Animals

The March of the Red Crab
A Moth Find a New Home
Suicidal Birds
A leopard and A cheetah
The Spectacular Hornbill
The Antelope with an extraordinary nose
Masquerading Males
Tiny But Powerful
Electric Fishes
Paternal Care
Hairless Cat
Passionate Parrot
Calling Out To Mother
Hot Wheels
Discs On Their Wings
Two-humped Camels
Frozen Frog
Silken Chambers
Earth Pig
Swordsman of the Sea
The Ostrich Trick
Electrifying Meal
Bizarre Turtle
Grey Whales
The Flying Lemur
The Winged Fishing Creature
Llamas
A Different Sort of a Parrot
The Tailless Cat
The Ancestor Of The Rhino
Acquisitive Wood Rats
The Butterflyfish
The Amazing Jumper
The Largest Deer
The Devil’s Coach-Horse
The Porcupine With A Prehensile Tail
The Irritating Fencing
The Acrobatic Otter
The Busy Termite Colony
Superb Mimics
The Canary
Snow Monkey
Jumping Spiders
Glass Lizard
Beetle Rhino
The World’s Smallest Bear
Hygienic Ants
Flat as a Pancake
The Carpet Shark
The Centipede Walk

Go to page: 1  2 

Flat as a Pancake

The African pancake tortoise does not have a strong, domed shell for protection like other tortoises. Its shell is as flat, as thin and as soft, as a pancake. It squeezes itself into a rock crevice to escape predators! It then pumps itself up with air so that the shell expands and lodges it securely in the crevice.
The tiny creature (about 14 cm long and 2 cm high) has such a flexible shell that it visibly moves in and out as the animal breathes. It is also known as Tornier’s tortoise and is found in southern Kenya and parts of Tanzania. It prefers to live in rocky areas and scrubland or in the savanna.
Compared to its lumbering cousins, the pancake tortoise can move quite quickly. Even if it falls on its back, it rights itself in an instant and moves on.

---

Last updated on :2/14/2005

---

User's Comments

---

Aarushi Prabhakar: It was very interesting to read all these paragraphs

---