Spiritual value of buffalo

Buffalo is one of the animal which has also the spiritual value. It is the huge bodied animal with black colour. Body is covered with hairs. It is herbivorous in food habit. It has one pair of horns which are used as its defensive organ. Buffalo sometimes uses butting its head with other elephants. Although elephant is domesticated mainly for milk and milk products but it is also used for ploughing the land before cultivating crops. Buffalo is also used to run the vehicles like bailgada It is also used for running the vehicles.
So far as the spiritual value is concerned, buffalo is also considered as the vehicle of Yamraj, the God of death. According to Hindu mythology, Yama, the God of death, goes to his sister Yamuna and stays with her as a guest for five days. In Nepal, Deepawali or Yama panchak festival is celebrated as Tihar festival. During this festival due respect is paid to Yama by the people. During this festival buffalo is also paid due respect as the ehicle of God Yamaraj.

More about elephant

Elephant has got different names from the religious point of view. These names are naga, dvipa, padmin , Hastin etc. So, the different epithets have been given to the elephant. It is so called naga because it freely moves in water as well as on mountains and jungles. The name Dvipa which means the twice drinking i.e. drinking both from the mouth and the trunk. It has the habit of eating lotus. Due to this habit its name is given as Padmin that means lotus.It is associated with lotus in several representations. It is also given the name of 'Hastin' as it is born from teh hands of God rahma.
          According to legend, thefirst elephant was produced from the cosmic golden egg or Hiranyagarbha. Brahma took two halves of the broken shell in his hands and breathed life into them. Out of the shell came Airabata and seven other male elephants and from tehsecond shell sprang eight female elephants. These male and the female elephants started reproducing. Attached to this legend, an elephant is also called Hathi in Hindi and Hatti in Nepali. The eight male elephants became the bahana of Astha dikpalas or guardians of eight directions.

lElephant is also one of the majestic animal which is also important from the spiritual point of view along with its lots of other importance.These majestic animals are greatly associated witht he myths, mythologies and symbolisms of Hinduism and Buddhism in the countries like Nepal and India.
Its habitat: Its habitat is the jungle of herbs,where it goes cautiously moving breaking through all obstacles, protecting its calves from dangers, roaming over hills ,swimming across rivers and lakes in spite of its huge body. It possesses enormous strength and size. It imparts decorative grandeur to the pomp and pageantry of Indian and Nepalese life It has multifarious characteristics which has led to their representation in arts and literature. Its a fact that among the large animls of nature only the elephant survived in the struggle for existence. Its survival is not only due to its intelligence but due to its qualities of being associated and domesticated with men. It means it has the power of adaptation which has made it successful in the different types of adverse natural condition.The elephant enjoyed great prestige and it finds mention in various contexts in the epics i.e. in arthashastra of Kautilyawhere its force has been referred to the fabulous strength of kings.

Monkey ,the familiar animal of nature

Monkey is the familiar animal of nature. It is found almost all over the world. Monkeys are distributed in the forest areas. But sometimes they come near the human dwellings. They live in groups.The zoological name of monkey is Macaca mulatta. That is its genus is Macaca and species is mulatta. Monkeys have the general characters like that of human beings in many of the points which are as follows:
- They have the body which is covered with hairs.
- They have one pair of external ears known as pinna.
- They have two pairs of limbs, one pair of forelimbs and one pair of hind limbs.
- They have the four - chambered heart.
- They are also viviparous animals i.e.they do not lay eggs but give birth to the young ones.
-They are warm-blooded animals. i.e. they keep the body temperature constant all the year round.
  Monkeys are well known as the naughty animals of nature. They have the herbivorous food habit. They show the very good example of group behavior.

