Orangutans are closer to humans than you thought. They share many human characteristics. When wild animals fall sick they frequently chew medicinal plants. But the orangutans of Colorado's Denver Zoo are perhaps the first zoo animals to receive aromatherapy treatment.

They sniff plant oils to improve their moods. And it seems to have worked too. Allie, an 8-year-old orangutan, was sad after her mother died. But she soon 'cheered up' after smelling rose and jasmine oils daily.

Did you know that doves and pigeons are the only birds that can swallow water directly after drinking it? All other birds have a different technique. They have to dip their bills and then flip their heads back to let the water run down their throats!

The ancient Aztecs used to drink money! The Aztec civilisation was the first to discover that crushing the beans of the cacao tree (Theobroma cacao) into a paste and adding spices made a refreshing drink. This beverage named ‘chocolatl’ was considered divine and was drunk out of golden cups. So highly was cacao treasured that the beans were used as currency! The 16th century European explorers brought the drink back from their travels and popularised chocolate, as we know it now.

Lightning strikes the earth’s surface about a 100 times every second. Each flash lasting for less than a second contains one billion volts of electricity. That's enough energy to light a 100-watt bulb for three months.

Even though the lightning flash can happen in half a second, the bolt temperature is higher than the temperature on the surface of the sun.

Britain has a baby boom! So now there is a major housing crisis. Well, it is an avian baby boom. 2004 was a very productive year for the Blue tits and many of these birds will be now looking for a place to build their nests. Once these birds find a nesting site they return for several seasons. Since natural nesting sites, such as holes in trees and buildings, are vanishing the people are pitching in to solve the problem. The British Trust for Ornithology (BTO) is urging people to put up nesting boxes to help the birds tide over the crisis.

Fireflies have an organic compound in their abdomens, called 'luciferin' that reacts with air to produce a glow. This light is called 'cold light' because it generates very little heat. A firefly regulates airflow into the abdomen to create a pulsating pattern. These insects can recognise other members by the manner in which they flash light.

That’s because each species has a specific flash pattern. In fact, males and females of the same species actually use a sort of Morse code to signal each other. Males flash every five seconds while females flash every two seconds.