Animals That Mate For Life

Humans are not the only species that can express faithfulness, many other animals can offer examples of how to keep a relationship together. Even though lifelong pair bonds are fairly rare in the animal kingdom, there are a few animals that can keep it together. 

Gibbons

Gibbons will form an extremely strong bond with their mate and spend time grooming each other and hanging out together

Swans

Swans can form strong pair bonds that can last for many years or even for life. Swans have become a symbol of love because of their loyalty and while swimming together their necks form a heart. 

French Angelfish

French Angelfish are rarely alone, they form monogamous bonds that often last a lifetime. They will live, travel and hunt in pairs.

Turtle Doves

It's no wonder that Turtle Doves come in pairs in the classic "The Twelve Days of Christmas".

Source: Mother Nature Network 

The Difference Between Apes and Monkeys

There are over 300 species of primates in the world, but there are a couple of distinctive differences that separate apes from monkeys. Apes don't have tails and are generally a lot larger. They also depend more on their vision than their smell because their noses aren't snout-shaped like monkeys' noses are. Great Apes consist of gorillas, chimpanzees, oragutans and bonobos, while the Lesser Apes consist of gibbons and siamongs.

Bonus Fact: The amount of identical DNA in chimpanzees and humans range from 94.6% to 99.4%.

Tiger cubs attacked by gibbon

I couldn’t resist sharing this video clip from southeast Asia. It’s obviously taken from a much longer film from Thailand and sound effects have been added to enhance humor.



It reminds me of how my cat will tease my dog, then dash under the bed where the dog can’t reach him.

It also made me more curious about gibbons. According to Wikipedia:
“Gibbons are masters of their primary mode of locomotion, brachiation, swinging from branch to branch, distances of up to 15 m (50 ft), at speeds as much as 56 km/h (35 mph). They can also make leaps of up to 8 m (27 ft), and walk bipedally with their arms raised for balance. They are the fastest and most agile of all tree-dwelling, non-flying mammals.” I believe it! Though I don’t think this gibbon would have picked on an adult tiger!

(If you want to read more about tigers go to our animal facts page on tigers.)

Jungle Jane