The fastest animals on the planet: top ten. The most predatory animal The most dangerous predators in the world: interesting facts

none of known to science Animals are not killed for no reason or for fun. That's just what people do.

If the mood of most animals can be determined by the movement of the ears, nose, tail, lips, wrinkles on the muzzle, then Brown bear (Ursus arctos) is not like that - his facial expressions are extremely poor. Small narrowed eyes, motionless ears, a smooth nose - it is impossible to understand whether the bear is “smiling” or preparing for an attack.

Scientists studying the movement of sharks in Arctic waters discovered this summer the jaw of a young bear in the stomach of a Greenland shark. Nothing like this had been found before, and therefore a dispute immediately arose: was the bear alive when the shark caught him, or did she bite the carrion.

In the first case, the shark has the full “right” to take the title of the “most important predator” of the Arctic from the polar bear. And if so, then the inhabitants of cold regions should now be more afraid of sharks than bears.

In fact, there is nothing strange in such a find. Sharks are always hungry and always on the lookout, they “sweep” everything in their path, both living and dead. What was not found at one time in their stomachs - bags of gold, cages with the corpses of chickens, dogs in muzzles, human hands, legs, skulls and even explosives.

Oceanologist Harold McCormick and journalist Tom Allen talk about how easily sharks deal with prey in their book "Shadows in the Sea":

In 1959, in Kenya, a thirsty elephant entered the sea, apparently heading for an islet where he hoped to find water. But he didn't make it to the island. He was surrounded by huge sharks and literally torn to shreds. The fishermen who witnessed this bloody feast could not determine the type of sharks, but most likely they were great white sharks, not missing an opportunity to assert their superiority over any living creature that got in their way.

Although the word “sharks” may suggest carefree Australian or American surfers, “man-eating fish” live not only in warm seas. For example, the Pacific polar shark (Somniosus pacificus) is found in the Bering Sea, and the aforementioned Greenland polar shark (Somniosus microcephalus) enters the Barents Sea and White Sea. This large (up to 6.5 m) Arctic shark is a relative of the well-known black sea katran shark(Squalus acanthias, about 1 m long) - both of them belong to the family of spiny sharks. Moreover, with climate change, sharks, killer whales and some other predators are moving further north, where it was previously too cold for them.

Of course, white sharks (Carcharodon carcharias) cannot be compared with the size of a katran - the body length of the “white death” reaches 8–12 m, which is why it is put in the first places in various ratings of the “most dangerous animals in the world”. But now White shark it is quite rare to meet a person, it is much easier to meet another noteworthy "cannibal" - a tiger shark (Galeocerdo cuvieri).

Poachers and spearfishers love to tell stories about killer whale attacks. But if killer whales sometimes surround boats, it is only for fun, and not for hunting a person. This love of games is used by coaches when teaching in oceanariums. However, captivity greatly shortens their lives: on average, killer whales live in aquariums for 6 years, and in nature, the average life expectancy of females is 70-90 years, and males - 60.

The deep blue sea

The polar bear is sure to appear in such ratings, since it is very strong predatory beast- He is able to blow off a person's head with one wave of his paw. However, cases of attacks by polar bears on humans are rare and are associated with the destruction of their habitat.

Usually in the first place among the most dangerous animals put ... a mosquito. Malaria, yellow fever and other diseases carried by Anopheles mosquitoes kill two to three million people a year, while deaths from shark attacks are rare. So, in 2000, 79 shark attacks were noted, 11 of them were fatal. In 2005 and 2006 - 61 and 62 attacks respectively, and total deaths in two years - 4. Of these attacks, most occurred in the United States. By the way, people catch about 40 million sharks every year. Most sharks prefer to feed on fish, shellfish and other small things, but some species specialize in seals and even attack surfboards, mistaking them for animals.

Who could deal with a person easily and quickly is the killer whale (Orcinus orca), but it is completely undeservedly called the “killer whale”. This highly developed mammal, unlike shark fish (even if the length of this “fish” is 11 meters), not only easily distinguishes a fur seal from a person, but also teaches its cubs unusual hunting techniques. So, some killer whales during the hunt are able to throw themselves ashore after the prey. This is very dangerous, and it takes a lot of time for killer whale mothers to train their cubs.