Porcupine, as the sacred animal

Porcupine is also one of the sacred animal of nature. It is directly not associated in religion as the vehicle of any God and Goddess. But still it has some spiritual value.
Porcupine is an animal which belongs to the order rodentia of class mammalia. It comes under phylum chordata. It is in the same group in which the cat belongs.
Habitat: Porcupine lives in the deeply wooded areas of the forest. It is very easy to kill porcupines and its meat is also tasty. Porcupine has the habit of girdling trees. The quill of porcupine is found to be used for different porpuses: For example, In the investiture of the sacred thread ceremony (upanayan) the top knot of the brahmachari (celibate) is separated into three portions with the help of a quil of porcupine. Another use of the quill of porcupine is that a pregnant woman observes a ceremony called simanta ceremony in which the prtings are separated with a quill of porcupine.Among the newar caste, there is the custom of performing the primary marriage ceremony called ihin when young girls of pre puberty age are symbolically married to a bell fruit which is the personification of God Narayan.During this ceremony, a quill of porcupine is inserted in the hair of the girl.

Parrot, the beautiful song bird of nature

Parrot is the beautiful animal bird of nature. It is included under the class aves of phylum chordata. being the birds parrots show the general characters of birds  which are as follows:
1.They have the stream-lined body
2. Body is covered with feathers which provide the   good insulating mechanism to their body.Feathers help them to decrease the body weight as well.
3. Forelimbs are modified in the form of wings which help them to fly in air.
4. They have the hard and curved beak which are white or red in colour. Beak halps them to tear the nuts and hard fruits.
5. The colour of the body is very attractive with :amixture of green and lemon yellow which looks brilliant tot eh viewers.
6. Their tail is cylindrical and help them to balance the body in air during their flight.
Parrots as the beautiful cage bird: Parrot is the beautiful cage bird. It has the sweet voice and it can imitate certain words of human beings. So people use to keep them inside the cage and use to hear their sweet song time to time.
Role of parrot in ecosystem: Parrot is not only the beautiful animal of nature but also has the important role in balancing the natural system called ecosystem. Being the herbivorous bird, it is included under the primary consumer in the food chain of ecosystem. They help to balance the number of producers in an ecosystem which is their role of balancing the ecosystem. As a whole they are helping to protect the environment by balancing the ecological system.

The Dragon, a symbolic animal

Dragon is a fabulous, winged fire breathing monster which is scaly- armoured . Dragons are symbolic animals because they are represented in various paintings, weaving- works, sculptures and wood works.They are also represented on the sides of the temples. For example dragons are sculptures in the Kalmochan temple at the Bagmati river and the Akash Bhairabha temple which is situated in Indrachowk of Kathmandu city.Hindus and Buddhists believe that dragon is associated with water. They believe that water sprout is regarded as a dragon as it can never be seen fully because its head or its tail always remains invisible.It is also regarded that a dragon and the tiger are mutual enemies. Buddhists regard that if a tiger's bone is thrown into a dragon's well, the rain will intervene and a fight takes place between them.It is also a common belief about the dragon that if the dragon moves there is always rainfall.
                 Dragons are usually represented half feline , half reptilian  with dorsally situated spikes and pin wined wings. However some people believe dragons to be winged lions and not the dragons.So it can be said that dragons are the animal symbols which can not be described in any one form but they show the mixed characters of the different animals. They are master pieces of carefully related forms. Sometimes horns are also depicted and fire juts out of their mouths. Their wings are highly styled and neck is powerful and thick.
The body is very muscular with swelled up chest. The treatment of the muzzle is excellent. They look very terrible in  appearance. The pre -paws are pointed in front. Phallus is highly erected to depict its fierce attitude.The dragons are bulky with square  block -like heads. The monster is in a roaring condition and has a forward -striding attitude. Dragon's figures are commonly woven on the carpets  which are manufactured in Nepal.

