Seymour Simon's Blog, page 53

Did You Know?

I visited my friend Max and his family this weekend. Max is a first grader who loves to know everything he can about arachnids…..that is the scientific word for spiders. I thought he (and probably lots of my other readers!) would like this science news story about Tarantulas and how they climb safely.Tarantulas are quite heavy, at least for spiders. They can weigh up to 1.75 ounces (50 grams), and their bodies are very delicate. So, climbing is possibly one of the riskiest things an adult tarantula can do. "They wouldn't survive a fall from any height," explains Claire Rind, an arachnologist from the University of Newcastle, England. Rind ran a series of experiments, putting tarantulas into an aquarium, tilting it straight up, and then using slow motion microphotography to film the spiders' feet as they held on. She also used a microscope to look at the moulted exoskeletons from her Mexican flame knee tarantula, Fluffy (yes, she saved them all!), and discovered tiny, silk-producing openings all over the spider's feet. She discovered that when a tarantula slips, it saves itself by shooting silk threads out of its feet to grasp the surface it is climbing. Sound like anybody you've ever heard of? Photo: International Society of Arachnology

Look at this Cute Baby Hawk!

Have you ever seen a baby hawk being fed its breakfast? You can watch live footage right now on the hawk cam. Only one fledgling has survived, but it is growing so quickly that I find myself keeping the window open on my desktop so that I can watch. If you click on this photo, it will take you to the live webcam.Sometimes you have to wait a little while, if the mother is sitting on the baby to keep it warm. But, the wait is worth it, I promise. What a cutie!

New Android Book App!

I'm excited to tell my readers that one of my favorite books, ANIMAL FACT ANIMAL FABLE, is now available as an app in the Android Marketplace! This is a book that I did some years ago with a talented illustrator named Diane deGroat. I bet lots of you have read her books about Gilbert, like No More Teachers, No More Books.Can you believe this was the first book she ever illustrated? I remember that when she came to meet with me and my editor, she brought her cute little baby in a stroller! Anyway, I have always really loved this book, and I am so happy to be able to introduce it to a new generation of readers. It is both funny and full of real facts about animals. Anyone who has an Android phone can buy this book, which has "read to me" narration. It will be in the iTunes store soon, hopefully next week, for those of you that have an iPod Touch or an iPad. Happy reading!

Baby Animals in the Spring

Yesterday, we drove along winding roads through the hills in Dutchess and Columbia counties, in New York State. It's very agricultural up here, with many horse and dairy farms. Spring is the season for animal babies and we saw many calves and foals in farms along the roads. This calf is two to three months old and follows its mother everywhere. Where mom goes, baby is not far behind. Spring is an amazing season of quick changes. Trees and bushes leaf, and the color of the leaves changes from a pale yellow-green to a darker green in a few weeks. Flowers bud on apple trees and on forest floors as if by magic. Birds are singing. Butterflies are flitting from one bush to another. It feels as if you're in a nature movie, but this is real life and it happens every spring. Years ago, Rachel Carson, a scientist and naturalist, wrote a book calledSilent Spring. It was about the dangers of using too much and the wrong kinds of insecticides. The "silent spring" referred to the bad effects of insecticides upon birds. Every time I hear birds singing in the spring, I give silent thanks to Rachel Carson, a wonderful nature writer who also provided me with the inspiration to become a writer. (Editor's Note from Liz Nealon)I often travel with Seymour as he walks in nature and photographs, and thought that it would be fun for readers to see what was going on "behind the camera" while Seymour was taking the photograph above. This herd was very curious, poking their heads through the fence and nuzzling to see if he had any food for them!

My Favorite Animal

A student named Makayla M. wrote today and asked: "Do you think that macaroni penguins are weird or cool? What is your favorite animal in the world? I think all penguins are cool, don't you? Macaroni Penguins are so unusual, with those magnificent, bright-colored feathers on their heads. You can probably find my book PENGUINS in your school library, and you'll find a page in there that tells you how the Macaroni penguin got its name. (Hint: It has nothing to do with pasta.) I can't tell you my favorite animal because then the other animals would attack me! (Photo from PENGUINS, by Seymour Simon. CollinsSmithsonian Books, 2007) Note to students Using the "ASK SEYMOUR SIMON" button: Please take your time and be sure that you enter your email address correctly. If it is misspelled, I can't reply to you, so you never get an answer to your question. Type your email in, and then check your work! Thanks.

PLANET WATCHING ALERT!

Set your alarm for just before dawn tomorrow morning, May 11 and you can see FOUR of the planets in our Solar System with your own eyes!Mariano Ribas took this photo early today from his home in Buenos Aires, Argentina. The three "stars" that form a triangle high in the sky are Venus, Mercury and Jupiter. If you look down below, closer to the fence, there is a fourth faint light, which is Mars. This amazing sky show will continue all the way through the end of the month. Astronomers are excited about tomorrow because they say it will be the "best" day for viewing, with the two brightest planets in our Solar System, Venus and Jupiter, very close together. Set your alarm, look to the eastern sky, and greet the planets.What a great way to start the day!

Cool Photo of the Week

Regular Seymour Science readers know that we do this every Tuesday…...and isn't this trumpetfish photo a beauty?!I am particularly interested in the trumpetfish (Aulostomus maculatus) these days because I am working on a new book about CORAL REEFS. Trumpetfish live in coral reefs, and they often swim vertically (straight up and down, as you see here) as a way of camouflaging themselves. They want to blend in with tall coral like sea rods and pipe sponges so that they can sneak up on unsuspecting prey. They catch their food by lying so still that they look like a stick, and then sucking up passing fish into their mouths. These fish grow to be about 36 inches (just under one meter) long. If you spread both your arms out as wide as they can go, that is about the size of a full-grown trumpetfish. Photo: Nick Hobgood

We Have a Winner!

Katie, a student at Thunder Hill Elementary School in Maryland, has won an autographed copy of Seymour Simon's BABY ANIMALS by answering the question: What do you call a baby hippopotamus? Katie (and several other students) correctly answered that a baby hippo is called a calf. We did a random drawing, and Katie came out the winner. Thank you to everyone who entered. We love to hear from you!

Choo Choooooooooooo!

May 7 is National Train Day, and in honor of the event, I'm re-posting this blog from Carol H. Rasco, CEO of Reading Is Fundamental, Inc., America's oldest and largest nonprofit children's and family literacy organization. Seymour Simon's Book of Trains is devoured by children interested in trains…children and youth of all ages. While it is advertised as written for ages 9-12, even pre-school youngsters love the big color pictures and some of us adults learned things about freight trains we had seen on the rails but never knew the details. From the earliest rail cars to the obsolete cabooses to electric subways to France's TGV with speeds of between 200-300 mph, the details are here in words and photos. It is a great book to use as the centerpiece for National Train Day as it reminds us:Trains can carry grain and gravel, milk and machines, cars and computers, pipes and people. Amtrak turned 40 years oldon May 1 and there is a timeline which might be of interest to students on the National Train Day website with the Kids' Corner featuring the cities where special children's entertainment will be held on Train Day along with a downloadable Amtrak Kids' Booklet, Kids Depot featuring games and even a section to learn to fold an origami train. Carol H. Rasko writes often about the books related to current events. You can read her stories on the RASCO FROM RIF blog.

The Baby Hawks are Hatching!

If you are reading this morning, click on the "play" button to watch baby hawks being born. I've just seen both parents standing on the edge of the nest while the first, tiny fledling squeezed out of its shell. Amazing sight to see!