Do tarantulas have teeth?: questions and answers about poisonous creatures PDF
Preview Do tarantulas have teeth?: questions and answers about poisonous creatures
SSCCHHOOLLAASSTTIICC QQUUEESSTTIIOONN AANNDD AANNSSWWEERR SSEERRIIEESS SSCCHHOOLLAASSTTIICC QQUUEESSTTIIOONN AANNDD AANNSSWWEERR SSEERRIIEESS DDOO TTAARRAANNTTUULLAASS HHAAVVEE TTEEEETTHH?? B $4.99 E R G E R ■ E In DO TARANTULAS HAVE TEETH? you will find the answers to 80 questions about FF L E tarantulas and other poisonous creatures. R Questions and Answers About Poisonous Creatures Which is the most dangerous spider in the United States? Are copperheads as dangerous as rattlesnakes? Which tiny sea creature kills more people than any shark? Which frog has the strongest poison? You can read straight through and become an expert on poisonous creatures. You can find answers fast, and quiz your friends. There are hundreds of facts to collect, plus D O dramatic illustrations that show lots of poisonous creatures in spectacular detail. T A R A N T U L DISCOVER ALL THE BOOKS IN THE SCHOLASTIC QUESTION AND ANSWER SERIES: AS H A V E ■CANITRAINCATSANDDOGS? ■DOTORNADOESREALLYTWIST?Questions and T E E Questions and Answers About Weather Answers About Tornadoes and Hurricanes T H ? ■CANYOUHEARASHOUTINSPACE?Questions ■DOWHALESHAVEBELLYBUTTONS?Questions and Answers About Space Exploration and Answers About Whales and Dolphins ■DIDDINOSAURSLIVEINYOURBACKYARD? ■HOWDOFLIESWALKUPSIDEDOWN? Questions and Answers About Dinosaurs Questions and Answers About Insects ■DOALLSPIDERSSPINWEBS?Questions and ■WHATMAKESANOCEANWAVE?Questions and Answers About Spiders Answers About Oceans and Ocean Life ■DOSTARSHAVEPOINTS?Questions and ■WHYDOVOLCANOESBLOWTHEIRTOPS?Questions Answers About Stars and Planets and Answers About Volcanoes and Earthquakes ISBN 0-439-09579-4 ■DOTARANTULASHAVETEETH?Questions ■WHYDON’THAIRCUTSHURT?Questions and and Answers About Poisonous Creatures Answers About the Human Body E A N M G B I J E 9 780439 095792 ELVIN AND ILDA ERGER ■ LLUSTRATED BY IM FFLER DDOO TTAARRAANNTTUULLAASS HHAAVVEE TTEEEETTHH?? Questions and Answers About Poisonous Creatures M G B BY ELVIN AND ILDA ERGER I J E LLUSTRATED BY IM FFLER CONTENTS Introduction 3 • ANIMALS THAT BITE 4 • ANIMALS THAT STING • 18 KEY TO ABBREVIATIONS cm = centimeter/centimetre cm2= square centimeter/centimetre ANIMALS DANGEROUS TO TOUCH 34 • km = kilometer/kilometre l = liter m = meter/metre Index 48 • t = tonne About the Authors and Illustrator 48 • Copyright © 1999 by Melvin Berger and Gilda Berger. For Jacob Leary, a wonderful guy Illustrations © 1999 by Jim Effler. All rights reserved. Published by Scholastic Inc. with an inquiring mind SCHOLASTICand associated logos are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Scholastic Inc. No part of this publication may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in — M. ANDG. BERGER any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission of the publisher. For information regarding permission, write to Scholastic Inc., Attention: Permissions Department, 555 Broadway, New York, NY 10012. To Dad, who took me camping when I was young, ISBN 0-439-09579-4 Book design by David Saylor and Nancy Sabato sparking an interest in nature 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 9/9 0/0 01 02 03 — J. EFFLER First printing, September 1999 Printed in the U.S.A. 08 Expert reader: Anthony P. Brownie, Wildlife Conservation Society, Central Park Wildlife Center, New York, NY The poisonous creature on the cover is a Mexican red knee tarantula. INTRODUCTION I f you’re like most people, you’ve already met some poisonous creatures. Perhaps you’ve been stung by a honeybee, or touched by a jellyfish. Surely you’ve seen pictures of tarantulas and rattlesnakes. Now you can read and find out more about these amazing animals. The animals in this book all make poison in their bodies. The poison, called venom, is a chemical made by a living creature to kill or harm other living beings. Animals use venom for defense or to paralyze or kill prey. After they use up the venom, they make more. Oddly enough, the animals are not hurt by their own poison. Animals deliver the venom in various ways. Some bite and inject the poison with sharp fangs. Some inject the venom with stingers on their tails. Others have venom on their skin or hair. No doubt you’d rather read about poisonous creatures than meet them. So turn the page and learn some very incredible facts about these fascinating animals. 