Animal Cams page!
Click on the squirrel to go there!

This page is one small part of Good Sites for Kids!

Look for to see what's been added lately!

 

 

AKC for Kids Mostly about how to care for dogs and puppies, some reproducibles. The American Kennel Club is the most reputable dog organization in the US. The AKC list of recognized breeds has much information about different dog breeds, would be useful for reports. 

 

 

All About Owls is part of Zoom Birds from Enchanted Learning (one of the best kid sites evah). It has lots of elementary school level basic information about owls, as well as a quiz, printouts, crafts, and coloring. (They also include The Owl Pages in the bibliography!)

 

 

 

 

Alligators and Crocodiles at Enchanted Learning Giving crocodilians their usual epic treatment - Poems, art with facts to color, report worksheets, graphic organizers, report wheels, and more. Editorial: if you don't already subscribe to Enchanted Learning, you really should.

 

Fact Sheets from the American Cetacean Society: "From the enormous blue whale to the tiny vaquita porpoise, you’ll learn everything you’ve ever wanted to know about 28 cetacean species, including their physical description, geographical distribution, ecology and behavior, life history, diet, conservation status, and more!" That says it all! Good for report research.

 

Animal Bytes from the San Diego Zoo. Animals from all over the world are indexed geographically by continents, by order, and by habitats and ecosystems. Scroll over to the right on their menu bar and there's a whole big section on plants, including a list of all the species at the zoo!

 

Animal Diversity Web from University of Michigan.  All about animals, from insects to humans. This site is at a junior high/grade 7 and up level.

 

Animal Fact Guide is a site for Kindergarten through middle school. It has Animal Facts with photos for 39 popular animals. "Each animal facts article is printer-friendly and covers a range of topics, such as the animal’s physical characteristics, habitat (with a distribution map), diet, breeding patterns, unique traits and behavior, and when applicable, conservation and tips on what you can do to help." The blog is full of animal s in the news, discussions, cool links, and animal videos. The Fun Stuff section has nice printable: mazes, coloring pages, and word searches. "Did you know that elephants hold grudges or that cougars can't roar? Learn interesting animal facts and download free coloring pages at Animal Fact Guide." Links to a Great White Shark tracker and a Giant Squid video! Very worthwhile and entertaining! Thanks Abi Cushman, for the email about your site.

 

Animal Facts from Canadian Geographic Everything a kid would need to do a report on any of 56 Canadian animals (& birds & fish)! Printable pages for each animal, or just open the .pdf files.

 

Animal Information from SeaWorld/Busch Gardens has some sort of information on every animal.  Students will need to be fluent readers.  Younger kids will like Small Wonders (baby animals) and Animal Sounds the best. Wildopedia is a multimedia evolving reference. The keynote article was Adaptation when we looked, and they do a great job of explaining the concept. Just keep clicking the paw prints.

 

Animal Kingdom (new URL) from Extreme Science. The animal section of the larger site. The most extreme animals.

 

Animal Kingdom from KidPort. Good, basic elementary level information about the members of the animal kingdom, with basic taxonomy (no big words).

 

Animal Planet is a place that's loaded with animal information and games! Their Petsource section has guides to cats, dogs, and other pets, cat and dog breed info, dog horoscopes (Whaaa?), games, and more! The Wild Animals section has an A to Z listing of animals, bird guides, mammal guides, butterfly guides, an endangered species guide, and a lot more! The Games sections is stupendous fun for kids of all ages. All these things can be reached from the golden menu bar near the top of the screen. Thanks to Jessica the Opsmart Lady for this one.

 

Animals from the BBC. Something about every sort of animal there is! "Find out more about your favourite animals, where and how they live..." Hundreds of mammals and birds, dozens of amphibians, reptiles, fish, mollusks, crustaceans, insects, other arthropods, echinoderms. A great reference for school reports or just to explore!

 

Animals from National Geographic. This is Nat Geo's animal site map page, with photos and facts about animals from aardvark to zebra. Includes amphibians, birds, bugs, fish, invertebrates, mammals, prehistoric, and reptiles.

 

Animals at the Smithsonian's National Zoo Oh yeah! You have GOT to see this site to believe it! Stunning amounts of highly organized information presented so wonderfully! You come away with the same feelings you have after watching a good movie.

