon-fly is really the best.

Microbats and Megabats

 There are two kinds of bats.
 The Megabat and the Microbat.
The Microbat is much smaller.
There are many ways to tell the difference.
The first is by the size.
While the Megabat is huge and has a wing span of  up to six feet, (That's a lot of wing!) the microbat is very small.
The magabats when it hangs upside down to sleep, it wraps its wings around it and the microbat folds his winds to his sides.
 While the Micro. uses echo location to find it's dinner of bugs, most Mega.s don't have to ability of echo location. -Instead the Megabat prefers fruit, and you don't need echo location to help you find nice sweet smelling fresh fruit.
scents the Megabat eats fruit, it doesn't need sharp teeth like the microbat. GOD gave the Megabat short flat teeth that can help it chew the fruit better.
I would really like to see a Megabat flying around my house one night but they only live in tropical arias.
The Megabat eats many tropical fruits that with out these kinds of bats, would eventually die out.
So we can know that GOD has a purpose for every animal on the earth great and small and we can know that no matter how insignificant we may seem, we still have a purpose here on GOD's great earth.

Bat's Ears and Echo location

It's a common fact that bats use Echo location to find bugs and avoid abjects that they might fly into while flying (Trees, rocks and the like.).
Actually most people think that bats can just barely see and that's why the need to use their echo location, but no. Bats really have very good eye sight, it's just that they can't see a little tinny gnat in the black of night.
Bats use a very loud shrill noise to detect bugs and objects that they will need to avoid.
 This sound is to high for us to hear put the bat hears it- almost too well. It's sound that it sends out is so loud  that a bat could go deaf from it.
 But GOD has already figured all that out.
 When to bat makes it's sound a little shield comes up and protects the bats ear from the sound. After the bat has sent it's sound out and is waiting for the echo the little shield comes back up so that the bat can hear the echo.
 Pretty cool! Isn't it just amazing that GOD has it all worked out and not one bat goes deaf because GOD forgot to put in that little peace.
 Sorry that there aren't any pictures, but if I find any I'll post them.

Bats

By the way this is a Microbat.

Bats.

  Now, believe it or not, bats are part of the fifth day of creation.

 They are mammals,  but so are blue whales, and whales are certainly not part of the fifth day of creation.

  Bats are nocturnal mammals and most bats are no larger then six or seven inches from tip to tip.

  Bats- or most of them do not carry rabies. In the past 40 years only 40 people have gotten rabies from bats.

  People often get scared of bats especially a bat called a vampire bat, but bats are not human eaters and only eat bugs and fruit. Those bats that do eat blood only cut a small hole in the animal while it is asleep.  GOD made it so that the amount that the bat takes is not vital to the survival of that animal.

 Fruit bats pollinate and help to spread that seeds of rare fruit trees by first eating the seed then ...

 Well, we all know what happens next.

 Insect eating bats eat about six hundred insects in one hour, and they feed for about ten hours. All in all that equals 6,000 bugs per bats and there are about 20 million bats in Texas alone so that comes to a whole lot of bugs eaten every night.

There are about 900 species of bats.

  The bat is equipped with sharp little claws that allow it to hang upside down for long hours with no effort at all.

 So that's a little on bats for now.

Beaks Vs. Bills

For a very long time I have been wondering what the differences is between Beaks and Bills.
 But at long last I have found out.
 A Beak is sharp much like that of a Hawk. And a duck has a Bill flattish and often looks rather rubbery.
 Birds of the water have Bills and the others have Beaks!
Bills are most commonly used for scooping up small fish and other stuff from under the water. (This is why ducks and other water birds have them.)

 Beaks are used for cracking nuts and catching prey.

What do you think this bird has? A bead or a Bill.

So there you have it. The difference between BEAKS and BILLS.

How Is It that birds can fly?

    20. Then GOD said, "Let the waters abound with abound with an abundance of living creatures , and let birds fly above the earth across the fave of the firmament of the heavens"     21So GOD created great sea creatures and every living thing that moves, with which the water abounded according to their kind and every winged bird according to its kind And GOD saw that it was good.

SO, how dose a bird fly and where do bugs come into this?
This is how a bird is able to take flight.

 

Think you could do that?

Probably not.

 Well, whole thing is a a bird's fly muscles, and they are located in the bird's chest.

When you eat a chicken chest that is what you are eating.

You a Probably rethinking what you eat off of a chicken and Turkey. 

Well, the pink little thing is one of the chest bones of a bird.

The orange is humerus and it's attached to the wing part.

The light green smaller muscles is what conducts the up stroke and the dark red larger muscles

is for the down stroke.

Pretty cool!

Pictures by E.G. Pritchett. Please do not take without consent from me.

Eggs

  GOD designed each part of an egg with a purpose .