A shark, on the other hand, is not able to jump ashore and grab a gaping animal (or person). Interestingly, in captivity, during a few incidents, killer whales did not use their sharp teeth, but crippled people simply by leaning on their weight. This happens if too frequent performances in the aquarium make the animals tired and stressed.

In the seas, even supposedly teeming with sharks, the real danger threatens a person not at all from the side of a monster like the heroine of the movie "Jaws", but from the side of small and beautiful creatures like jellyfish, physalia - " Portuguese boats» (Physalia physalis), fish with venomous spines, and brightly colored blue ringed octopuses (Hapalochlaena lunulata). Before diving into this environment alien to humans, you need to thoroughly study marine animals or simply follow the rule - do not touch anyone, no matter how beautiful and friendly he looks.

Many jellyfish are completely harmless and can be touched in the water. But a person who is not familiar with marine biology should avoid contact with any living creatures. From the touch of the tentacles of some box jellyfish (for example, the sea wasp), a person can die in a matter of seconds. Photo (Sun Photo Library): Julia Smirnova

Deadly jellyfish - " sea wasps» (Chironex fleckeri, the poison of one jellyfish is enough to kill 60 people) - are found in Australia, but even when there are too many of them near the coast, people continue to swim. Why? They found a simple way to avoid deadly contact - you need to dress from head to toe in clothes from the material from which women's nylon tights with lycra are made - it will protect poisonous tentacles from sticking to the skin. Some craftsmen successfully sew such costumes from several pairs of tights.

Snakes also live in warm seas, the poison of which is many times stronger than poison land reptiles, so sea kraits, or dovetails (Hydrophis belcheri) often fall into the ratings of the most dangerous. However, their teeth are located deep in their mouths, and in most cases, sea kraits are not able to bite a person. But if a diver tries to catch them by spreading his fingers, the skin between the fingers will just serve as an excellent target for teeth.

In any case, when a person enters the sea, a person is much more likely to simply drown than to die from a snake bite or end up in the jaws of a shark.

And now let's go ashore and see who is the most terrible beast there.

A drunken elephant is not a friend of a man

Some put the lion in the first place, others the buffalo, others the elephant, and each is right in his own way. Despite numerous books and films about man-eating cats, these animals are not so bloodthirsty. Movies like "Ghost and Darkness" about man-eating lions are based on real stories just a few crazy big cats disturbed by the builders of the railway.

Usually a healthy lion at the sight of a person simply runs away. The leopard does the same, although the most famous cannibal of the last century is just a representative of this species. A leopard from the Indian Rudraprayag claimed 125 lives in 8 years, until it was killed in 1926 by the famous hunter Jim Corbett (Jim Corbett, 1875-1955), author of The Leopard from Rudraprayag. If the man-eating lion is usually quickly found and shot, then no one could track down the leopard. This is such a smart and dexterous animal that you can live your whole life next to it in the jungle and never see it.

Unlike tigers, lions, leopards and cougars, Snow Leopard, or snow leopard (Uncia uncia) almost never attacks a person. Even wounded and driven to the edge of a cliff, he would prefer to retreat back into the abyss, rather than jump on the hunter. This timid animal is listed in the Red Book. In the world (the mountains of Russia, Tibet, Kyrgyzstan, Afghanistan, Tajikistan) there are about 4-7 thousand snow leopards left, about 600 live in zoos.

In this regard, I want to put on him the crown of the most, but the ubiquitous statistics show that every year people die mainly from the attack of herbivores, and not at all predators. Of course, these herbivores don't hunt or hunt humans, they're just defensive. A wounded buffalo is able to trample a hunter, leveling him to the ground, a mother hippo, protecting her child, easily turns the boat over and pierces a person with fangs, and a blind and extremely nervous rhinoceros attacks everything that seems suspicious to him - from a small frog (croaking too loudly!) before big man with a gun.

