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Armadillos Are Best at Doing

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Armadillos Are Best at Doing Texas Wildlife Association presents.... December 2010 Kid’s Quarterly Mini-Mag! Vol. 4 No. 4 ¡ ¢ £ ¤ £ ¥ ¢ ¦ £ § § £ ¤ ¨ Postcards from Nancy... Hello there, TWA! I am gearing up to participate in my first ever Iron-Dillo competition! It is being held at the end of the month in Kerrville, Texas, so Grant and I are staying close by with my good friend, Rachel Atkins in Fredericksburg. Rachel is great at 3rd grade science, knows some karate and thought she might be able to help me train! I have been practicing like crazy for the three Iron-Dillo events which include swimming, extreme digging and vertical jumping. Those are the three things that armadillos are best at doing. Armadillos from all over the state will be there competing, and I’m hoping to bring home a medal! So far, my best event seems to be swimming. A lot of people don’t know this but armadillos can swim two different ways. We can jump into and Cuda will hide and then when I go out looking for them, the water, sink to the bottom, and walk across using our Cuda will scamper out to scare me and Rachel will measure claws to help us hold on to the ground underwater. We can how high I jump. So far, my best jump was 3.3 feet. It’s not also take a deep breath before we jump in and swallow the bad but I’m hoping to break 4 feet by Iron-Dillo day. air in a way that allows us to inflate our stomachs and parts of I still have a lot of work to do with my digging. I can dig our intestines like little rafts. Then, we can just float across the for grubs all day and I can excavate a super nice burrow, surface of the water. I like to float! It makes me feel like a but I like to take my time while I do it. Iron-Dillo is all about balloon and since I can’t fly, it’s the next best thing! the need for speed, and I get frantic when I try to dig fast. Jumping is probably my second best event. Armadillos ...go to page 7 to !nish reading this great story! are known for their vertical leap—that means © © jumping straight up in the air. When an armadillo becomes scared, they can jump between 3 and 4 # ! " feet straight into the air. This is actually a defense mechanism because when a predator sees us jump like that, it freaks them out a little and gives us a chance to escape. Rachel and her dog Cuda have been helping me practice my jumps. 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Armadillo Fun Fact! ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ 15 11 To solve this Armadillo Fun Fact, you must match the numbers to certain letters. Two letters have already been given. Hint: This Fun Fact may be found in the story on pages 4 and 5! ___ ___ ___ ___ ___I ___ ___ - ___ ___ ___ ___DD ___ ___ 20 21 16 7 11 7 16 17 12 7 15 16 15 ___ ___ ___ ___ ___DI ___ ___ ___ ___ word searches...... word 12 18 1 12 15 11 2 2 22 ___I ___ ___ ___ ___ ___ ___’ ___ ___ ___ ___ ___ 11 6 20 16 25 12 6 6 20 12 20 16 ___ ___ ___ ___ ___ ___ ___ ___ ___ ___ ___ . 6 1 12 2 2 1 12 1 1 12 2 Photo courtesy of Wyman Meinzer Distance Learning Program ASI: Animal Skull Investigation Let’s Talk Turkey Texas Critters More Than a Drop: Aquifers Uncovered BATS: LIVE on the BIG Screen Programs listed above, in addition to special programs, may be added throughout the semester. Check the websites below for additional program offerings. To learn more information about Discovery Trunks (availability and shipping) or Distance Learning, visit the TWA website, www.texas-wildlife.org. To see our schedule, or sign up for Distance Learning visit Connect2Texas, www.connect2texas.net. For questions or scheduling, please contact: Brought to you by: Kassi Scheffer Sponsored by: Education Programs Assistant 210-826-2904 ext 113 [email protected] 3 corner Photo courtesy of Wyman Meinzer It is easy to see where the Nine-banded Photo of armadillo bands and chicken eggs, not too far, they will swim across. On other occasions, ArmadilloArm got its name – from the nine bands by Russell Graves and they probably do the armadillo may walk across the bottom of the Proud Symbol whichwhi protect its body. The “armor” is actually occasionallyocc destroy creek. If the distance is great, the armadillo can ingest a bonyb carapace (rhymes with ‘anyplace’), somesom nests, but eggs air, inflate themselves, and whichwhi is a shield similar to a turtle or crab. The are not a large part of float across. Scientists are not of Te *as carapacecar is covered with scutes (pronounced theirthe diet. sure how they know what to ‘scoot’),‘sc which are composed of bone with a Unlike most do when they come across a c coveringcov of horn. mammals,mam armadillos creek or river. Many people think armadillos roll do not have a lot of Although they have large thethemselves up into a ball to protect itself from hairhai covering their eyes, they do not have good prepredators, but the fact is that only the Three- bodybod nor do they have eyesight.
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