 

Animals section of KidsKnowIt. Big list of animals and facts.

 

Archosaurs is about dinosaurs, crocodiles, birds, and all their diapsid relatives, both living and extinct. Part of UC Berkeley's gigantic tree of life web site complex (more on that below.) This is for older students.

 

ARKive "Explore 15,000 of the world’s endangered species. With over 100,000 photos and videos, discover what these animals, plants and fungi look like, what makes them special and why we should protect them." Fun stuff for kids! Games! Make an insect! Coral reefs! Food chains! Endangered species! Hibernation! Adaptation! Nocturnal! Penguin masks! Plants! Temperate rain forests! Quizzes! Adventure! Survival! Baby elephant videos! Habitats! Spawning salmon! Celebs! The Tripwire of Terror! Barn owls! China! Wrasse! Sharks out the yang!

 

Arthropod Story "This interactive investigation delves into the amazing world of the arthropods..." Simple language and lots of pictures. From UC Berkeley.

 

Australian Animals Nice, easy to use site with lots of photos, and descriptions of how the animals interact with humans.  Many links to related animal sites.

 

Australian Animals - Our Animals  For younger students. Has lots of photos and information at a lower reading level (still good, though.) From the ABC, Australia's answer to the BBC.

Australian Fauna  "No rubbish, just fair dinkum Aussie animal info. "  "A magnificent site loaded with free information, a true asset to the Internet in Australia, and researchers Worldwide." This really is a good site for research, as it has a lot of information. Easy to use, animals in alphabetical order, too.

Bagheera Named after Mowgli's panther friend. One of the oldest endangered species sites, still a very good resource.

 

Bats of Jewel Cave (new URL) Very good information on bats! Jewel Cave is in the southern Black Hills of South Dakota, near Wyoming. It is one of the longest caves in the world.

 

Big Cats Online Medium and small wild cats, too. Get the facts on all of them here.

 

Zoom Birds Like the rest of Enchanted Learning, this is a fine kid learning site, with a lot of good information about birds. If you find yourself using Enchanted Learning sites a lot, please subscribe.

 

Birds in the Classroom from the Fernbank Ornithology Center in Atlanta.  The frame on the left side of the page (pull it down to see it all) has links to pages on bird adaptations, anatomy and physiology, and bird behavior. Excellent site.

 

Birds of Paradise This slideshow from NatGeo has amazing photos of 14 of the 38 - 41 known species of these incredibly beautiful birds. Scroll through the slideshow and discover them. If you are interested, explore further in this NatGeo article or in this Wikipedia entry which links to a separate page for each of 41 species, plus a discussion of hybrids, which are fairly common!

 

 

 

Black Hills Wild Horse Sanctuary "See hundreds of wild American, Spanish, and Sulphur mustangs roaming free across wind swept prairies. Imagine a place where, as far as the eye can see, miles and miles to the horizon, you can view America as it was 300 years ago. Imagine a place, long revered by the American Indians, where the Cheyenne River flows in all four directions, and eagles’ shadows sweep the rocky canyon walls, a place where wild horses run free across endless prairies, hooves striking thunder, manes and tails flying in the wind." Fourteen miles south of Hot Springs (home of the Mammoth Site). Visit if you're anyplace close and see this wonderful place for yourself! See their Slide Show and explore the rest of the site, too!

 

Blue Planet Games from BBC Blue Planet web site.  Learn about the oceans and have fun doing it!  If you haven't seen the Blue Planet DVD series, it's worth watching.

 

Breeds of Livestock: Horses This site will tell you everything you want to know about breeds of livestock, from cattle to pigs, from camels to yaks! Has links to poultry, too. Our link goes to horses because girls like them best.

 

Buffalo (Bison) Education from the InterTribal Bison Cooperative. From the original people of the bison comes this excellent educational resource. Learn the Traditional Uses of the Buffalo with a comprehensive printable .pdf chart. Learn why Buffalo Are Sacred. Learn buffalo facts and the Historical and Cultural Connection to the Buffalo. Find out about buffalo Meat & Nutrition. Play the Buffalo Brain Busters game.

