I don't know if these are actually true or not, but they're pretty funny either way. Especially the coffin thing. (Maybe I'm just morbid.)
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* Lead cups were used to drink ale or whiskey. The combination would sometimes knock them out for a couple of days. Someone walking along the road would take them for dead and prepare them for burial. They were laid out on the kitchen table for a couple of days and the family would gather around and eat and drink and wait and see if they would wake up. Hence the custom of holding a "wake."
* England is old and small, and they started running out of places to bury people. So, they would dig up coffins and would take their bones to a house and reuse the grave. In reopening these coffins, one out of 25 coffins were found to have scratch marks on the inside and they realized they had been burying people alive. So they thought they would tie a string on their wrist and lead it through the coffin and up through the ground and tie it to a bell. Someone would have to sit out in the graveyard all night to listen for the bell. Hence on the "graveyard shift" they would know that someone was "saved by the bell" or he was a "dead ringer."
* Most people got married in June because they took their yearly bath in May and were still smelling pretty good by June. However, they were starting to smell, so brides carried a bouquet of flowers to hide the b.o.
* Baths equaled a big tub filled with hot water. The man of the house had the privilege of the nice clean water, then all the other sons and men, then the women and finally the children. Last of all the babies. By then the water was so dirty you could actually lose someone in it. Hence the saying "Don't throw the baby out with the bath water."
* Houses had thatched roofs. Thick straw, piled high, with no wood underneath. It was the only place for animals to get warm, so all the pets... dogs, cats and other small animals, mice, rats, bugs lived in the roof. When it rained it became slippery and sometimes the animals would slip and fall off the roof. Hence the saying, "It's raining cats and dogs."
* There was nothing to stop things from falling into the house. This posed a real problem in the bedroom where bugs and other droppings could really mess up your nice clean bed. So, they found if they made beds with big posts and hung a sheet over the top, it addressed that problem. Hence those beautiful big 4 poster beds with canopies. I wonder if this is where we get the saying "Good night and don't let the bed bugs bite"...
* The floor was dirt. Only the wealthy had something other than dirt, hence the saying "dirt poor." The wealthy had slate floors which would get slippery in the winter when wet. So they spread thresh on the floor to help keep their footing. As the winter wore on they kept adding more thresh until when you opened the door it would all start slipping outside. A piece of wood was placed at the entry way, hence a "thresh hold."
* They cooked in the kitchen in a big kettle that always hung over the fire. Every day they lit the fire and added things to the pot. They mostly ate vegetables and didn't get much meat. They would eat the stew for dinner leaving leftovers in the pot to get cold overnight and then start over the next day. Sometimes the stew had food in it that had been in there for a month. Hence the rhyme: peas porridge hot, peas porridge cold, peas porridge in the pot nine days old."
* Sometimes they could obtain pork and would feel really special when that happened. When company came over, they would bring out some bacon and hang it to show it off. It was a sign of wealth and that a man "could really bring home the bacon." They would cut off a little to share with guests and would all sit around and "chew the fat."
* Those with money had plates made of pewter. Food with a high acid content caused some of the lead to leach onto the food. This happened most often with tomatoes, so they stopped eating tomatoes...for 400 years.
* Most people didn't have pewter plates, but had trenchers - a piece of wood with the middle scooped out like a bowl. Trenchers were never washed and a lot of times worms got into the wood. After eating off wormy trenchers, they would get "trench mouth.
* Bread was divided according to status. Workers got the burnt bottom of the loaf, the family got the middle, and guests got the top, or the "upper crust".
Credit: Brobdignagian Bards.
Showing posts with label Fun Facts. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Fun Facts. Show all posts
Monday, June 29, 2009
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
Facts about Flamingos you never knew
Did you know there are 6 different types of Flamingos!?:
Greater Flamingo - largest of the flamingos, has deep pink wings.
Caribbean Flamingo - slightly smaller than sir Greatness above.
Chilean Flamingo - slightly smaller than Caribbean, has gray legs with pink bands at joints.
