Do You Know Why Turkeys are so Fascinating Bird on Thanksgiving ?

Credit: greennature.com

Time to slice up a turkey, unfasten your jeans and watch your favorite show on TV on Thanksgiving.  Whatever your family rituals is, Turkey Day traditions have profound roots in American history.  Do you ask yourself why? Why are they fascinating? Based on my research, here’s the top 10 remarkable facts about this bird. So prepare yourself to gobble! Gobble! 

1. Periscopic Vision-  the turkey  has a 360-degree field of vision by rotating its head, eyes are on the sides of its head.

2. Stones in their stomachs- its stomach is called the gizzard that contains tiny stones known as gastroliths which help in the breakdown of food for digestion, since birds do not have teeth.

3. Wild turkeys can fly- at the speed of up to 55 miles per hour (89 kilometers per hour) but commercially raised turkeys cannot fly.

4. Make you sleepy- its  meat contains tryptophan, an amino acid that the body uses to make serotonin, a neurotransmitter in the brain that helps regulate sleep.

5. Sleep in the trees- prefers to sleep  on top of tree branches where it is safe from its predators. They like oak trees.

6. Do not have external ear structures- turkey have small holes in their head, very keen sense of hearing and can locate sounds from afar even miles away.

7. Turkeys have heart attacks-  dropped dead with heart attacks when the United States Air Force was doing experiment runs and breaking the sound barricade close by.

8. Female turkeys don't gobble-they talk through clucks and little, chirp-like noises.Male turkeys are called gobblers. They can be heard a mile away on a silent day.

9. They blush-when terrified, disturbed, thrilled or sick, the uncovered skin on its head and neck can change from its usual pale pink or bluish gray color to red, white, or blue.

10. Benjamin Franklin adored turkeys- he wrote a letter to his daughter and quote, “the turkey is in comparison a much more respectable bird, and withal a true original native of America. Eagles have been found in all countries, but the turkey was peculiar to ours..."

Scientific classification

Kingdom: Animalia

Phylum: Chordata

Class: Aves

Order: Galliformes

Family: Phasianidae

Gray, 1840

Subfamily: Meleagridinae

Genus: Meleagris

Linnaeus, 1758

Species

M. gallopavo

M. ocellata

How terrific is that? Let’s gobble! Gobble! Gobble!

Sources: 
8 Terrific Turkey Facts | Turkey Bird

Do You Know Why the World Won’t End in 2012?

Is the world really ends on December 21, 2012? Below, NASA Scientists answer questions on the following 2012 topics.  Here’s what they are saying.

Question (Q): Are there any threats to the Earth in 2012? Many Internet websites say the world will end in December 2012.

 Answer (A):The world will not end in 2012. Our planet has gotten along just fine for more than 4 billion years, and credible scientists worldwide knows of no threat associated with 2012.

Q: What is the origin of the prediction that the world will end in 2012?

 A: The story started with claims that Nibiru, a supposed planet discovered by the Sumerians, is headed toward Earth. This catastrophe was initially predicted for May 2003, but when nothing happened the doomsday date was moved forward to December 2012 and linked to the end of one of the cycles in the ancient Mayan calendar at the winter solstice in 2012 -- hence the predicted doomsday date of December 21, 2012.

Q: Does the Mayan calendar end in December 2012?

 A: Just as the calendar you have on your kitchen wall does not cease to exist after December 31, the Mayan calendar does not cease to exist on December 21, 2012. This date is the end of the Mayan long-count period but then -- just as your calendar begins again on January 1 -- another long-count period begins in the Mayan calendar.

Q: Could planets align in a way that impacts Earth?

 A: There are no planetary alignments in the next few decades and even if these alignments were to occur, their effects on the Earth would be negligible. One major alignment occurred in 1962, for example, and two others happened during 1982 and 2000. Each December the Earth and sun align with the approximate center of the Milky Way Galaxy but that is an annual event of no consequence. 

Q: Is there a planet or brown dwarf called Nibiru or Planet X or Eris that is approaching the Earth and threatening our planet with widespread destruction?

 A: Nibiru and other stories about wayward planets are an Internet hoax. There is no factual basis for these claims. If Nibiru or Planet X were real and headed for an encounter with the Earth in 2012, astronomers would have been tracking it for at least the past decade, and it would be visible by now to the naked eye. Obviously, it does not exist. Eris is real, but it is a dwarf planet similar to Pluto that will remain in the outer solar system; the closest it can come to Earth is about 4 billion miles.

Q: What is the polar shift theory? Is it true that the Earth's crust does a 180-degree rotation around the core in a matter of days if not hours?

 A: A reversal in the rotation of the Earth is impossible. There are slow movements of the continents (for example Antarctica was near the equator hundreds of millions of years ago), but that is irrelevant to claims of reversal of the rotational poles. However, many of the disaster websites pull a bait-and-switch to fool people. They claim a relationship between the rotation and the magnetic polarity of the Earth, which does change irregularly, with a magnetic reversal taking place every 400,000 years on average. As far as we know, such a magnetic reversal doesn’t cause any harm to life on Earth. Scientists believe a magnetic reversal is very unlikely to happen in the next few millennia. 

Q: Is the Earth in danger of being hit by a meteor in 2012?

 A: The Earth has always been subject to impacts by comets and asteroids, although big hits are very rare. The last big impact was 65 million years ago, and that led to the extinction of the dinosaurs. Today NASA astronomers are carrying out a survey called the Spaceguard Survey to find any large near-Earth asteroids long before they hit. We have already determined that there are no threatening asteroids as large as the one that killed the dinosaurs. All this work is done openly with the discoveries posted every day on the NASA Near-Earth Object Program Office website, so you can see for yourself that nothing is predicted to hit in 2012. 

Q: How do NASA scientists feel about the claims of the world ending in 2012?

 A: For any claims of disaster or dramatic changes in 2012, where is the science? Where is the evidence? There is none, and for all the fictional assertions, whether they are made in books, movies, documentaries or over the Internet, we cannot change that simple fact. There is no credible evidence for any of the assertions made in support of unusual events taking place in December 2012.

Q: Is there a danger from giant solar storms predicted for 2012?

 A: Solar activity has a regular cycle, with peaks approximately every 11 years. Near these activity peaks, solar flares can cause some interruption of satellite communications, although engineers are learning how to build electronics that are protected against most solar storms. But there is no special risk associated with 2012. The next solar maximum will occur in the 2012-2014 time frame and is predicted to be an average solar cycle, no different than previous cycles throughout history.

We may never know what lies ahead of us but one thing for sure, are we really prepared for that? Are you ready? The answer is in your hand.

 Source: NASA