 

 

Bugs That Live on You from PBS/NOVA. "From your head to your toes, your body is a veritable jungle of flora and fauna. Like or not, our bodies are perfect environments for the creepy and crawly. For hundreds of thousands of years, these animals have called our bodies home—or at least food." Watch the slideshow or scroll though the printable version. But it itches, Mom!

 

Butser Ancient Farm Living Iron Age farm animals. Lots of photos and info about ancient farm animals from all over Europe that are kept at Butser. Many are endangered. These are the same breeds that ancient farmers kept thousands of years ago. To see the animals, go to the right-hand side of the page, go down to the button that says Animals, and click it.

 

Here I am sneaking up on my prey, like my ancient ancestors. My clever camouflage of brown and white helps me blend into this green grass. ;P

 

 

Butterfly Guide Captain's European Butterfly Guide " A Photographic Guide to Europe's Butterflies" has photos and info on butterflies of the UK, rest of Europe, and North Africa. Great resource, many photos.

 

Butterfly Utopia is a commercial site offering mounted butterflies.  Obviously not in their natural state, but the photos are beautiful!  Twelve pages with 21 different butterflies per page.  Has some info about each. Excellent source for photos and species names.

 

The Butterfly Website "is the world's oldest and largest website dedicated to butterflies and moths. Here you'll find hundreds of articles about butterflies and moths, an extensive clipart collection, many photographs, videos, butterfly gardening tips, links to purchase butterflies for your wedding or special event, and a lot more." Also an FAQ page with 25 general questions and answers about butterflies, moths, and caterpillars; and page of links to butterfly curricula.

 

Monarch Butterfly photos from fohn.net. Good natural photos of monarch butterflies with more info on each page.

 

Zoom Butterflies is all about butterflies and moths, species, pictures, a dictionary, lots of printables and activities for kids.

 

Camel Spiders are not true spiders. Related to spiders and scorpions, 900 known species of wind scorpions, sun spiders and camel spiders live in deserts worldwide. Site also has some really hairy scary photos of camel spiders in places from Arizona to Iraq.

 

Canine Corner from the San Diego Natural History Museum. Woof! "Discover domestic dogs and their wild cousins. Bite-sized facts about dogs and wild dogs!" Also has a glossary and links.
Here's the fierce dog and her duck!

Carolina Wild Dogs are North America's original native dogs! These tough, shy survivors may (or may not be) closely related to Australian Dingos. They can still be found in wild places in the southeast US. There are other primitive "yellow dogs"and "pariah dogs" still holding out in obscure places worldwide. They probably are the wild dog ancestors of many of our modern dog breeds.

 

Cat Breed Profiles from CatChannel.  Information on many breeds of house cats, including photos and what makes each breed special.

 

Cat Species  Photos and information about 36 wild cat species (around 50 or so exist). Everything from lions and tigers to Borneo Bay Cats and Kodkods. Also has links to sites that work to save endangered wild cats.  From CatChannel.

 

Cicada molting video actually a short animated gif of a cicada climbing out of its shell and sprouting wings. Neat. Watch how the wings expand and harden.

 

Cnidarians: Simple Animals with a Sting!  Good, easy to read information about jellyfish, coral, sea anemones, and hydroids.  Now part of a larger site, Wonders of the Sea. 

 

Cnidarians from UMich's Animal Diversity Web. Higher-level information on the two types of cnidarians. (pronounced "nai-dare-ee-yans", the "c" is silent)

 

Create a Bird lets you design your own bird and post it on the site! Link goes to Beak Adaptations, the link to Feet Adaptations is near the top left of the page. From Norman Bird Sanctuary in Rhode Island.

 

Creature Features from National Geographic Kids > Animals. Find out all about 128 animals by browsing, by taxo order, or by habitat. Clicking on thumbnails reveals photos and facts, videos, distribution maps, and printable fact sheets with a photo!