  The Shell(Dark Purple) protects the egg and keeps it together. There are tinny holes in the Shell that allow gas to go out and air to go in. The Shell has millions of holes covering the Shell. These are called Pores.

   

  The Outer shell membrane(Light Pink.) protects the egg from mold, mildew, and other kinds of bacterias. You can find this part when you peel the outer shell off of a hard boiled egg.

  Then you have the Inner membrane (Still Light Pink) this acts as a back up for the outer Membrane.

Next is the Albumen. (Yellow). This the white part of the egg that you eat. This watery stuff acts as a shock absorber, it protects the Embryo and keeps it from drying out.

  

The Chalazae (Reddish Orange) holds the Yolk and keeps it from just floating around. If you find one of these in your egg it means that your egg was fresh. -Exceptions are made.

Next is the Yolk. (Orange) This is the part that you eat. The Yolk is not the part that turns into a bird. People often get the two confused. That is the Embryo - but we get to that in a second.

The Yolk is the Embryo's source of food while it's growing in the egg. (Eventually the bird/ reptile will grow to fully fit the egg.) 

NOW the Embryo. (Black dot in the center of the Yolk.) This is the - animal~to~be. It really doesn't do much but grow and eat.

  

And last- The Air Sack. (Light Green) When the bird is ready to start breathing air, it squarms around and bumps into the Air Sack with it's Egg Tooth and breaks this sack. When you crack an egg you can most often find this Sack.

 

An Egg

Both pictures were drawn by E. G. Pritchett.

Feathers

 There are many parts of feathers:

• The Vanes (This is how you spell vanes on feathers.)
• The Shaft
• The Quill

 These are the main parts.

 The Vanes are the soft part of the feather that if you rub the wrong way the break apart.
If you get a magnifying glass and a flash light and a feather and looked very carefully at the vanes you can probably be able to see tiny little hairs lining the vanes. When you rub the Vane the wrong way they come apart but if you rub then the opposite way the stick back together.
Well this is caused by tiny little barbs attached to the vanes.

The Barbs hook on to vanes without barbs. These are called Barbules.

 
The Shaft is is the poll that runs down the length of the feather and all the vanes attach to it.

It's made out of a substance called Keratin. (Rhinoceros horns and animal claws are made of this as well as your fingers nails.)

The Quill is the tip of the quill that attaches to the bird. (It used to be used for writing because the quill could usually hold a small amount of ink.)

When you see a bird about to get into the water it will rub it's self with it's bill and then get in.
This is called preening and ducks, swans and gees will do this to oil and zip their feathers to block out the water and to stay afloat.

It really is quite amazing.

•  Now... when you are holding a feather you can break the little hairs a part and then when you rub them  the stick back together.

Wings

There are many different types of wings.
You would not believe how many kinds of planes are  designed after birds wings and their flight.
And I am very sorry for the frequent use of the word "designed".


The Fighter-Jet is designed like the Swallows and the quick way it can dive and sore through the air.

A Pheasant has short wings much like a Carrier-Plane. These short wings make it easier to take a quick take off and climb much faster.

 A Helicopter is designed after the Humming bird and the way it can hover.

 And Albatross has long wings enabling it to soar for long distances over the ocean without having to land. (This is nice because there really isn't anywhere for a bird to land in the middle of the ocean.)

A Soaring-plane's wings are designed in much the same way.

And even a parachute was designed like a bird.
When a Gull is landing it spreads out it's wings to catch the air and slow it's descent.

As for the turkey.... we still aren't really sure.

So that is a little of GOD's amzing wonders.

Bird's Bills

I am super sorry that I haven't done a post in so long but we have been really busy and then today I finally got a chance to get on the computer and I realized how long it had been since my last post.

We got a book once and it was about a little girl. And the whole book is a play on words. But my favorite part is when the girl is quoting her daddy and says: 'Daddy says all we get in the mail are big bills.'
  And it's a picture of a bunch of big birds with their bills in the mail box.

 GOD Created each birds bill in a unique way but suited to the birds habits.

 So that is some on all the amazing different of beaks.

 I am trying to find the difference between Beaks and Bills.

For instance a Wood-Pecker has a thin sharp beak that allows it to hammer through the wood of trees to get out insects.

 Birds like the Parrots and Parakeets have short strong beaks useful for cracking nuts and things like that.

A Heron uses her long thin beak to spear fish and to get down in the wet muddy sand to dig out bugs and worms that live down there.

A Pink Flamingo has strainers on the sides of it's bill that allow it to scoop up a mouth full of small bugs from off the bottom of a stream and then let all the water and mud drain out.

  
 
The Spoon Bill has a strange spoon like bill and uses it like a spoon to scoop up it's food.

A Hawk or a Bald Eagle has a long sharp beak that it uses to kill it's prey.