But the most dangerous is, perhaps, the elephant. Although his eyesight is also poor, he has an unusually developed intellect and easily distinguishes man from other beings. There are legends about the mental abilities of elephants, I was especially struck by the story of the naturalist and connoisseur of Africa Jean-Pierre Hallet (Jean-Pierre Hallet, 1927-2004) in his time. most interesting book Animal Kitaboo. Halle once saw a crippled elephant, without a trunk. With such a wound, any elephant is not a tenant, but this elephant lived happily ever after:

First, all the elephants approached their crippled friend in turn and held out bunches of branches with leaves to him ... He readily opened his mouth. Trying to feed him first, the two elephants even collided with each other... For a while he swallowed greedily, and then tightly clenched his mouth and refused the branches, shaking his head. And only then his friends began to eat themselves.

It is clear that such a developed animal, if desired, is able to come up with a whole plan to kill the hunter. If the elephants entered the plantation at night to steal the fruit (the destruction of their habitat forces them to do this), and the impudent watchmen attacked them with sticks, the elephants will defend themselves. Elephant accidents happen not only in wild nature but even in circuses and zoos.

This animal is simply too large and strong, one awkward movement is enough for it to kill a crocodile, a lion or a person. So, in India and Bangladesh, elephants got into the habit of stealing rice beer from people, as a result, drunken animals trample from 10 to 100 people a year.

This young African elephant at the sight of the photographers, he decided to scare them and rushed to the car. However, five meters later he changed his mind and returned back. Usually elephants do not attack a person if he behaves "modestly". There are cases when tourists literally waved cameras in front of an elephant, after which the insolent people ended up in the hospital.

Oddly enough, monkeys, in particular chimpanzees, macaques and baboons, go shoulder to shoulder with elephants in the lists of the most dangerous animals. In my opinion, this is not true, since monkeys, although they take away bags, documents, food from people, and even bite at the same time, do not at all seek to kill a person. Invasions of monkeys in India, where the people themselves fed them, cause many problems, but real tragedies happen extremely rarely. For example, two years ago, chimpanzees, while trying to escape from a nursery in Sierra Leone, West Africa, killed one person and injured several.

There is no scarier beast than "Bambi"

Many call the crocodile the most dangerous land predator. To some extent, this is true - as if in retaliation for the fact that a person kills several thousand crocodiles a year, the crocodiles themselves, on occasion, are also not averse to eating a human. So, this year forty people were killed by crocodiles on Lake Victoria in Africa, and last year thirty people died here. Most often this happens with gaping fishermen and children playing nonchalantly on the shore.

By the way, when in the last century in some parts of Africa they tried to exterminate crocodiles, predatory fish - favorite dish crocodiles - multiplied in incredible numbers and ate all the small fish that the natives used to eat. As a result, people suffered from hunger.

Interestingly, some attacks do not end in death, but only in injury. A clumsy crocodile is not adapted for hunting a person - if a person does not swim, but stands upright, it is not easy for reptiles to grab him, and if the crocodile has caught a person, he cannot swallow - you have to drag the victim to the bottom and wait for it to choke, after which you can slowly break it into small pieces.

For all its sluggishness, the crocodile is capable of rapid throws, developing speeds of up to 30 km / h over short distances, so tourists in the parks are not allowed to get too close to these “monsters”. In Sri Lanka, I saw several swamp crocodiles (Crocodylus palustris kimbula) of such a size that they seemed to me prehistoric monsters. My attempts to sneak closer to them were immediately stopped by the park workers, which is probably right.

Here is perhaps the most recent example of what happens when a person himself climbs into the mouth of an animal: at the end of August, a crocodile living at the Khan Jahan Ali temple in Bangladesh and accustomed to eating sacrificial chickens, unexpectedly ate a young pilgrim, who specifically went into the pond to ask the sacred animal for blessings.

Although there are tales in Moscow about giant crocodiles living in the city sewer, for us crocodiles, snakes and lions are clearly not a real danger (the exception is if a person lives in places where vipers gather and is allergic to their poison, or a person tries to self-medicate after being bitten by a snake). Even deadly poisonous spiders in middle lane There is no Russia, and you can safely launch any spider that you meet in the forest into your hand. Only in the Crimea and the Caucasus it is worth being more careful and not walking barefoot in the habitats of the karakurt (Latrodectus tredecimguttatus) - a black spider with red spots, whose poison can really be deadly if you don’t burn the bite immediately with a burning match and don’t get serum.

