What is a Mudskipper?

Mudskippers are small tropical fish of the eastern Atlantic, the Indian Ocean and the western Pacific from Australia to Japan. They live estuaries with mudbanks and also in mangrove swamps. Their eyes protrude from their heads and can be moved independently of each other. When the mud is exposed by the ebbing of the tide the mudskippers come out of the water and hunt for crustaceans and other small invertebrates. They crawl and hop about rapidly with the help of their powerful muscular pectoral fins which they use as forelegs. Their gill openings are small and they can live on land for hours at a time, providing the air is humid.

Where did David Kill Goliath?

The famous fight in which the boy David slew the giant Goliath took place about 15 miles south-west of Jerusalem, in the Valley of Elah in Israel. David was the youngest of eight brothers and looked after his father's sheep at Bethlehem while the Israelites under King Saul were at war with the Philistines. The First Book of Samuel in the Bible tells how David was sent by his father to take food to the Israelites' camp.

Goliath had challenged the Israelites to send a man to do battle with him, the result to decide which array should have the fruits of victory. No Israelite had dared to take up the challenge. But David persuaded Saul to let him fight Goliath, saying the giant was no more dangerous an adversary than the lion and bear he had slain while protecting his father's sheep.

The two contestants rushed to meet each other, the giant in full armour with sword, spear and shield, the boy with only a sling and five smooth stones from the river. David took a stone in his sling and aimed at Goliath. The giant was hit on the forehead and stunned. David then killed him with his own sword. The Philistines fled, pursued by the victorious Israelites.

Why Don't Trees Grow On Mountain Tops?

Trees do not grow on mountain tops either because the situation is too exposed, or because the soil is too thin or too frozen to allow their roots to draw nourishment from the ground.

In most mountainous areas, there is usually a clearly marked timberline, a boundary above which there is no tree growth. Sometimes the height of the timberline is dictated by local climatic or soil conditions, but as general rule the boundary gets lower as the distance from the Equator increases. In the far north and south the cold is so intense that it is quite impossible for any trees to grow and the timberline is therefore at sea level.

A range of mountains on or near the equator, like the Ruwenzori range in Africa, can be divided into different belts of vegetation according to the types of trees growing at its base and at various heights up its slopes.

Similarly the belts of vegetation change according to the distance from the Equator. The first belt is the tropical or rain-forest region where it is hot and trees grow rapidly. Next comes a hot dry belt where few trees grow because there is little rain. This is followed by the deciduous or warm and temperate belt, and by the coniferous belt, with very cold winters but fairly warm summers. Then comes the timberline, beyond which trees cannot grow, and finally the regions of permanent ice and snow, where no vegetation at all can live.

When Does a Cow Start To Give Milk?

A cow starts to give milk between the ages of two and two-and-a-half years after the birth of its first calf. For the first few days the milk is unfit for human consumption and is fed to the calf which is afterwards reared separately. During the milking or lactation period that follows the cow's yield usually reaches a maximum after four to six weeks and continues in decreasing quantities for nine to ten months.

To ensure a steady supply of milk, farmers arrange for their cows to calve every 12 months. Attention to breeding has led to steady improvements in yields. A good cow may produce up to 2,000 gallons during the lactation period.

Cows are normally milked twice a day, morning and evening. Except for the smallest herds, milking in advanced countries is usually done by machines which suck the milk from the cows' udders and transfer it to covered containers. But there are still many countries where milking is largely done by hand, in the traditional way.

Where is Alice Springs?

Alice Springs is a town situated in the heart of the continent of Australia, centered in the lower third of the Northern Territory. The surrounding countryside, "the Centre" as Australians call it, is parched. The lakes and rivers are dry for most of the time and the cattlemen on the few homesteads depend on water pumped from bores hundreds of feet deep.

The town of Alice Springs was founded in the middle of the 19th Century after the discovery of a sheltered, watered plain among the MacDonnell Ranges, a series of hills which ripple for 250 miles across the land. By 1872 a telegraph station had been built at a water hole beneath a rocky hill. It was called Alice Springs after the wife of Charles Todd, super-intendent of telegraphs in Adelaide, but it is always known as Alice to Australians.

Next came prospectors looking for gold. They left a ghost town at Arltunga not far from Alice. Once back in 1880, they thought they had found rubies by the million, but the gems proved to be cheap garnets, not worth transporting. Cattlemen soon followed, for much of "the Centre" is marginal land that provides good feed when it rains. The knew the rains did not come often, but felt one good season could carry five bad seasons. Often it has had to carry seven or eight bad ones.

The growth of Alice Springs in recent years has astonished everybody. The railroad linked it to Adelaide in 1939 when its population was less than 100. By the Second World War, 1000 people lived there. It was used as a military base after the Japanese bombed Darwin. Stuart Highway, still called simply "the bitumen", was completed from Darwin to Alice, a distance of 954 miles.

Alice Springs attracts crowds of tourists especially during the fine winter weather from June to September. They come for the spectacular scenery, the famous aboriginal artists, and to visit surrounding cattle stations.

Attractions include the tremendous monolith of Ayers Rock which towers 1,143 feet above the plain and is six miles around - the biggest pebble in the world, surrounded by a flat desert. Since the 1950s the area has been suffering from the worst drought people can remember. It is feared that the Centre may turn into a huge dustbowl. So it looks as if the future of Alice Springs lies in its tourist trade and the mineral wealth which experts believe lies under the rugged landscape.

What Happened to the Aborigines?

The original inhabitants of Australia, the Aborigines, met the usual fate of widely-scattered native peoples when the white settlers began to arrive and multiply. Their numbers fell drastically. This was not due to any policy of cruelty or repression. From the start intentions towards them were good. But the vision of the white administrators was not equal to bridging the gulf between the intensely religious and ceremonial native culture and the materialistic aims of the settlers.

By a natural process, perhaps the result of apathy or despair, the number of Aborigines fell from 350,000 in the 18th century to some 40,000 in the 1930's. But since then with more sympathy and understanding, their numbers have started to rise again. The main effort is now being directed to stop them becoming a permanently underpriviledged minority and to develop their undoubted gifts.