Salty Sam’s Fun Blog for Children
Number 329
Animal Care
Hello Everyone
So here is a strange question for you?
When do you think you will leave home?
When you are eighteen years old, or when you get married, or when you go to university, or when you can afford to buy your own home?
Some people who have special needs will need to be looked after their whole lives – even when they are an adult.
Sometimes parents get upset when their children leave home – but maybe it is worse when they are never capable of doing so.
ln the animal world, things are a bit different.
No animal waits until they are eighteen and then says they are off.
Most animals look after their young just until they are able to fend for themselves and then they let them go.
lf animals live in a large herd like zebras, the young will join the herd, other animals like lions will stay with the pride if they are females and live together with their mother and sisters and aunts. But if they are a male, eventually, when they reach full maturity, they will have to leave and find a pride of their own.
Birds are fed in the nest by busy parents when they are first hatched and also for a while when they leave the nest as fledglings. Some stay together in families, like swans and geese, and migrate together, animals often see the sense in staying together in groups, but most young birds move on to find their own territories.
Most mothers are very protective of their young and make sure they have the best start in life that they can. But life can be tough, and animals have to be quick to learn how to look after themselves if they want to survive.
Animals like horses and wildebeest will learn how to walk within a day of being born.
Seal mothers feed their babies with very nutrient and calorie-rich milk which will build their babies up very quickly, but can then desert them in as little as about two weeks after they are born to go and find food for themselves. The young seals will have to brave the rough and stormy sea alone to find their own food.
But every animal does things differently, which is why studying nature can be so fascinating.
Some birds only feed their strongest chicks and deliberately leave the weaker ones to die, because they think that it is not worth the investment of feeding them.
Some birds make sure that all their chicks have food and that the weaker ones have a chance to get stronger – even brothers and sisters help to raise the weaker chicks.
Babies always need looking after when they are first born, but then there are the animals that are unable to look after themselves very well even when they are older. They might have been born with a deformed leg or they might sustain a broken wing.
On the whole the ‘law of the jungle’ presides.
lf an animal is not strong and healthy, it cannot look after itself, so it perishes.
Nature is not very sentimental; and in the animal world it is a case of survival of the fittest.
Very few animals look after each other in the way that humans do if one of their fellows is struggling to cope. Herds of elephants and packs of wolves are amongst the few exceptions as they will help weaker members of their group.
lt isn’t very common for most animals to do this.
All elephants in a herd will watch out for the babies too and look after them as a precious member of their extended family.
ln the world of birds, males often share the workload of bringing food back to the nest, some male fish and frogs also help in parenting duties but in the world of mammals it is mostly the mothers who work hard to feed their offspring.
Exceptions to this are found though, in some monkeys and the foxes in your garden that will be brought up by both parents in their den. You might have foxes living under your shed or in an earth bank at the side of a nearby road.
The mother that looks after her baby for the longest is the orang-utan. Her young offspring stays with her for eight years. Orang-utans only have a baby once every nine years which means they only have one child to look after at a time. This means then that they don’t have babies as often as most other animals – but they do continue to have babies into their 40s.
The baby orang-utans stay with their mothers for such a long time because they have a lot to learn. They have to learn which foods are safe to eat and how to build a good and solid nest for sleeping in high up in the treetops.
Another amazing parenting story is that of the strawberry poison dart frog which lives in the rainforest.
After the female lays her eggs on the rainforest floor the father keeps them safe from predators. Once the eggs turn into tadpoles they could eat each other so the mother carries them separately on her back into the forest canopy where she will find a safe pool of water in a leaf or epiphyte (plant that grows on a tree branch) for each one to live in. She will then visit the pools for about fifty days and deposit and unfertilized egg into each one to keep the babies fed until they are mature. All this time the father patrols the area in order to watch over his babies and keep them safe.
One of the most dedicated mothers, is the giant Pacific octopus who can lay about 100,000 eggs. She will give so much attention to looking after these eggs, making sure they are guarded, cleaned and oxygenated for the six months of incubation, that she pays no attention to her own needs, and dies once the eggs hatch.
You might find that in your family the task of bringing up children is shared.
Your mum and dad might share the tasks of collecting you from school and cooking the dinner. You might even have grandparents and aunts and uncles who look after you sometimes as well. ln the past ‘male’ and ‘female’ roles where usually quite firmly defined in a family.
Men tended to be responsible for earning money or running a business that generated an income, while women were responsible for looking after the home.
Nowadays, people divide tasks up amongst the members of a family in a way they decide is best for them. They have to fit them into a very busy lifestyle.
So every family is different – a bit like in the animal world l suppose.