James Flamingo - all black flight feathers including the secondary flight feathers (normally red in other flamingos).
Andean Flamingo - only species of flamingo with yellow legs and feet. Has a red spot between the nostrils.
Lesser Flamingo - smallest of all flamingos, yet the color is brighter that even the Greater Flamingo!
Why are Flamingos Pink in color?
The simple answer is diet. A flamingo's pink or reddish feather, leg, and facial coloration comes from a diet high in alpha and beta carotenoid pigments, including canthaxanthin. The richest sources of carotenoids are found in the algae and various insects that make up the staples of a flamingo's diet.
Random Facts about Flamingos
- Male flamingos are slightly larger than females; however, visual sex determination of flamingos is unreliable.
- Flamingos have good hearing and use vocalizations to keep flocks together and for parent-chick recognition.
- Vision plays an important role in helping flamingos synchronize collective displays (social behaviors) of several hundred to several thousand birds.
- Flamingos have little or no sense of smell.
- Tactile organs on their tongues are used to examine food taken in.
- They are capable of drinking water at temperatures that approach the boiling point.
- When flamingos are resting, they may sit down with their legs tucked beneath them or stand on one leg.
- While resting, flamingos face into the wind. This stops wind and rain from penetrating their feathers.
- A flamingo flies with its head and neck stretched out in front and its legs trailing behind.
- Flamingos excrete salt through salt glands in the nostrils.
- Flamingos are very social birds. Breeding colonies of a few individual flamingos are rare, while colonies of tens of thousands of birds are common.
- Flamingos devote considerable time to collective displays before, during, and after breeding.
- Several hundred to several thousand flamingos are all involved simultaneously with ritualized postures and movements to synchronize breeding.
- An oil gland near the base of the tail secretes oil that the flamingo distributes throughout its feathers.
- Through slow-motion photography, researchers discovered that "Lesser Flamingo" birds pump water through their bills 20 times a second to filter their food.
- Flamingos seek out fresh water for drinking.
- Flamingos reach sexual maturity several years after hatching and usually begin to breed at about six years of age.
- Flamingos most often lay one large egg. Females have been known to lay two eggs, but it is rare for both to hatch. If an egg is lost early in incubation, a second replacement egg may be laid. This process is called double clutching.
- Both the male and female take turns incubating the egg by sitting on top of the nest mound.
- Eggs that fall from the nesting mound are not retrieved.
- Because there are no regular breeding seasons, chicks hatch throughout the year
- Egyptians revered the flamingo as the living embodiment of the sun god Ra.
- When hatching, the flamingo chick breaks through the shell using a growth on its bill called an egg tooth. The egg tooth is not a true tooth and falls off soon after hatching.
- Parents are able to recognize their own chick by sight and vocalizations. They will feed no other chick.
- Adults feed their chicks a secretion of the upper digestive tract referred to as milk. Milk secretion is caused by the hormone prolactin, which both the male and female flamingo produce.
- Flamingo vocalizations range from nasal honking to grunting or growling. Flamingos are generally very noisy birds.
- Experts have not yet determined how long flamingos live. At the Philadelphia Zoo, one flamingo lived 44 years.
- In early Roman times, flamingo tongues were carefully prepared, pickled, and served as a delicacy.
- Andean miners have killed flamingos for their fat, believed to be a cure for tuberculosis.
- SeaWorld feeds flamingos a special diet using submerged food trays used to accommodate flamingos' filter-feeding habits.
- If it is a murder of crows, then what is the term for a flock of flamingos? It's a pat of flamingos.
- Flamingos have knees that can bend backward. However, what we refer to as their knee, is actually their ankle.
- The word flamingo is most likely derived from the Latin, flamma, flame.
- Flamingos molt (shed and replace) their wing and body feathers at irregular intervals ranging from twice a year to once every two years.
- A flamingo's eye is actually larger than it's brain!
Credit: gardenfun.com
Greater Flamingo - largest of the flamingos, has deep pink wings.
Caribbean Flamingo - slightly smaller than sir Greatness above.