 

CROCODILIANS - Natural History & Conservation "Crocodilians: Natural History and Conservation is the Internet's largest crocodile site, established in 1995. Written by a crocodile specialist, it's an ever-growing database of everything you need to know about crocodiles, including all the different species, their biology, conservation, how they talk, and even their captive care. When you can't trust Wikipedia, come straight to the source." (1) Species List with pix and data on all 23 living species. (2) Biology Database has several sections including Conservation, General Biology (how they move, act, and live), and Crocodile Lore: "Bow down and worship Sobek, mortal!". (3) An FAQ: "Go on, admit it! There are some questions you just have to know the answers to, right? Learn the truth, from a real croc researcher!" (4) Communications has recordings of various calls. (5) Captive Care is an online manual with 10 sections, offering very good specific advice on keeping a caiman, if you must. "Who would want (a croc) as a pet? This is a creature that cannot fetch your slippers, has no desire to curl up on your lap, and would just as soon as bite the hand that feeds it... This document is a serious attempt to make useful and accurate information available on the captive care of crocodilians." A great site on the subject.

 

Dragonflies! Incredible dragonfly photos! Fantastic close ups of these colorful prehistoric survivors.

 

EEK! Environmental Education for Kids. This electronic magazine is for kids in grades 4-8. Surf around and learn more about the great outdoors. Every animal of any kind that lives in Wisconsin has a page in here somplace. The Creepy Critter Feature, Alien Invaders, Tracks Quiz for Beginners are all part of the wonderful Critter Corner, as is the Habitats section. Find out about woodland, lake, marsh, and prairie habitats and the animals that live there! Has a page for Teacher Resource section with lesson plans, too. From Wisconsin DNR.

 

Ecology Asia This fine Singapore site has photos and data for 300 different animals from Singapore and New Guinea. Perfect for those school animal reports.

 

Elephant Odyssey Be a baby mammoth! "On this journey through time, you'll learn the ways of mammoths and their modern day descendants, the elephants. - So let's go back 200,000 years and test your skills." Mother Mammoth trains you in the basic skills, including keyboard commands. You get three lives. Good luck! From the San Diego Zoo's new Elephant Odyssey exhibit.

 

eNature Field Guides   "Search more than 5,500 species." Guides for animals and plants, too. Good information. This site is rich in ads as well as in information, so don't let kids be too "quick to click."

 

Encyclopedia of Life "Imagine an electronic page for each species of organism on Earth..." STUNNING new project from a group including the likes of Harvard University, the Field Museum, and the Smithsonian! Students and seekers of any age can type in the name of any living thing and (usually) see pictures and information! We had fun putting in names of plants, animals, and bacteria. Still a work in progress - had velociraptor pix and data, but nothing on Tyrannosaurus rex. Also has groups to join and ways you can help.

 

Endangered Species - World Wildlife Fund Part of larger site. Links to endangered animals on the left side of the page.

 

Endangered species Excellent endangered species site with a lot of information. Links to similar sites and a map to click on to see endangered species in your (US) state.

 

Exmoor Pony  Learn about this Ice Age survivor, the oldest breed of horse in the UK, which lived wild for 60,000 years.

 

Explore the River Interactive Game from the Amazon Voyage Exhibit at the Denver Museum of Natural History. Stunning mural becomes an interactive exploration of the underwater animal life in the Amazon river system. Learn about fishes, reptiles, and mammals. Lots of information about all of them!

 

exZOOberance - Celebrating the Animal Kingdom! A good site for learning about plants and animals, with backyard tours.

 

Frogland (AllAboutFrogs.org) Name says it all! Fun site with real facts about, and pix of, all sorts of frogs & toads. This very busy site will keep your kids very busy! Games, coloring, pix, facts and more facts, printables, stories, myths, more fun than a barrel of bullfrogs! Teachers' Corner has suggestions, links, and lesson plan outlines for class projects!

 

 

 

 

Great Plains Nature Center Website Index The Great Plains Nature Center in Wichita, Kansas is a wonderful place that lets all ages learn about the Great Plains' habitats: The prairie, woodlands, lakes, rivers, streams and wetlands, and the plants and animals who live there. Scroll down through their index. Make sure to look at the "INTERNET VERSIONS OF THE GPNC POCKET GUIDES". There are extensive! Guides for Raptors, Mammals, Snakes, Great Plains Shorebirds, (Where else could you find that?), Freshwater Mussels, Kansas Threatened and Endangered Species, Great Plains Waterbirds, and Wildflowers and Grasses. You will find information on every native animal, bird, fish, and plant in Kansas, most of which are native to all of the Great Plains of North America. Their Prairies of the World page is also worth a visit. So glad we found this site and are able to share it with you!