Well, l am off to see my family now. We are going to have a big family meal at Auntie Alice’s cottage.
Bye bye everyone – don’t forget to subscribe to my blog!
lf you like my blog, please support it by telling all your friends and followers about it.
Thank you!
And see you again next Fun Friday!
Love and kisses
Salty Sam
www.christina-sinclair.com
Bill and Bob’s Joke of the Week
Bill: lf a baby refuses to take a nap…
Bob: Yes?
Bill: ls that resisting a rest?
Salty Sam © Christina Sinclair 2015
Unauthorized use and/or duplication of material from this blog without express and written permission from this blog’s author and owner is strictly prohibited.
Links may be used to www.christina-sinclair.com
Picture Gallery
Seal pup
(waving at the camera 😉 )
Elephants
Baby wildebeest
Lion cub
Orang-utan
Baby flamingo on a nest
(tinamotta.tumblr)
Octopus
Animals caring for each other
THE SALTY SAM NEWS DESK
Because Auntie Alice had knitted some juggling balls for Henry last week and some cupcakes for Emily the week before, she thought that she should make things fair and knit Bill and Bob a toy as well.
She knitted them an owl and a pussy cat in a boat.
If you would like the pattern for your own, here it is…
NEWSDESK MINIMAKE
AN OWL AND THE PUSSYCAT lN A PEA GREEN BOAT
PUSSYCAT BODY (KNIT ONE)
Using 4mm knitting needles and white dk yarn cast on 17 stitches
Purl 1 row
Purl 1 row
Using stocking stitch knit 20 rows
Don’t cast off
Cut off yarn leaving a length of 20cm and thread it through your stitches and remove them from the needle
PUSSYCAT BASE (KNIT ONE)
Using 4mm knitting needles and white dk yarn cast on 20 stitches
Cast off
Curl the knitting round in a spiral and sew across it to make it into a solid disc
PUSSYCAT EARS (KNIT TWO)
Using 4mm knitting needles and white dk yarn cast on 4 stitches
Knit 2 stitches together at the beginning of the next 3 rows
Cast off
PUSSYCAT TAIL (KNIT ONE)
Crochet 7 chains into a length of white yarn
TO MAKE UP
- Sew up the back seam of the body right sides together using over-sew stitching
- Turn the cat the right way out
- Pull the top of the head shut and stuff the head and body
- Tie a strand a yarn around the neck a couple of times, pull tight and secure the yarn into the back seam
- Insert the base and sew into the bottom of the body
- Sew ears and tail in place and add eyes with black yarn
OWL BACK (KNIT ONE)
Using 4mm knitting needles and dark brown dk yarn cast on 9 stitches
Purl 1 row
Purl 1 row
Using stocking stitch knit 20 rows
Don’t cast off
Cut off yarn leaving a length of 20cm and thread it through your stitches and remove them from the needle
OWL FRONT (KNIT ONE)
Using 4mm knitting needles and light brown dk yarn cast on 9 stitches
Purl 1 row
Purl 1 row
Using stocking stitch knit 20 rows
Don’t cast off
Cut off yarn leaving a length of 20cm and thread it through your stitches and remove them from the needle
OWL BASE (KNIT ONE)
Using 4mm knitting needles and white dk yarn cast on 20 stitches
Cast off
Curl the knitting round in a spiral and sew across it to make it into a solid disc
OWL WINGS (KNIT TWO)
Using 4mm knitting needles and light brown dk yarn cast on 5 stitches
Knit 1 row
Knit 1 row
Knit 2 stitches together at the beginning of the next 4 rows
Cast off
OWL EYE RINGS (MAKE TWO)
Crochet 5 chains into a length of light brown yarn
Tie the ends together to create a loop
TO MAKE UP
- Sew up the side seams of the body right sides together using over-sew stitching
- Turn the owl the right way out
- Pull the top of the head shut and stuff the head and body
- Tie a strand of yarn around the neck a couple of times, pull tight and secure the yarn into the centre back of the neck
- Insert the base and sew into the bottom of the body
- Sew wings, eye rings in place and add beak with black yarn (3 stitches into a triangle) and add a French knot (wrap the yarn 2 times around the needle) into the eye rings with black yarn
You can take the ends of the yarn you use for sewing the owl up through the top of the head and cut them off to create a cute little tuft of feathers like the owl in the photograph or you can take them up the sides of the head to create tufts that look like little ears.
Some owls have very round heads and some have tufts each side of the top of their heads that look like ears. They are not actually ears because owls have ears on the side of their heads under their feathers.
Once you have made your owl and pussycat they will need a pea green boat and provisions to take on their journey.
