Oaks are trees and shrubs of the beech family. There are about 450 species of oak. They are common in places with mild weather. Oak trees can grow to 45 meters high. Their leaves can have rounded, rough, or smooth edges. The fruit of an oak tree is the acorn – a round nut in a woody cup. The buds are usually in clusters, often with several about the same size, resulting in the numbers of large irregular branches that give most oaks their characteristic rugged crowns. The male flowers develop in the form of drooping catkins, with fewer females, on short stalks, erect above the males.
The roots are quite extensive, reaching out at least three times the height of the tree and down as deep as 4.6-12.2 m.
There are both evergreen (they have no synchronous leaf loss) and deciduous species.
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The term elk refers to different animals in different parts of the world. In Europe it is used for the mammal known in North America as the moose. The American elk is more properly named the wapiti. They live in Canada, Alaska, the Rocky Mountain region of the United States, and in the northern forests of Europe and Asia. They like to be near rivers, ponds, and lakes.
Moose are the largest animals in the deer family, weighing as much as 800 kg and standing as tall as about 2 m. They have a long and large head, long legs, a short neck and tail. They are good swimmers.
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For hundreds of years warriors called samurai controlled Japan. The Japanese emperor took away the power of the samurai in 1871.
The first samurai protected vast lands owned by members of Japan’s upper class. Gradually the samurai spread out across the country and got their own pieces of land. They became more and more powerful. In 1185 one of the samurai gained military control of all Japan and in 1192 he took the title of shogun. The emperors had less power than the shoguns.
The originally Chinese term samurai means “a person who serves in close attendance to nobility.” They served with a loyalty, bravery, and honor that have made the samurai one of the best-known icons of Japanese history. The samurai are symbols of Japan’s feudal past before the rapid modernization.
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Until the 30s of the XX century, Mount Corcovado attracted the attention of architects and sculptors who dreamed to install on it some national symbol.
In 1921, the popular weekly magazine announced the best monument contest. The project of the little-known engineer Ector da Silva Costa was the winner. He offered to erect a statue of Christ on Corcovada with arms outstretched, embracing the whole Rio de Janeiro. Brazil is a Catholic country and very religious. Everyone liked the idea: the fathers of the city, the public and the church. Jesus Christ hugging the city was the great idea.
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Dolphins look like big fishes, but they are actually mammals. They belong to a large group of animals called whales.
There are two groups: true dolphins and river dolphins. True dolphins live throughout the world and the most widespread species are the common dolphin and the bottlenose dolphin. The River dolphins live in freshwater in South America and Asia. There are thirty-two species of dolphins.
Most dolphins are 2 to 3 meters long, but some species can reach a length of 4 meters.
A dolphin breathes through a single nostril, called a blowhole, on the top of its head.
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On May 31, 2003 Russian President Vladimir Putin and German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder opened a new Amber Room in Tsarskoye Selo near St. Petersburg. It took 25 years, over 6 tons of amber and several million dollars to recreate a masterpiece. The new Amber Room appeared in the same room where it was more than 230 years ago.
Amber is a stone of organic origin and becomes too fragile because of temperature changes. Nevertheless, jewelers have always valued this semiprecious stone for compliance in processing. It was found on the coast of the Baltic Sea, especially near Prussian Königsberg.
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All stars are basically enormous balls of fire made up of gases which give off heat and light as they burn. Their power comes from nuclear energy.
The life of a star spans billions of years. It is born from clouds of dust and the element hydrogen. A protostar, glowing gas ball, becomes a star when hydrogen atoms combine to form helium. A star can continue to glow for millions of years. When the star finally runs out of hydrogen it starts to cool.
Red supergiants are stars run out of hydrogen. They explode in a violent blast, supernova, but in some cases they may become a black hole.
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