 

Hall of Mammals One of the many, many entrances into UC Berkeley's truly immense web site about living things from the beginning of life on earth until now. This one starts off by explaining about the different types of mammals and their close (long extinct) relatives; who together make up the synapsids.

 

The Horse From the American Museum of Natural History. We hope they keep this site up past its expiration date! Anything you want to know about horses, ancient and modern, it's likely to be here. Beautiful pictures, too.

 

Hummingbird Pictures Guide  Scroll down to see photos and information on 38 species of hummingbirds.

 

 

 

 

Hunt for the Giant Leech from PBS/NOVA. "Imagine you're about to join leech expert Mark Siddall on a field search for the giant Amazonian leech. As he leads you knee-deep into the leech's swampy tropical habitat, you consider what you'd urgently like to know about the near-mythic creature he's seeking. For starters, how big? Well, it's the world's largest bloodsucking leech, growing up to a foot and a half long. Any other questions?" Watch the slideshow or scroll though the printable version. It vants to drink your blood, blaaah, blah, blah. And it will, too.

 

Insect Image Gallery from Iowa State University's Dept. of Entomology has photos of most kinds of insects, with information on them.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

International Wolf Center The International Wolf Center advances the survival of wolf populations by teaching about wolves, their relationship to wild lands and the human role in their future. The Learn page has areas for children (activities and reading), educators, and wolf facts.  Ambassador Wolves has bios of the wolves, updated regularly. Each update includes a short video. Click "Video Link" under each entry to watch the videos.  You can also watch three webcams of the wolf preserve.

 

Invertebrate Notes is a good intro to the major invertebrate phyla (but no water bears!) with a lot of clear and readable information.

 

Jellyfish Facts (Now called "jellies") "Jellyfish Facts aims to provide information about jellyfish, helping people to understand these beautiful and interesting creatures. We have 6 sections, including Jellyfish Species List, Photo Gallery, and Jellyfish as Pets. Check us out!" So, we did. "Jellyfish Nate" is obviously fascinated by jellyfish, or jellies, as some now call them. Anything you want or need to know about them is on this well organized site. Even eating them, which is good because they're taking over much of the oceans :(

 

 

This is "Smudge", whale # 1538

Juneau Humpback Whale Catalog Learn about humpback whales: what they are, their habits, their migrations, watching them, much more - including why tracking them by cataloging their flukes is important! Learn what flukes are, how they are different between individual whales, and look at a fluke catalog of 126 whale tails! Oodles of other photos, too! Look at the bottom of the Whale Watching page for other fluke catalogs: Humpback Whales of Southeastern Alaska is another good site with humpback information and its own well-indexed fluke catalog. Clayoquot Whales covers both humpbacks and gray whales in Clayoquot Sound, Vancouver Island, British Columbia. Humpback Whales of Lower Cook Inlet and and Kachemak Bay, Alaska has their own unique humpback fluke catalog, and photo galleries of whales, orcas, seals, birds, etc. Good close-up "action" photos.

 

KidWings "This site was designed to teach young and old about the wonders of birds. The most exciting part of the site is the Virtual Owl Pellet Dissection. Many interactive activities await you." Also features section on bird skulls, nests, feathers, beaks, feet, and "topography" for birders. Fun!

 

Let's Talk About Insects from U of I's Urban Extension explains facts about insects to elementary school students. Body sections, exoskeletons, respiration, legs, wings, metamorphysis, food, and insects' places in ecosystems are explained. Learn to tell the difference between insects and other arthropods. What's the difference between ants and termites? What's a larva? These and many other questions are answered with narration and animation.

 

Life Cycle of a Cricket This simple illustration from inforvisual shows a cricket, egg to adult, over a year.

 

 

Life Cycle of a Frog All sorts of froggie facts and pictures. A few of the sections are: life cycle, anatomy, frogs vs. toads, frogs in the food chain, myths, different frogs, printable coloring pages, frog art, and animations!

 

 

 

Moth Life Cycle  AMAZING photo series of the life cycle of the giant cecropia moth from eggs to adults. It includes wonderful closeups of caterpillar stages, including photos of the moth developing inside the cocoon! Definitely educational!

 

Mountain Lion Facts  Safety tips for what to do to discourage attacks by mountain lions. Sound advice from the Mountain Lion Foundation.

