Interesting and Unbelievable Facts

There are more than 300 identified species of hummingbirds. They are easily distinguishable due to their small size and other unique features.  The hummingbird’s most important sense is its vision. It has  excellent color vision  and sees colors similar to that of humans. They also can see UV (ultraviolet) light. ( Source ) Hummingbirds have the  largest brain  relative to their size among all birds. Their brain is 4.2% of their body weight. ( Source ) Hummingbirds have one of the  best memories  in the animal kingdom. They also may have episodic memory that is present only in human beings. ( Source ) Many hummingbird species spend winter and summer in different areas. For this purpose, they  migrate long distances  twice a year. In contrast to most other bird species, hummingbirds  migrate individually  instead of in flocks. Before these long migrations, these birds gain up to  40% of their original weight . Their uniqu...

Along with Antarctica, Greenland is the only ice sheet area on earth. Ice sheets are areas permanently covered by ice with a size of more than 50,000 km 2 .  Greenland is also the world’s largest island . It covers an area of more than 2.1 million sq. km. The size of the second largest island, New Guinea, is only 821,400 sq. km. More than 80% area of Greenland is covered by permanent ice , the largest ice mass in the Northern Hemisphere. It contains nearly 12% of glacier ice in the world.  According to research, the Greenlandic ice sheet is more than  400,000 years old . Some part of this ice is nearly one million years old. ( Source ) The Greenland ice sheet is melting at around 240 cubic km per year. The complete melting of Greenlandic ice will cause the sea level to rise by more than 7 meters (23 feet). Despite being one of the world’s largest countries by area, the population of Greenland is just over 55,000. Its population density (around 0.03 people per s...

Dinosaurs are extinct reptiles of the Mesozoic (mainly Jurassic period) era (which emerged around 250 million years ago). These animals  vanished from the  earth around 66 million years ago due to unknown reasons. More than 500 dinosaur species  have been discovered so far. According to  estimates, the total number of extinct species of dinosaurs could be 1,300 or more. ( Source ) The extinction event of dinosaurs is known as the Cretaceous-Paleogene extinction event. It also wiped out 75% of all the animals and plants  present on earth at that time. According to a theory, this extinction event likely happened because of an asteroid hitting the earth. Other possible reasons include volcanic eruptions, climate change, etc. There were both meat-eating and plant-eating (and probably omnivore) dinosaurs. According to estimates, around 65% of dinosaurs were herbivores, while the remaining species were carnivores.   Many plant-eating dinosaurs wer...

With a population of more than 16.5 million, Guatemala is the most populated country in Central America. Guatemala has one of the lowest Human Development Index  (HDI) in the whole Latin American region. The country is just above Haiti and Honduras in this aspect. ( Source ) Guatemala has one of the highest rates of femicide  (murder of a female due to gender) in the world, only behind  El Salvador , Honduras, and  South Africa . In 2008, it also became the first country to recognize femicide  officially. ( Source ) It is generally recognized that human life started in Guatemala around 12,000 years ago. But there are few evidences that Guatemala is the  first human settlement  in Central America, with its initial human existence in 18,000 B.C. ( Source ) Guatemala’s politics after its independence came under the influence of  American fruit companies (especially the United Fruit Company). Therefore like a few other Central American c...

Ecuador is a small country in South America. The imaginary line of the equator passes through more than ten countries. However, Ecuador is the only country named after this line that bisects earth into the Northern and Southern Hemispheres. The majority population (around 70%) of Ecuador is composed of  Mestizos  (mixed European and Amerindian descent). It is one of the highest in  South America . Quito, the capital of Ecuador, is the  2 nd  highest capital city  in the world. It is located at an altitude of 9,350 feet above sea level. ( Source ) Galapagos Islands and the city of Quito (both in Ecuador) are two of the 12  earliest  UNESCO World heritage  sites . The UNESCO ID of these two sites is 1 and 2, respectively. ( Source ) In 2008, Ecuador became the first country in the world to recognize the rights of nature . This law makes the ecosystem the defendant. There are around 25,000 species of vascular  plants  in E...

The main reason behind earthquakes is the  movement of plate tectonics  in the earth’s crust.  Naturally, earthquakes can also occur with volcanic eruptions. Every year, around 500,000 earthquakes occur on earth . But most of these have very low intensity, and only 100,000 are noticeable. Severe earthquakes cause material damage and loss of life on a large scale. These destructions are not always directly caused by earthquakes but instead by  natural disasters triggered by these quakes. Tsunamis, volcanic eruptions, flooding, liquefaction, avalanches, and landslides are deadly natural disasters caused by earthquakes. ( Source ) In the East African Rift System (EARS), the tectonic plates continuously try to  create new plates  by splitting the old ones. It is a rare example of an active continental rift zone. ( Source )   Earthquakes produce massive energy. An earthquake of magnitude 9 is equivalent to  99 million tons of TNT . It is the e...

Black holes are formed when the matter of a dying star presses into a tiny space. Due to this collection of a large amount of matter in little space, the black hole contains excessive  gravitation force that nothing (even light, the fastest object) can pass through it. Subatomic particles can  escape from black holes . Just before reaching the event horizon, these tiny particles accelerate close to the speed of light and manage to move outside the black hole’s axis of rotation. ( Source ) The  fastest spinning supermassive black hole is present at the center of the galaxy NGC 1365. This black hole is spinning at 84% of the speed of light. ( Source ) According to a study in 2006, a black hole (GRS 1915+105) is spinning between 950 and 1,150 times per second. The speed of this black hole near the  solar system  is almost the  maximum possible spinning speed . The  sun cannot  change into a black hole due to its small size. The sm...