Animal Behaviors
By Zoey Kay
Colorful Plumage
One species of bird that uses colorful plumage is the pheasant. The male pheasant uses its bright colors to attract a female.
Herding
Giraffe's are one of the many animals that herd. A herd of giraffe's is called a tower. In a tower there is no leader. As a result of their height, a herd of 20 giraffe's may spread out over half a mile, because they can see each other from long distances.
Pheromones
The Canada Lynx uses pheromones to attract a mate or mark its territory by urinating on trees. They also have scent glands in their paws, so when they leave claw marks somewhere, they leave a little bit of their scent behind.
Gift Presenting
Many male flies wrap their prey in silk after they catch it and give it to a female fly to attract a mate. In addition, male spiders in South America inject pheromones into their silk wrapped gift.
Vocalization
Many male frogs sing to attract a female. When air flows over the vocal chords, the vocal sacs inflate. The vocal sacs can inflate to be as big as the frog in some species!
Dance
Male peacock spiders dance to attract a female. The males will perform a dance for a female spider of any species. But there is a price to pay for a poor performance; If the female decides that the male spider is not an ideal mate, it kills the male and eats it!
Bioluminescene
The Aequorea Victoria jellyfish has a blue colored bioluminescene. The main reason the jellyfish uses it's bioluminescence is to scare off predators, but jellyfish also use it to attract a mate.
Nest Building
The termite has a very unique nest. Termite nests are called mounds, and they can grow to be 5 meters or higher! The mounds can take four to five years to build. The queen of the mound produces hundreds of millions of termite eggs to sustain the population.
Image Citations
http://www.arkive.org/bombay-bubble-nest-frog/raorchestes-bombayensis/image-G98696.html
http://www.arkive.org/giraffe/giraffa-camelopardalis/image-G12034.html
http://morgan--k.deviantart.com/art/Blue-jellyfish-s-292587571
http://news.softpedia.com/news/The-Largest-Architectonic-Buildings-in-Nature-57816.shtml