Animal Adaptations!

Animal adaptations

On Wednesday the 29th of October the whole of year seven went to Orana Wildlife Park to inquire further into our science topic, Animal Adaptations. Animal adaptations is when an animal changes the way it lives by adapting to the different environment. There are three types of adaptations, physical, behavioral and physiological.

Each class went off with a different educator. 7G went with an educator named Sarah and 7OM went with an educator named Paula. We went around the park observing certain animals. The tigers and rhinos are very territorial animals! Tigers go around their territory “spraying” the surroundings so when other male tigers come, they know that there is another male tiger around. Whereas Rhino males will leave piles of dung around their territory and keep piling up so that other males know who is in charge or that there is another male already living there.

Eliza and Joanna Holding A Rhino’s Horn!

We saw lions, four females and three males. Although the males didn’t have their manes. Their manes fall off or “shed” when there hormones change. The male lions had an injection that makes them no longer be able to breed and that causes their change in hormones. There were giraffes two! There were one boy and three girls. The girls names are Zuri and Harriet but we can’t remember the last girls names , the boys name is Franana.

We saw little meerkats and because it was windy and cold they were all huddled together and cuddling to keep warm but the big meerkat was standing guard! We saw lots of different birds like Kea, Kiwi, Kererü, Tui and many more endemic birds.

We also met a llama called Roldo! We all got a little bit of food in the palm of our hands to feed him with, he originated in South America, thats a while away from here! He has lots of fur so that he can keep warm in the cold mountains. The air up in the mountains is very thin so his blood is naturally thin so he can breathe and stay alive up high in the sky!

Amelia Getting Up Close and Personal With Roldo!

We saw some gibbons, Oscar, Peggie and their family. There was even a little baby who was only one year old! Oscar was kidnapped from his home when he was only six or seven months old by a trucker who made him dance for money but fortunately people put in complaints and people from a zoo in Indonesia, came and took Oscar off of the trucker and kept him in the zoo for a couple of years, but he didn’t fit in there because he wasn’t used to other gibbons so Orana took him in, where he met Peggie. They took it in stages for the two gibbons to meet and slowly they took a big liking to each other and sang their own song, like a duet! Now they are like two peas in a pod!

The Meerkats Huddling To Keep Warm!