Chilean Flamingo - slightly smaller than Caribbean, has gray legs with pink bands at joints.
James Flamingo - all black flight feathers including the secondary flight feathers (normally red in other flamingos).
Andean Flamingo - only species of flamingo with yellow legs and feet. Has a red spot between the nostrils.
Lesser Flamingo - smallest of all flamingos, yet the color is brighter that even the Greater Flamingo!
Why are Flamingos Pink in color?
The simple answer is diet. A flamingo's pink or reddish feather, leg, and facial coloration comes from a diet high in alpha and beta carotenoid pigments, including canthaxanthin. The richest sources of carotenoids are found in the algae and various insects that make up the staples of a flamingo's diet.
Random Facts about Flamingos
- Male flamingos are slightly larger than females; however, visual sex determination of flamingos is unreliable.
- Flamingos have good hearing and use vocalizations to keep flocks together and for parent-chick recognition.
- Vision plays an important role in helping flamingos synchronize collective displays (social behaviors) of several hundred to several thousand birds.
- Flamingos have little or no sense of smell.
- Tactile organs on their tongues are used to examine food taken in.
- They are capable of drinking water at temperatures that approach the boiling point.
- When flamingos are resting, they may sit down with their legs tucked beneath them or stand on one leg.
- While resting, flamingos face into the wind. This stops wind and rain from penetrating their feathers.
- A flamingo flies with its head and neck stretched out in front and its legs trailing behind.
- Flamingos excrete salt through salt glands in the nostrils.
- Flamingos are very social birds. Breeding colonies of a few individual flamingos are rare, while colonies of tens of thousands of birds are common.
- Flamingos devote considerable time to collective displays before, during, and after breeding.
- Several hundred to several thousand flamingos are all involved simultaneously with ritualized postures and movements to synchronize breeding.
- An oil gland near the base of the tail secretes oil that the flamingo distributes throughout its feathers.
- Through slow-motion photography, researchers discovered that "Lesser Flamingo" birds pump water through their bills 20 times a second to filter their food.
- Flamingos seek out fresh water for drinking.
- Flamingos reach sexual maturity several years after hatching and usually begin to breed at about six years of age.
- Flamingos most often lay one large egg. Females have been known to lay two eggs, but it is rare for both to hatch. If an egg is lost early in incubation, a second replacement egg may be laid. This process is called double clutching.
- Both the male and female take turns incubating the egg by sitting on top of the nest mound.
- Eggs that fall from the nesting mound are not retrieved.
- Because there are no regular breeding seasons, chicks hatch throughout the year
- Egyptians revered the flamingo as the living embodiment of the sun god Ra.
- When hatching, the flamingo chick breaks through the shell using a growth on its bill called an egg tooth. The egg tooth is not a true tooth and falls off soon after hatching.
- Parents are able to recognize their own chick by sight and vocalizations. They will feed no other chick.
- Adults feed their chicks a secretion of the upper digestive tract referred to as milk. Milk secretion is caused by the hormone prolactin, which both the male and female flamingo produce.
- Flamingo vocalizations range from nasal honking to grunting or growling. Flamingos are generally very noisy birds.
- Experts have not yet determined how long flamingos live. At the Philadelphia Zoo, one flamingo lived 44 years.
- In early Roman times, flamingo tongues were carefully prepared, pickled, and served as a delicacy.
- Andean miners have killed flamingos for their fat, believed to be a cure for tuberculosis.
- SeaWorld feeds flamingos a special diet using submerged food trays used to accommodate flamingos' filter-feeding habits.
- If it is a murder of crows, then what is the term for a flock of flamingos? It's a pat of flamingos.
- Flamingos have knees that can bend backward. However, what we refer to as their knee, is actually their ankle.
- The word flamingo is most likely derived from the Latin, flamma, flame.
- Flamingos molt (shed and replace) their wing and body feathers at irregular intervals ranging from twice a year to once every two years.
- A flamingo's eye is actually larger than it's brain!
Credit: gardenfun.com
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