Amazing animal tales children can read — and tell everyone about
Did you know that a kiwi bird can sniff out worms using two nostrils at the tip of its beak? Did you know that a Greenland shark can live up to 400 years? Did you know that the thorny dragon lizard uses its spiky skin to collect water? Did you know that zombie worms feed on whale bones down at the bottom of the sea?
Are you ready to be peppered with “Did you know” questions by an enthusiastic young scientist? These gorgeously illustrated, fact-packed books about animals will prompt wonder ... and an irresistible urge to share it with anyone in earshot.
“We’re Not Weird: Structure and Function in the Animal Kingdom” by Michael Garland. (Ages 4 through 8. Holiday House. $18.99.)
Author-illustrator Michael Garland explores amazing animal designs shaped by evolution, letting creatures both familiar and little-known tell their stories. “I look like a kite gliding from tree to tree in the night,” the Sunda flying lemur tells us.
Woodcut-and-digital illustrations offer close-up views of the star-nosed mole, the mudskipper, the gharial, the blobfish and other stunning animals, and remind readers that they’re not weird — they’re wonderful, because “our special body parts help us survive and thrive.”
“Birds Everywhere” by Camilla de la Bedoyere, illustrated by Britta Teckentrup. (Ages 6 through 9. Big Picture Press. $17.99.)
This encyclopedic look at how birds fly, eat, nest, migrate and survive all over the world will amaze young readers with its vivid illustrations and fact-filled pages.
An evolutionary timeline starts with eoraptor and other theropod dinosaurs, as they developed feathers and wings, producing stunning beasts from the ancient “terror bird”
Titanis to the modernday hummingbird.
The whirlwind tour of the bird universe ends with tips on bird-watching and a reminder that “we are learning to treasure our feathered friends and take better care of their habitats.”
“Whale Fall: Exploring an Ocean-Floor Ecosystem” by Melissa Stewart, illustrated by Rob Dunlavey. (Ages 4 through 8. Random House Studio. $18.99.)
From one ending — the death of a whale — comes a beginning for scavengers and residents of the ocean floor: It’s “a bountiful gift that can sustain life for another fifty years.”
Author Melissa Stewart explores the littleseen world of hagfish and sleeper sharks, amphipods and scale worms, and Rob Dunlavey’s evocative illustrations show the oddness of the creatures, washed in a dark, cold world.
Over time, the “thriving oasis” shrinks as nature’s recyclers glean all the nutrients from it — until “somewhere, perhaps not so far away, the cycle is beginning again.”
“How Old Is a Whale? Animal Life Spans From the Mayfly to the Immortal Jellyfish” by Lily Murray, illustrated by Jesse Hodgson. (Ages 6 through 9. Big Picture Press. $21.99.)
It’s a question that opens the door to so many more, once you ask it: “Why is life so short for some and so long for others?”
This fascinating book looks at how different life spans shape creatures’ every moment, whether in a race against time or a long, slow glide, and dives into such mysteries as the monarch butterfly’s multi-generational migration and the chilly lives of glass sponges and jellyfish. Readers will never look the same way again at American lobsters (life span: 100-plus years), which can regrow lost limbs, and ocean quahogs (life span: 400 years), clams that, like trees, accumulate shell bands as they age.