Surprising
Animal Senses
by Terry Ruby
Table of Contents
Introduction
2
Sight
4
Touch
6
Taste
8
Smell
10
Hearing
12
Super Senses
14
Introduction
You may already know about your five
senses. People can see, touch, taste,
smell, and hear.
Did you know that animals also use
their senses to learn about the world?
It’s true! But animal senses do not
always work like people’s senses work.
2
3
Sight
Look at this picture. Who is the
mother and who is the child? How
can you tell? You use your sense of
sight. You use your eyes to see.
Small spots on the starfish’s arms
help it to see light and dark.
You use your eyes to see, but a
starfish uses its arms! Starfish do not
have eyes, so they can’t see as well as
you can. But, small spots at the ends
of their arms can help them tell the
difference between light and dark.
4
5
Touch
If your eyes are closed, how can you
tell the difference between a soft
chick and rough sandpaper? You use
your sense of touch. You use your
skin to touch.
A cat uses its whiskers to
feel what is around it.
You use your skin to touch, but cats
use the hair on their face! The long
hairs on a cat’s face are called
whiskers. Cats use their whiskers to
let them know if they can fit through
small openings.
6
7
Taste
Think about your favorite food. Now,
think about a food you don’t like.
Why do you like one food better? You
use your sense of taste. You use your
tongue to taste.
This butterfly is tasting the
flowers with its feet.
You use your tongue to taste, but a
butterfly tastes with its feet! When
butterflies land on flowers, they use
taste buds on their feet to know if
the flowers are good to eat.
8
9
Smell
Do you like the smell of fresh flowers?
Or do you like the smell of garbage?
Most people like flowers better. Your
sense of smell tells you that flowers
smell good but garbage smells bad.
You use your nose to smell.
A snake uses its tongue to
smell the world around it.
You use your nose to smell, but
snakes use their tongues! Snakes don’t
have noses, so they use their tongues
to bring smells into their mouths.
Then, they use special holes in the top
of their mouths to tell them what they
are smelling.
10
11
Hearing
Your friends whisper a secret to you.
How do you know what they are saying?
You use your sense of hearing. You use
your ears to hear.
The small white dots on the cricket’s
front legs are actually its ears.
You use your ears to hear, but
crickets use their legs! Crickets don’t
have ears on their heads, like people
do. Instead, they have ears near
their knees.
12
13
Super Senses
Super Smell
Some animals have senses that are
A bloodhound’s sense of
much, much stronger than your senses.
smell is a million times
Super Sight
stronger than a person’s
Birds have some of the best eyes of
all animals. They look for food on the
ground while they are flying high in
the sky. An eagle can spot its prey
from up to a mile away!
sense of smell. That is why
bloodhounds are used to
track people who are lost.
A bloodhound can use its super nose to
track a scent that is nearly four days old.
Super Hearing
Bats can not see in the
dark. They use their ears
at night to tell where
they are flying. They
make a high noise and then listen
to its echo to know where they are.
14
15
You do not see in the same way
a starfish does.
You do not touch in the same way
a cat does.
You do not taste in the same way
a butterfly does.
You do not smell in the same way
a snake does.
And you do not hear
in the same way
a cricket does.
But you can learn
about all of these
animals through your
very own senses!
16