3 ANIMALS THAT BITE D o tarantulas have teeth? Yes. But they’re not like your teeth. Tarantulas have two very sharp teeth, called fangs, for catching and killing their prey. The fangs are hollow and sharp, like a doctor’s hypodermic needle. They are connected to glands where the tarantula makes its venom, or poison. When the tarantula bites, the fangs force venom into the victim. With fangs like that, who needs teeth like ours? What are tarantulas? Large, hairy, scary spiders. Some are as large as dinner plates. Like all spiders, they are poisonous. Yet this may surprise you: Even though tarantulas are poisonous, their bite is not nearly as nasty as the bite of some other spiders! What do tarantulas bite? The insects, birds, and mice they prey on. Tarantulas also bite the lizards, snakes, and wasps that attack them. Their venom paralyzes or kills. Tarantulas rarely bite humans. But when they do, the bite seldom hurts more than a bee sting. You might say a tarantula’s looks are worse than its bite. Do tarantulas chew their food? No. Tarantulas cannot chew. They can only drink or suck up liquids. When a tarantula bites its prey, the poison starts to “digest” the victim. It turns the flesh into a kind of mush. Then the tarantula sucks it up. 4 Desert tarantulas 5 Black widow spider 6 Do tarantulas have any other weapons? Yes. Tarantula hairs are poisonous, too. When in danger, the tarantula raises its rear legs and brushes a cloud of hairs off its body. Beware the hairs! If they land on your skin they can cause a rash. Inhaling them can make breathing difficult. Which is the most dangerous spider in the United States? The female black widow spider. Its deadly venom is about 15 times more poisonous than a rattlesnake’s! But the spider injects much less venom into the victim than the snake does. The black widow is small and shiny black in color with a red or orange hourglass marking on its underside. A shy animal, it hides and waits near its web for dinner. Its name comes from the female’s habit of sometimes killing the male after mating. Where do black widows spin their webs? In people’s houses, mailboxes, sheds, and garages. Before indoor plumbing, black widows often spun webs across outhouse toilet seats. Ouch! As soon as anything touches its web, the black widow dashes out. If a small insect is caught in the web, the black widow bites. Its poison starts to eat away at the victim’s body. Soon the spider sucks up what’s left. Are black widows dangerous to humans? Very. Black widows usually flee or freeze near people. But when someone steps on or touches a black widow—ZAP! The spider bites. The person usually doesn’t feel the bite at first. But then the pain starts. The muscles grow stiff. Cramps spread all over. It becomes hard to breathe. The effects usually go away in a couple of days. Almost no one dies of a black widow bite. But few forget a visit from this spider! 7 Are all snakes poisonous? No. Only about 600 of the nearly 3,000 different kinds of snakes are poisonous. Of these, just 150 types of snakes can kill people. Poisonous snakes have fangs to inject venom into their victims. Sometimes the prey is small and harmless, like a little frog. Then the poisonous snake doesn’t use its poison. It grabs the live frog and swallows it. Other times the prey is as large as a rat. Then the snake strikes. Venom shoots out through two fangs in its upper jaw. The snake slithers away from the wounded rat as it thrashes about. When the rat stops moving, the snake returns to eat its meal in peace. Are rattlesnakes really dangerous? They sure are! Each rattlesnake has two sharp-tipped fangs for biting. The fangs are usually folded back into the roof of the mouth. But when a rattlesnake spots a rabbit— even from about 1 yard (1 m) away—then its fangs shoot straight up. With mouth wide, the snake lunges forward. Faster than the blink of an eye, it bites its unlucky prey. Do baby rattlesnakes have as much poison as adult rattlesnakes? Yes. Rattlesnakes are born with fangs and venom. This makes them dangerous from the very beginning. But it doesn’t save them from being eaten. Big rattlesnakes sometimes eat little rattlesnakes. They swallow them whole and alive! Are copperheads as dangerous as rattlesnakes? No. Copperheads have shorter fangs and their venom is not as strong. But copperheads actually bite more people than rattlesnakes do. Copperheads are dangerous to humans for a few reasons. Copperheads are smaller than rattlesnakes and harder to see. There are also more of them. Also, copperheads move more quietly than rattlesnakes, which often rattle their tails. 8
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