Animals have many special ways to protect themselves. Some animals use camouflage to hide, other animals use a stinky smell to keep predators away and some are too sharp to touch. Let’s discover these sharp animals together!
Porcupine
When you think of sharp animals the first thing that pops up is the porcupine. There are 24 different kinds of porcupines and they live all over the world in Europe, North and South America, Asia and Africa. One thing that all porcupines have in common are their sharp quills. Their quills are kind of like hairs but they are stiff and very sharp. If an animal touches a quill, it lets loose easily and sticks in their skin. Some quills even have barbs like a fishing hook making it very painful to take out. Ouch! Quills typically lay down flat on the porcupine, but when it senses danger they stand up straight warning predators to stay away. Quills will regrow just like hair after a porcupine looses them.
Porcupines love to eat wood. They eat twigs and bark. They will also eat fruit leaves and buds. Most porcupines are good climbers too.
Echidna
An echidna is a very unusual animal found only in Australia, Tasmania and New Guinea. They have soft fuzzy fur for insulation helping to keep them warm, but they are also covered with quills like a porcupine. They have a beak like a bird with a long sticky tongue they use to catch termites, ants and other insects.
Echidnas are a mammal that lays eggs, usually only birds, fish and reptiles lay eggs. The egg an echidna lays is soft and leathery and it stays in the mother’s pouch until the baby comes out after ten days. A baby echidna is called a puggle The puggle will stay in its mom’s pouch until it is three months old.
The echidnas spines are very good at keeping away predators and they can live in the wild up to 45 years!
Pufferfish
Pufferfish or blowfish are known for their ability to blow up into a big ball. Pufferfish are not very good swimmers, so they use their spines that stand out when they expand into a big round ball to keep predators away. Another defense that pufferfish have is being poisonous. They have a special kind of poison that tastes terrible to fish and can sometimes be deadly. Pufferfish blow up by very quickly sucking in huge amounts of water and even air into their stretchy belly. No predator can eat a fish that shape or size and the spikes found on many types of pufferfish add extra warning.
Pufferfish live in many different water environments all over the world, but most live in warm, tropical salt waters.
Hedgehog
A hedgehog is a small critter that is found in many different types of habitats all over the world. Some people even keep them as pets. Hedgehogs are covered in stiff sharp spines and curl up into a prickly ball when they sense danger. They can also sleep curled up into a ball to protect themselves. They are called hedgehogs because they eat insects, worms and small snakes found in hedges and undergrowth. While they root around for their food they make grunting noises that sounds a lot like a pig or hog. Can you make a pig noise? In place where it is cold hedgehogs can hibernate through the winter. Hibernate means their body slows down and they sleep all winter long so they don’t need food. They can also sleep through droughts in dry places.
Animals have so many special ways of protecting themselves from danger. Having sharp spines warns other animals that may want to eat them to stay away. They may be cute, but would you want to touch a prickly animal? No way! Sharp animals know how to stay safe and survive in the wild.
Sources
National Geographic Pufferfish