 

Names of Males, Females, Babies, and Groups of Animals Here's a list of the "official" names for Males, females, babies, and groups of individuals of a species. A parliament of owls? An obstinacy, a shrewdness, a piteousness, a coalition? Who is in charge of assigning these names? Animals, birds, and insects are listed. An "infestation" of roaches makes sense. This is just one little page out of 30,000 pages from the amazing Enchanted Learning.

 

National Geographic Kids "Features different people, animals, and places each month with facts, games, activities, and related links." Well, hey, it's National Geographic.  Very educational, and the games are fun, too

 

National Geographic Kids Creature Feature lets you look up animals by order (reptiles, birds, mammals, et al.) OR by habitat (rainforest, desert...). You can use the grid to find desert mammals, for example.

 

Nature Adventures "Welcome to the home of the Emmy Nominated Television Series 'Nature Adventures With Terri And Todd', an educational and entertaining series created to showcase the beauty and wonder of the Midwest! Each season contains 13 fun, education-packed episodes. Terri Lawrenz and Todd Magnuson are your hosts!" They roam all over South Dakota and parts of adjacent states, checking out ecology and wildlife. The Online Learning section has all episodes from Seasons 1 and 2 are online as Flash videos! There are also resource links, video modules, photo galleries, and a glossary!

 

Nature_Malaysia "Malaysia is located in the center of Southeast Asia, home to a vast range of tropical rainforest that teems with the wonders of nature. The amazing wildlife species found in this region have long been the fascination of researchers and explorers around the world." See all the amphibians and reptiles of this region by scrolling down the left-hand menu. Amazing photos and information on all sorts of snakes, lizards, turtles, frogs, salamanders, etc. Worth looking at!

 

Netfrog The original frog dissection online site from U of Virginia. Now with the old-time (1994) version AND a newer more multimedia version. It's like two for one good sites! Also see the Lawrence Berkeley National Lab's Virtual Frog Dissection Kit "This award-winning interactive program is part of the 'Whole Frog' project. You can interactively dissect a (digitized) frog named Fluffy, and play the Virtual Frog Builder Game." Your choice as to which site is better for your kids.

 

North American Bear Center features various black bears studied by the good people in Ely, Minnesota. There are links to several den cams. Check out the rest of the site, too.

 

Nutrition from the Animals section of the Learning Zone of Oxford University Museum of Natural History. This page discusses ways to tell what an animal eats, emphasizing the three main tooth types: incisors, canines, and molars. Then animals are typed based on what they eat: Carnivores, herbivores, and omnivores. There's a whole page of skull and teeth comparisons for students to look at. Click "Look at more animal skulls and different types of teeth" right above the koala on Page One. The skull & teeth page is tricky: there is an anteater in there, a barbirusa is a type of pig, and a bearcat is also called a binturong. Also, be aware that some carnivores eat insects, and that they are called insectivores. What do you think their teeth look like?

 

Ocean Collection for Kids This is a group of ocean sites for kids put together by faculty from Cal State LA. They cover ocean habitats, ocean mammals, and ocean fish. This is for elementary kids and has good simple explanations.

 

Ocean Life from the Office of Naval Research, USN, covers marine mammals, sea turtles and California Sea Lions. Characteristics and adaptations are discussed. There's also a quiz for each section.

 

Owl Pages Will tell you all about the Eurasian Eagle Owl below. They also have tons of information about all the other owls in the world! Use their pull-down menu at the top of the page to see all the options. Owls of the USA is in this menu.

 

 

 

 

 

Owl Pellet Dissection from KidWings features virtual own pellet dissection with Flash, also addition diisection activities with eight owls and three other birds.

 

Panda Videos from the Atlanta Zoo. These are archival videos and plenty of them, featuring cute pandas.  Further down, there are more videos of other zoo animals. We have been running these in QuickTime.  Parents and teachers: Remember to have the kids close each window as they finish watching that video.  Otherwise you will have 10 or 20 videos still running in background, and a very slow computer.

 

Plankton Chronicles "Plankton are any organisms that live in the water column and are incapable of swimming against a current. They provide a crucial source of food to many large aquatic organisms, such as fish and whales." (from Wikipedia) Watch videos and see photos of various sorts of plankton. There are 16 HD videos with more being added. Each narration explains the organism it's about. Very good quality videos with good sound, too. Click and explore the ocean and see different kinds of plankton emerge. This covers larval crustaceans, larval fish, cnidarians, ctenophores, diatoms, mollusks, tunicates, larval worms, various echinoderms, and more. All these can be plankton.