Moose ( Alces alces) are so shy and cautious that it is almost impossible to get close to them in nature. But when the time comes seasonal migration, moose boldly cross the tracks. Even if there is a sign on the road warning about the exit of wild animals, drivers rarely pay attention to it. The results of a collision with the largest modern deer (body length up to 3 m, weight up to 600 kg!) are often fatal.

Bears and wolves are not easy to find, so the main danger for us is wild boars and elks. It was not for nothing that there used to be a saying in Russia - “If you go for a bear - take straws, if you go for a wild boar - drag the coffin”, and in some regions the word “boar” was replaced with “horny”. There are times when a moose cow, protecting a cub, or an elk during the rut, pursue a person until he climbs a tree, and then guard him all day.

In Canada, Finland and some US states, the same dangerous beast not a grizzly bear, but a herbivore - an elk or a deer. In the state of Michigan alone, about 67,700 collisions with deer on the roads occur annually, some of which are fatal.

Of course, all the dangers and predators that lie in wait for a person in the wild cannot be listed - these are the “killer bees” (Apis mellifera scutellata), which the person himself brought from Africa, and rabid foxes, and wounded tigers, and even crows protecting their chicks. However, all these attacks are mere accidents, because the animals have no special taste for human blood, and certainly do not kill for fun or to make fashion shoes out of the victim's skin.

If you meet an animal in the forest park in the evening, then it will almost certainly run away, the main thing is not to provoke it and not to panic, because the escaping object awakens in a predator (even in a domestic dog) the instinct to “play catch up”. If you meet a person in the evening in the same forest park, it is difficult to predict how it will end ...

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Ecology

The world of animals has its record holders.

Find out the answers to the questions of who in the animal world flies, swims, runs or crawls the fastest.

Here you can learn about the fastest of its kind representatives of the animal world.

The fastest bird is the peregrine falcon (Falco peregrinus)

This bird of prey from the falcon family can be seen on almost all continents, with the exception of Antarctica.

In nature, there are about 17 subspecies of peregrine falcons.

On our planet, this is not only the most fast bird, but also the fastest living creature.

According to experts, in a fast dive flight, the peregrine falcon can reach speeds of up to 322 km/h.

But it is worth noting that in horizontal flight the peregrine falcon gives way to the swift, in which the horizontal flight speed can reach 111 km / h.

The fastest horse - English racehorses

On the this moment these thoroughbred riding horses are considered the fastest. If you choose a specific representative, then the fastest is the thoroughbred stallion Beach Rekit.

He was able to set an absolute record among domestic breeds. During the 409.26 meter race in Mexico, Beach reached a top speed of 69.69 km/h. Generally average speed English racehorses is 60 km/h.

The fastest fish is the sailfish (Istiophorus platypterus)

This sea fish from the perch-like order, lives in all the oceans of the Earth, preferring tropical, subtropical and temperate waters.

It is worth noting that the sailboat is an active predator and is capable of speeds up to 100 km/h.

During experiments at a fishing camp in Long Key, Florida, USA, this fish was able to swim 91 meters in 3 seconds, which is equal to a speed of 109 km/h.

The fastest animal (land animal) is the cheetah (Acinonyx jubatus)

The cheetah is the fastest land animal. It differs from other felids in that it does not hunt prey, sitting in ambush, preferring to pursue it.

First, the cheetah approaches its prey at a distance of about 10 meters, not particularly trying to be stealthy, and then tries to catch potential prey in a short run. During the race, he can reach speeds of up to 110-115 km / h, while he develops a speed of 75 km / h in 2 seconds. It is also worth noting that the cheetah runs in jumps 6-8 meters long.

The fastest dog is Greyhound

In general, opinions about which dog is the fastest are divided. Some say that this is a hunting English Greyhound, which boasts a very fast run over short distances, which gives them the opportunity to catch a hare.

If we talk about the hyena dog, then she capable of reaching speeds of up to 55 km / h and chasing its prey to exhaustion.

And yet officially, the highest speed among dogs was recorded on March 5, 1994 in Australia, when a greyhound named Star Title was able to accelerate to 67.32 km / h.

The fastest cat is the Egyptian Mau

This short-haired, medium-sized cat breed boasts a full of energy that loves to move and play. Therefore, the Egyptian Mau has a flexible and muscular shape.

