MOVIE NEWS: Earth
Hey all. As I mentioned on Monday, I got to see a preview screening of the new movie Earth this week. It primarily follows three animal families — polar bears, elephants, and humpback whales — for a year, and shows how “wild” their lives truly are.
The movie is full of fantastic visuals, but I also learned a lot about our amazing home planet. Here are the Top 10 things I discovered:
10) Deserts cover about one-third of the Earth’s land surface.
9) The male Superb Bird of Paradise is awesome:
[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6gAxbxxmYZ8&feature=related]
8) Sailfish can travel at speeds of up to 110 km/h (70 mph) — that’s the speed limit on Canada’s fastest highways! Sailfish also look a whole lot like swordfish. But that’s not exactly a “fact.” Let’s move on.
7) The southern equivalent to the northern lights (“aurora borealis”) is called “aurora astralis.”
6) Humpback whale calves drink more than 550 L (145 gallons) of milk a day. That’s the amount of liquid in 1,550 cans of pop!
5) In the winter, mother polar bears don’t eat for five months. During this time, they lose half their body weight.
4) Each year, three million caribou travel almost 3,300 km (2,000 mi.) in search of green pastures for grazing. On foot, of course. That’d be like you or me walking from Vancouver to Toronto!
3) This is a follow-up fact: newborn caribou calves are on their feet and running the day they’re born.
2) About one-third of the world’s trees are in the Arctic.
And finally…
1) Rainforest covers only three percent of the Earth, but contains half of the Earth’s plants and animals.
And that’s it! Hope you enjoyed the facts. If you did, you might also enjoy the movie. There’s some footage in it that’s a little scary — it can be tough watching animals hunt — but there’s also some footage that’s totally humbling and awe-inspiring.
Hope everyone has a great Earth Day. Talk to you again on Friday.
Craig, owlblog@owlkids.com
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Ha! I like that clip that bird is like ” You wanna mess with me” it keeps getting closer to the other bird! LOL
Sounds like an interesting movie.
Does that bird in the video actually look like that? ‘Cause if it does, that’s totally amazing. The 2 facts I find most interesting are one third of trees are in the arctic and the rainforest one. Craig, have you ever seen Planet Earth??? This is something I read from a book: leopard seals eat penguins and they eat the head first!!! I find that gross and sad at the same time. Oh and on Craig’s Picks, under movies, I like School of Rock too. Me and my sister have watched it sooo many times.
Yup, Katherine, that bird actually looks like that. It’s funny you ask about Planet Earth: the movie is based on that series, so a lot of it is the same footage. It’s cool to see it on the big screen, though!
Oh, oops. Well, I just learned something today. And, I heard that there’s gonna be a wordsearch contest in June. I remember giving you the idea a year ago.
Craig, are the OWL Mags. made on 100% recycled paper? I f not you should make it on 100% recycled paper. What can you say every single bit counts:)
Hey, what did everyone do for Earth Day? At my school, we turned off our lights, wore green, blue or brown and picked up garbage around the schoolyard! GO EARTH!
9. What an AWESOME and funny bird!
8. I knew that Sailfish were really fast since Kindergarten(I learned it on a Magic School Bus computer game), but I never knew the exact speed.
4. Wow!
3. That’s not that interesting, all or most 4-legged animals are like that, including horses. It’s interesting, but I’ve know that forever.
2. What about the tree line?
1. Wow!
I just noticed today, Madison made it into Hot Topic! Congradulations, wherever you are?
On the GR8 DB8 Hot Topic a while back: the girl in the title page, was it a stock photo or something? Because I saw the exact picture of just her face(no cell phone) on the cover of a Chick Soup…Soul Book.
I just got my May Issue, and to my surprise, I was in it!!!!! My quote is in the Hot Topic section. I wasn’t sure if it was going to be in the magazine, but I guess it is! Thanks OWL!
Hey I got my mag! Craig I have a question about the acrostic poem. When they say pik a theme do they mean like a sentence or a word?
Hey Mara. The theme of our sample poem in the magazine was “OWL” but yours can be longer if you like. It can be one word (such as “spring,” for instance), or a bunch of words together (“the first day of spring”). Your call!
Also, Katie, I think it was probably a stock image. We do a lot of our own photo shoots for the magazine, but we also buy shots from photographers and agencies via the internet.
Oh, and one last thing: yup, Katherine, the Word Search Contest is finally going in the magazine! Thanks again for the idea.
Hey Sydney, thst’s cool how you wore those colours to school. Every class at my school had an area of the schoolyard to clean up. But, my class didn’t end up going outside becase there was already absolutely no garbage in our area. But last year, my class collected tons of garbage!!! Also everyone got a pansy to take home. No thank you Craig for putting that contest in the magazine!!!!
Madison are you the guy that says I don’t think near by residents would enjoy…
Hey. I think only the same few people go on owlblog. I’ll tell more people about it. It’s actually pretty cool!!!!! I also love the magazine because it’s not celebrity junk. It’s educational!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
OMG Madison! You’re the one in the magazine! Congratulations!!!! Kewl. “I don’t think nearby residents would enjoy listening to sticks clanging and banging day after day.” That’s you’re quote right???
Also, I have another idea for OWL. For What’s Hot, a book should be Twilight or one of the other books in the saga. They’re good. Oh yeah, and where do you get the summaries for the what’s hot section???
PS Sorry I’m posting so many messages.
Hey!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The time on this site is wrong, Craig!!!! It says eight something, but it’s really nine!!! It’s an hour back!!!
Yea I know Kathrine same with me
Oops! Not anymore!
The Twilight books, in my opinion, are disgusting and a waste of paper.
I collected tons of garbage around the ravine on the edge of the shoolyard with my class today for Earth Week. There were so many snail shells(which I of course didn’t touch).
Mara, I saw ur advice in OWL magazine. Kewl. 🙂
Oh, and ur right, the time did go back to usual!!!
I can’t wait for Craig’s next post, which is tomorrow!!!!! WHat’s it gonna be about Craig?
Thanx Katherine but um… I’m not 100% sure that was my comment. I think it was but that remains a mystery for now. My comment had that in it with some other stuff that wasn’t shown on the mag.
Wow. Nice colours…uhm
Hey Mara! That was definitely your advice in the May issue. Since we aim to fit in as many letters as possible, we usually get to keep only a sentence or two from each one. Hope that makes sense!
Okay Craig, thanx for putting my advice! YAY!!!!!!!!
i know i know