 

Pronghorn All about the pronghorn "antelope" of the North American Great Plains. One page of pictures and amazing facts. Easy to read, too. From the Great Plains Nature Center in Wichita, Kansas.

Photo from Wikipedia. Click on it to see larger sizes.

 

 

Raptor Adaptations from the Delaware Valley Raptor Center. How do hawks, eagles, and their kin do the things they do so well?  Information on raptor feet, beaks, eyes, and wings. (Scroll down a little past the poem)

 

Red List of Threatened Species "Life on Earth is disappearing fast and will continue to do so unless urgent action is taken. There are now 41,415 species on the IUCN Red List and 16,306 of them are threatened with extinction, up from 16,118 last year." Search the Red List for animals, birds, and plants here.

 

San Diego Zoo Animal Bytes has animal facts, sounds, photos, videos, ecosystems, and habitats!  Videos need Real Player.

 

San Diego Zoo Kids specially designed to appeal to elementary kids. Kids can look at animals sorted by class (mammals, birds, et al.) and read facts about them, too. Online games, hands-on activities, jobs at the zoo, and a section of animal cams & videos! The Panda Cam is here, along with Elephant Cam, Ape Cam, and Polar Bear Cam!

 

Sci4Kids: stories about bugs. "Stories! Stories! Stories!" Tons of fun facts about "bugs!"

 

Scorpions and their relatives.  Photos sent in from all over the world. Each "bug" is identified and discussed.  Part of a larger site.

 

Shark Attack - How to Avoid being attacked.  Practical advice for all ages.

 

Zoom Sharks! Maybe the very best shark place for kids! But then, all the Zoom sites and activities are wonderful.

 

Shark Classification from The Dedicated Shark Site. Good information and plenty of it, with pictures of plenty of sharks, anatomy lesson, and a list of more sharks than you ever dreamed existed. Good job!

 

Hi there! I'm a friendly dolphin! Wanna play?

 

 

Shark School (new URL) from the San Diego Natural History Museum. "Swim among some local sharks! Angle your way through fish and games. Explore ten shark species found in the waters off of southern California and northern Baja California." Shark FAQ's, anatomy, links, more.

 

The Shark Side of Life! BIG and colorful site that's absolutely crammed with facts and photos! It's a must-see stop on your trip to find shark facts! A separate page for every shark, and many other pages, too.

 

Shark - Who's Who of Sharks  Find out all about your favorite shark!  Shark species arranged by their eight orders, or check the Species List, or try the Shark-a-Matic. From PBS Nova.

 

Shark Word Search from Florida Museum of Natural History.  Easy to use. Needs javascript to run.

 

Shedd Educational Adventures (SEA) from the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago. Lesson Plans, Interactives, and the Explorer's Guide! Interactives are the online learning games, indexed by grade level. We tried Build a Fish and it was fun!

 

Snail biology  Everything you ever wanted to know about snails. Written at a secondary school level.

 

Snow Leopards for Kids " In it you will find answers to your questions about snow leopards. You will find photos and videos of snow leopards. You will also find suggestions for things you can do to help save snow leopards. We are also working on a section of “snow leopardy” things to do that are just, plain fun...We are proud to receive the MyReportLinks.com Book Seal of Approval awarded to sites that are especially valuable to students who are doing research for school reports." (Emphasis ours)

 

Spiders! This is a nice spider unit for lower elementary kids, with lesson plans ready to go.

 

Splash Zone! is another part of Monterey Bay Aquarium. Scroll down to play Crunch Nibble Gulp Bite or Make a Tide Pool Come to Life. Also check out the links to more wonderful places, on the left side of the page.

 

Switcheroo Zoo 146 animals! Animal List and Profiles. (Profiles are information about the animal.) "These animals inhabit Switch Zoo. Click any name to read the animal's profile. Make new animals in Switch Zoo by switching the animals' heads, legs and tails." Cute!