From the Egyptian language "mau" means "cat". This cat can reach speeds up to 58 km/h. In addition, Mau have excellent vision, hearing and smell.

The fastest snake is mamba

The officially recorded speed of this snake is 11.3 km/h, and this is on the ground. In the branches, the mamba is even faster.

In addition, she is one of the most poisonous snakes on Earth, and in Africa, there is no other snake that is as feared as the mamba.

The fastest turtle is the leatherback turtle (Dermochelys coriacea)

Among reptiles, this is the fastest - in water it can reach a speed of 35 km / h.

Such a turtle weighs 450 kg, and its body length can vary from 1.8 to 2.1 meters.

However, in 1988, a male leatherback turtle was found in Harleck, UK, with a body length of 2.91 meters and a weight of 961.1 kg.

The fastest insect

In this case, it is worth dividing by the speed on the ground and in the air. The fastest insect on earth is the American cockroach. Its speed reaches 5.4 km/h. It is worth noting that in 1 second he is able to run a distance that is 50 times the length. own body. When compared with a person, this corresponds to a speed of about 330 km / h.

The insect that holds the record in the air is the dragonfly, namely Austroflebia costalis, which can reach speeds of up to 52 km/h in flight. Since there are different ways measurements of speed, experts cannot unambiguously say who is faster, divided between dragonflies, hawks and horseflies.

If a person achieves sports records for the sake of fame and awards, then animals must set speed and strength records every day in order to survive. This article contains various records of representatives of the animal kingdom of nature: mammals, birds, fish, amphibians, insects, arachnids, etc.

The fastest animals:

The fastest land animal is the cheetah. The super-elastic spine and long legs allow it to accelerate in 2 seconds to 75 km/h, and in 3 seconds to 110 km/h, which exceeds the acceleration of most sports cars. A case is known when a cheetah covered a distance of about 650 meters in 20 seconds, which corresponds to a speed of 120 km per hour. The absolute speed record for a cheetah is 128 km per hour. If the human record for the 100m run by Jamaican Usain Bolt is 9.58 seconds, then a cheetah can run the 100m in 3.5 seconds. At the same time, the cheetah can maintain a high speed of no more than half a kilometer.

The second place in speed among terrestrial animals belongs to the pronghorn (pronghorn antelope), which lives in North America. The pronghorn speed record is 98 km / h, while the pronghorn can run for high speed much longer than a cheetah. It is noteworthy that the pronghorn acquired such running skills in competition with the now extinct predator - the North American cheetah. In modern North America, there is no predator that could compete with the pronghorn in speed.

The third place in speed among land animals belongs to African antelope wildebeest, which can reach speeds of over 80 km / h.

The fastest bird is the peregrine falcon. In a dive flight, the peregrine falcon develops a speed of up to 440 km/h.

However, in level flight, the needle-tailed (spiny-tailed) swift is faster than the peregrine falcon, which can reach a speed of 169 km / h.

The fastest fish is a sailboat, which can reach a speed of 109 km/h.

The fastest marine mammal- killer whale. She can swim at a speed of 55.5 km/h.

Most fast insect- American cockroach, which in one second can run a distance 50 times the length of its own body. For a human sprinter, this would correspond to a speed of 330 km/h. For a cockroach, this is a speed of 5.4 km / h.

The strongest animals:

Records of strength belong to insects, because. they can lift and carry loads ten times their body weight. The strongest of all is the rhinoceros beetle, which is able to carry a weight of 850 times its body weight.

In second place in terms of strength is the ant, which is able to carry a weight 50 times its body weight.

In third place is the hatch spider, which is capable of carrying a weight 40 times its body weight.

Most best jumpers tall among animals:

The best jumpers among land mammals are representatives of the cat family. A cheetah can jump up to 4.5 meters and a cougar up to 4 meters.

The third place in the jump height among land mammals belongs to kangaroos, which can jump 3 meters.

The record for the highest jump among mammals belongs to the bottlenose dolphin, which jumps 6 meters up.

Of the fish, the chum salmon jumps above all, which during migrations can jump over obstacles 3.65 meters high.

However, the best jumper in the animal kingdom is the flea, it can jump to a height of 34 cm, which is 150 times its body size. It's like a person jumping 255 meters high!

