An elephant family is sleeping photographed by a drone Elephants sleep on average two hours a night, the shortest recorded time for a land mammal. Some days they don’t sleep at all, staying awake for up to 46 consecutive hours and covering considerable distances of about 30 kilometers. It seems that elephants only reach the REM phase every three or four days, which makes them unique animals. Experts believe this might be due to disturbances caused by the presence of lions or poachers that keep them in a constant state of alert.

When sperm whales need a nap, they take a deep breath, dive down about 45 feet and arrange themselves into perfectly-level, vertical patterns. They sleep sound and still for up to two hours at a time between breaths, in pods of 5 or 6 whales, presumably for protection. No one knew whales slept vertically until a 2008 study documented the behavior. And no one captured really good photography of it in the wild until 2017. French photographer Stephane Granzotto was documenting sperm whales in the Mediterranean for his book on the creatures when he came across these sleeping whales. Sperm whales and their mysterious vertical sleep. Until a 2008 study…

Fans of the beloved Looney Tunes franchise know this to be the common motto of the popular Road Runner character eternally in conflict with the desperate Wile E. Coyote. But Beep beep! shares a different meaning in regard to a zany situation that occurred at the Lost Dutchman State Park in Pinal County. A photo shared Wednesday from the Arizona State Parks Twitter account shows a roadrunner taking shelter inside a park ranger’s truck, supposedly to escape the clutches of a ravenous coyote. The tweet read, “POV: you were running away from the coyote and got confused…” The roadrunner took a brief break next to the driver’s seat, seemingly scouting…

The dog in the picture is named Hachiko.In 1923, the Japanese citizen (Isabura) found the dog (Hachiko) in a small box inside one of the train cars that he used to take daily to work… and the dog was still a small puppy.. He took it and raised it in his house.. The days pass and Hachiko grows. Isabura used to go to work every day by train, and Hachiko used to drive him to the station and wait at the station until his return about 10 hours later. A statue of him was designed at the entrance to Shibui Station in Japan, and it is still present.Loyalty is a…

Every morning, a very independent pooch named Eclipse leaves her house alone. She’s on a mission: get to the dog park located in the heart of Downtown Seattle. Over the years, Eclipse has become a favorite among Seattle commuters and is now seen as an inspiration, being called an “independent woman.” Each day, like a very good girl, she waits patiently at the bus stop by her home. When her bus arrives, she boards it and is greeted by adoring fans. The Mastador (half Mastiff and half Labrador) pooch has amassed a strong social media following because of this remarkable behavior. According to a Seattle-based observer who left a comment…

A woodpecker’s tongue is so long that it wraps around its skull to protect its brain while hitting a tree or other hard surfaces. This, combined with other factors like: super-strong neck muscles, spongy bone plates in the skull that act like a football helmet, and a very small amount of cerebrospinal fluid surrounding its brain, all help prevent a woodpecker from rack your brain while pecking with a force of more than 1000g. Two fledglings waiting for their mother to return to the nest were killed after a Gila woodpecker stopped by for a quick snack. The woodpecker proceeded to ram its beak into the back of the doves’…

Puerto Escondido on the Oaxacan coast of Mexico, you’ll probably have read or heard about the turtle conservation efforts here. Every day, just before sunset, people gather on the beaches of Puerto Escondido to assist in the baby turtle release. The cost of releasing one turtle is 100 pesos and the money raised is circled back into protecting this beautiful but endangered species. Upon arriving at the release site, we were shown around a large tent where the sea turtles’ eggs were buried. The turtles don’t actually lay their eggs here; instead, the team here works tirelessly through the night to find, remove and rebury the eggs as the turtles…

Smoky was a 4 lb, 7 inches tall, Yorkshire Terrier who served in World War II. In 1944 Smoky was found in a foxhole in the jungles of New Guinea by an American soldier who brought her back to camp and sold her to Corporal William A. Wynne for $6.44. For the next 2 years, Smoky lived a soldier’s life. Because she was not an official military dog, she did not get dog food or medical care. She shared Wynne’s meals and slept beside him in his tent. The dog was named Smoky, and over the last two years of the war she accompanied Wynne on 12 combat missions and…