 

The Adventures of Herman The autobiography of Squirmin' Herman the worm. Learn all about earthworms; their origin, taxonomy, anatomy, physiology, earthworm facts, what earthworms like to eat, growing your own worms, fun stuff (coloring, madlibs, jokes, etc.), and links. Basically anything K-12 students need to know about earthworms is in here. It's part of the large Just for Kids and Schools Online sites, part of the University of Illinois Urban Extension Urban Programs Resource Network.

 

Turkey Facts from KidZone. Plenty of facts, online puzzles, and coloring pages to print out.

 

Untangling the web: how spiders use their silk Very informative and colorful graphic from, and owned by, The Guardian. It turns out spiders have six different silk glands that make six different kinds of silk for six different purposes.

 

Virtual Roach We love the things ya'll submit! This is from Orkin, the famous pest control people. Nicely done 3D roach dissection helps students learn insect anatomy! "The Virtual Roach is a web resource focused on insect anatomy that was developed as a technical reference and an instructional tool. The interface for the system links morphological terms with an extensive image archive, including scientific illustrations, scanning electron micrographs, and photomicrographs. Images are linked in a manner permitting a detailed examination and virtual dissection of the American Cockroach." Yes, and it was fun to play with, too! Includes lesson ideas. Thank you, Steve Clark of Orkin Pest Control.

 

Water Bears Also known as Tardigrades, these microscopic creatures are the toughest multicelled animals ever, able to withstand outer space, boiling, freezing, and radiation! They are also kind of cute. This site tells about them in easy to understand language.

 

Weird Fish Marine Reserve is a NatGeo video explaining the benefits of protected places in the ocean. Weird Fish Mel is your kinda offbeat guide. Part of NatGeo's huge Ocean section. We'll have a lot more from there!

 

WhoZoo from Texas Wesleyan University is good zoo animal site. WhoZoo is easy to use, has animals organized into orders (mammals, birds,...) and has short, readable information on each animal.

 

Hi! Me beluga. Dis my derp face.

Wild Whales bc cetacean sightings network From the Vancouver Aquarium comes this site designed to help you identify that whale you just sighted. It also contains a lot of information about many species of whales, other cetaceans, and sea turtles. It even explains the difference between whales and dolphins. A series of 15 big action photos shows species differences using blows, dorsal fins, flukes, splashes, and behaviors. There are separate pages for over a dozen species, and a section for sea turtles, too. Perfect for animal reports!

 

Where do I live? from the BBC. Identify animals and place them in the correct habitat. Timed exercise, two levels of difficulty. Nice art and sound effects.

 

Wildlife Profiles and Information from Colorado Parks & Wildlife. Information of dozens of Colorado mammals and birds, native fish, reptiles, and some others. Useful for reports or just finding out. Each has its own page. While visiting the site, check out the Kid's Activities Page, especially the Black Bear Challenge and the (downloadable pdf file) Colorado Wildlife Coloring Book

 

Wolf Haven International is a wolf sanctuary in Washington State. Their Basic Wolf Info section has a ton of information about wolves, perfect for elementary or middle school research! They also discuss wolf-dog hybrids. They also have a good small section on the prairie plants and animals around them, as well as a bio section with information on their wolves.

 

Wolf Sanctuary is located in northern Colorado. They rescue abused or neglected captive wolves and wolf-dog hybrids, nurse them back to health, and give them large wooded areas in which they roam freely. If you're looking for an wild animal charity that could use your help, look no further.  Isabeau is the "Poster Child" of Wolf Sanctuary. This girl is worth reading about all by herself!  More photos here.  Note: this is not a tourist attraction, nor are they normally set up to receive visitors. Please, always contact the Sanctuary FIRST if planning a visit.

 WolfQuest From the Minnesota Zoo and EduWeb comes this excellent download wolf simulation game. Players become a wolf and explore Yellowstone Park! Kids from elementary to high school love to play this game, it's hard to get them to stop! We printed out the enclosed instructions for players to use. Needs a newer computer with good graphics. The download includes both episodes 1 and 2.

 

Wonders of the Sea  This site is devoted to sea animals.  There are sections on sponges, cnidarians (see above), mollusks, arthropods (crustaceans, etc.), echinoderms (starfish and relatives), sharks, sperm whales, and Chessie, the Long-Distance Swimming Manatee!  Good and concise on what it covers.