The best long jumpers among animals:

In second place in the long jump is the African black-footed antelope impala. She is able to jump 12 meters in length.

The biggest animals:

The largest animal on the planet is the blue whale. Its dyne reaches 33 meters, and its weight is up to 190 tons.

The largest land mammal is the African elephant, which can weigh up to 7 tons and grow up to 4 meters.

The largest land predator polar bear, which can reach a length of 3.5 meters and a mass of 1 ton (which is three times the mass of the largest lion or tiger).

The tallest land animal on the planet is the giraffe. The largest giraffe was 5.86 meters tall.

The largest reptile combed crocodile, the length of which reaches 7 meters, and the mass - up to one and a half tons.

The most big snake- Anaconda, which can reach a length of 11.5 meters.

The longest living animals:

The longest-lived representative of the animal world is the sponge Xestospongia muta, which lives up to two thousand three hundred years.

The longest-lived mammal is the bowhead whale, which can live up to 211 years.

The longest living land animal is the turtle. The Indian giant tortoise Advaita lived to be 255 years old.

What is the strongest animal in the world? You can immediately think of an elephant, because it is the largest creature on Earth after the blue whale, but is the elephant the strongest on the planet? Does the strength of an animal depend on its size and weight? How to determine who in the animal kingdom is the strongest? Read the article and you will know everything.

The strongest animal in the world

It doesn't have to be a big animal at all. To rank the strongest animals in the world, you need to take into account the ratio of their body weight to the weight that they can lift, because some of these living creatures are only 1 mm in length. The abilities of some representatives of the fauna are simply amazing.

Animal Rating

Based on the above criterion, this rating of the strongest animals of the Earth was compiled.

The grizzly bear is considered the largest of all bear species. Its height can reach four meters, and it can weigh up to seven hundred kilograms.

The grizzly lifts a weight equal to its own weight. It is known for its power and is very dangerous to humans. Such a bear can open a car with its claws, like a can of canned food.

Elephant

Of course, there is an elephant in the ranking of the most powerful animals on Earth. He is not only one of the largest animals, but also one of the strongest. Its weight can be up to seven tons, and the length of the body up to eight meters. An elephant picks up objects with its trunk. The trunk is a unique muscular organ. And the weight that an elephant can lift with its trunk is one and a half times the weight of an elephant. An elephant can easily lift a car with its trunk or uproot a tree. Max Speed elephant is forty-five kilometers per hour. The elephant is very stable, it is almost impossible to knock it down, only if it is attacked by several predators at once.

In India, elephants are used to carry large loads.

Tiger

The tiger is the strongest member of the cat family. It can reach very serious sizes: growth up to three and a half meters, and weight up to three hundred kg. When hunting, the tiger can run at speeds up to sixty km/h, making it one of the fastest animals.

A tiger can lift twice its own weight.

Tigers are listed in the Red Book and hunting for them is prohibited throughout the world.

African crowned eagle

Among birds, the African crowned eagle is the most powerful bird. Its wingspan reaches two meters.

An eagle can carry up to four times its body weight. It can be quite a large animal. These eagles also hunt even larger animals, but in this case they work in pairs, and after the hunt they tear the prey into pieces that they can carry away.

This is the strongest representative of the order of primates. The growth of a gorilla can be up to two meters in height, and weight - two hundred and fifty kilograms. Muscular gorillas are capable of lifting ten times their body weight. A gorilla can even win a fight with a tiger. Gorillas have very strong forelimbs due to the fact that they mainly rely on them when walking.

Crocodile

Among the order of reptiles, crocodiles are the most powerful animals. They reach four meters in length. Crocodiles have very developed jaws that can bite a large animal. Jaw pressure during a bite can be more than two tons per square inch. The crocodile is capable of speeds on land up to seventeen kilometers per hour.

leaf cutter ant

These ants are often called mushroom growing ants because they process the leaves, which then become the basis for growing mushrooms. And mushrooms subsequently are the main food of these ants.

Ants are generally considered the most hardworking and strong among insects.