PEA GREEN BOAT
Knitted in garter stitch
BOAT BASE (KNIT ONE)
Using 4mm knitting needles and pea green dk yarn cast on 2 stitches
Continue knitting in garter stitch
Increase 1 stitch at the beginning of each row until you have 10 stitches on your needle
Knit 40 rows of garter stitch
Decrease 1 stitch at the beginning of each row until 2 stitches remain
Cast off
BOAT SIDES (KNIT TWO)
Using 4mm knitting needles and pea green dk yarn cast on 8 stitches
Knit 36 rows of garter stitch
Cast off
BOAT TOPS (KNIT TWO)
Using 4mm knitting needles and pea green dk yarn cast on 10 stitches
Knit 1 row
Continue knitting in garter stitch
Decrease 1 stitch at the beginning of every row until 1 stitch is left
Cast off
TO MAKE UP
- Sew the pieces together working from the outside of the boat
- Sew the two ends of the sides together and then ease the sides onto the base and sew in place
- Sew a top into each end of the boat
- Run a length of yarn along the top edges of the side to make them more rigid – when you are happy about the shape of the boat, secure the ends of these lengths
There will be room in each end of the boat to stash their money and honey.
MONEY CHEST SIDES (KNIT FOUR)
Using 4mm knitting needles and dark brown dk yarn cast on 7 stitches
Knit 8 rows of garter stitch
Cast off
MONEY CHEST ENDS (KNIT TWO)
Using 4mm knitting needles and dark brown dk yarn cast on 6 stitches
Knit 8 rows of garter stitch
Cast off
TO MAKE UP
Sew the pieces together working from the outside of the chest
- Sew all the sides together and add the ends to the side
- Form the box and sew it together
- Stuff just before sealing up the last seam
- Put a little bead on the front to look like a clasp and lock, if you would like to
Make a net of the shapes to be curled up into a box
HONEY POT SIDES (KNIT ONE)
Using 4mm knitting needles and light yellow dk yarn cast on 12 stitches
Purl 1 row
Purl 1 row
Knit 6 rows of stocking stitch
Cast off
HONEY POT BASE (KNIT ONE)
Using 4mm knitting needles and light yellow dk yarn cast on 10 stitches
Cast off
Curl the knitting round into a spiral and sew across it again and again in different directions with yarn in order to make a solid disc
HONEY POT LID (KNIT ONE)
Using 4mm knitting needles and light brown dk yarn cast on 18 stitches
Cast off
Curl the knitting round into a spiral and sew across it again and again in different directions with yarn in order to make a solid disc
TO MAKE UP
- Sew the side seam of the jar right sides together using over-sew stitching
- Turn the jar the right way out
- Insert the base and sew around the edge to hold in place
- Stuff the jar
- Put the lid on and sew around the edge to hold in place
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Quick Quiz
Do you know the names these animals have when they are young?
- bear
- deer
- swan
- zebra
- kangaroo
- butterfly
- cat
- dog
- hare
lt’s the Weekend!
HOW TO MAKE A DOLL’S FEEDlNG BOTTLE
MILK BOTTLE (KNIT ONE)
Use a plastic bottle, pot or water bottle with nozzle.
Wash the bottle and leave to dry
Cover the label with a piece of white paper and tape into place
Measure the circumference of the bottle
Cast on 2 stitches for every centimeter
Using 4mm knitting needles and white dk yarn cast on a number of stitches – leave a length of white yarn to use for pulling the knitting in at the base of the bottle later
You will need to leave 1cm extra at the bottom of the bottle to pull in under the base
Knit in stocking stitch to where you want the top of your ‘milk’ to be and then change to a coloured yarn
Knit in stocking stitch to the top of the bottle but don’t cast off
Cut off your yarn with a length long enough to tie around the top of the bottle
Put your stitches onto this yarn
Sew the side seam up right sides together using over-sew stitching
Turn the knitting the right way out and pull over the bottle
Weave a length of white yarn around the bottom of the knitting
Pull the knitting in and secure
Pull the top of the knitting around the top of the bottle and secure
Glue a piece of paper onto the top of the bottle and a bead to represent the teat at the top of the feeding bottle
THIS TOY IS NOT SUITABLE FOR A SMALL CHILD OR BABY!
Please note that the material on this blog is for personal use and for use in classrooms only.
It is a copyright infringement and, therefore, illegal under international law to sell items made with these patterns.
Use of the toys and projects is at your own risk.
©Christina Sinclair Designs 2015
Quick Quiz Answers
- bear – cub
- deer – fawn
- swan – cygnet
- zebra – foal
- kangaroo – joey
- butterfly – caterpillar
- cat – kitten
- dog – puppy
- hare – leveret