Ants are, on average, capable of lifting and moving objects weighing twenty times the weight of an ant. And a leaf-cutter ant can lift and carry fifty times its own weight.

dung beetle

This is a small beetle about two centimeters long, which can easily lift and carry a thousand times more than it weighs. This beetle feeds mainly on manure, for which it received its name. He rolls balls weighing up to 50 grams, although he himself weighs no more than two grams. The dung beetle drags its ball into its hole to a depth of one and a half meters, and so about twice a day.

Their habitat is soil. Shell mites are completely invisible naked eye, but these microscopic creatures can lift a thousand times their own weight. These mites are very useful and play an important role in soil formation.

copepod

In the ranking of the most powerful animals on the planet, you can rightfully assign the first place to the copepod. It's an inhabitant sea depths, its size does not exceed one centimeter. Horsepods reach speeds of up to six kilometers per hour, which is five hundred times their size. Therefore, the copepod can be attributed to the fastest creatures in the world.

Why does such a tiny crustacean need such strength? It's simple - with such a tiny size it is very difficult to resist everyone who wants to profit from plankton. Therefore, such strength allows the copepod to quickly develop speed and run away from those trying to eat it. Such a system of escape from a predator allowed this crustacean to develop a population to huge size. The copepod is considered the most numerous creature on the planet.

Conclusion

The animal world is very rich and multifaceted, and each creature in it is endowed with certain capabilities and qualities. Someone is considered the fastest, someone is the biggest, and someone is the strongest, as can be seen from the above rating. The size of an animal does not always mean its undeniable strength.

It's hard to believe, but there are animals that are capable of speeds comparable to a moped, truck or even a car. In fact, there are not so few such representatives of the fauna. In this article, we will find out which is the fastest animal on the planet, and determine the top ten leaders in speed. Let's take a look at our top 10 in reverse order.

10. The list closes the coyote. This animal is capable of developing up to 70 km/h and is able to adapt to various conditions, and therefore it can be found in the mountains, steppes, deserts and other places. As for food, coyotes eat almost everything from newts to hares. They do not disdain carrion.

9. gray fox runs at speeds up to 71 km / h and in the ranking of "Most fast beasts on the planet” is in ninth place. She is a member of the Canine family. Compared to the red fox, it is much less common. An interesting feature animal is its ability to move along the branches of trees.

8. As practice shows, the fastest animals are not always predators that need to catch up with prey. The maximum speed of the moose is 73 km/h, which allows him to easily run away from bears and wolves, which move much more slowly. The animal always lives in herd conditions.

7. accelerates to 74 km / h and is also known as the "African wild dog". You can meet her exclusively on the territory of the African continent, both in the savannas and in wooded area. The animal is quite rare and hunts in packs. At the same time, hyena dogs never intimidate or drive the victim before killing it.

6. Rating "The fastest animals" is hard to imagine without lions. Their males are mainly engaged in the protection of the territory, and the females are directly involved in hunting. They attack, as a rule, only by sneaking up a short distance to the victim. Caught prey is first eaten by lions, then by lion cubs, and only at the very end by lionesses. Despite the fact that the animal develops a speed of up to 74 km / h, they only have enough endurance for a short distance.

5. In fifth place is a riding horse. Its speed is 75 km/h.

4. The fastest animals on the planet do not necessarily have a plastic body and modest parameters. Wildebeest are a vivid confirmation of this, which, being large, are capable of accelerating to 88 km / h. They constantly migrate and in a year can cover a distance of up to 1600 kilometers.

3. Pronghorn is able to break away from most predators, accelerating even at half its speed. On average, its speed is about 60 km / h, and the recorded record is 88.5 km / h.

2. In second place in the ranking is the springbok, which is one of the varieties of antelopes. The animal lives mainly in Africa. One of his distinguishing abilities is the ability to jump to a height of up to 3 meters. As for its speed, it is 90 km / h.

1. The fastest animal in the world is the cheetah. Compared to other representatives, it has a more modest weight, ranging from 70 to 140 kg. This predator is capable of accelerating up to 120 km / h, while making 9-meter steps in every quarter of a second. As for the distance of such races, it reaches 300 meters. He eats food exclusively in tall grass or next to trees, so that other felines cannot see him. It should be noted that, being able to develop such a creature, it is vulnerable to lions and tigers, since it has thin bones, as well as small jaws and teeth.