The Dragon, a symbolic animal

Introduction of squirrel

Squirrel is natures one of the beautiful animal. It comes under the phylum chordata. It belongs to the class mammalia. Squirrel as in the figure, shows the elongated cylicdrical bodywhich is covered with hairs. Its body

consists of the following parts:
a. head b.Neck.c. Trunk and d. Tail.
Head consists of the paired eyes , a pair of pinna or external ear, and a snout which is protruded anteriorly. At the tip of the snout , there is the mouth.
Neck: It is the second part of the body of squirrel and it lies in between the head and the trunk.
Trunk: Trunk is the third part of the body of squirrel. It lies just posterior to the neck and anterior to the tail. Trunk is the longest part of the body of squirrel and it is comparatively the wider part also. On the ventral side of the trunk two pairs of limbs are found, they are fore limbs which are anteriorely located paired limbs and the next pair of limbs are the hind- limbs which are longer than the fore- limbs.d.
dTail; It is the last part of the body. It is not very long but short and bushy.
Whole the body is covered with hair which is one of the important character of the class mammalia.
      Squirrels have the alternating longitudinal stripes of alternating black and brown colour on the dorsal side of its body which is the identifying feature. They are herbivorous animals and have the strong grasping power. They climb on the trees and can leap very fast to the long distance.
Distribution: It is distributed in the most ofthe tropical countries of South Asia like Nepal, India, Bangladesh etc.

Swan, the semiaquatic animal of nature.

Swan is also known as Hamsa. It is the long -necked bird with a red beak and a snow-white body. It is capable to fly high. It belongs to the migratory kind of bird. Its famous living place is Manosarobar , a famous big fresh water lake located in Tibet. This lake is the most sacred lake by both the Hindus and Buddhists and is situated against then backdrop of famous Kailash mountain.
According to Buddhists, in one of his previous birth, Buddha was a golden goose i.e. a kind of Swan He was helping a Brahmin  and his family by providing a feather daily. but the Gee Brahmin one day took off all the feathers which turned white and were of no value.
According to Hindus , Swan is the vehicle of Lord Brahma. Some scientists also consider the bird as the incarnation of Kubera, the Lord of wealth. Bannerjee write that later on the Hansa became the vehicle of Goddess Saraswati.Saraswati is the Goddess of learning.
 Anyway the appearance of a white Hansa or evena white bird over the head is considered to be an auspicious sign. When Budha got enlightenment, white birds similar to Hansa flew over him. Similarly when he descended fromTushita heaven or when he crossed the Niranjan river , white birds flew over the head of Buddha.

How do animals remove their excretory wastes?

Animals perform the different systems from the from the different organs. Excretory system which is found in animals as one of the vital systems of the body is the system which helps animals to remove the excretory waste ,materials from their body to out side. The organs which help in excretion are known as the excretory organs.The main excretory organs of the vertebrates are known as kidneys. Kidneys are paired structures which are bean-shaped and located in the dorsal wall of the abdominal cavity. Human kidneys are not located in the same level, one is located a little bit above than the other. Anyway kidneys are the very important organs of the animals body. They have two important functions:
One is the filtration of blood and the other is urine formation. For that purpose each kidney has its two important functioning parts: The Bowman's capsule- which helps to filter the blood and pass the useful substances present in the blood back to the body cells and the other important functioning part of the kidney is called the uriniferous tubule. It is the elongated tubule of varying diameter which helps to form urine.

Facts about Sharks

Introduction : Sharks are the animals which are included under the phylum chordata and the group vertebrata. They are in the series pisces. i. e. fishes.
Sharks do not have the well -developed skeleton like other fishes becaus  other fishes have the well developed skeleton which are made up of bones. But in sharks, the body is supported by cartilaginous skeleton that means  the skeleton is not made up of bones but of cartilage. Cartilage is not as hard as the bone and it is made up of the material called chondrin. That is the reason the sharks are also known as the cartilaginous fish.Sharks have the muscle tissue made up of cartilage and it makes the fish to be weightless in water.They are adapted excellently to live in water. They have the rough type of skin which is covered with the small toothed scales, which overlap like roof tiles to achieve streamlining and speed in water. Sharks can find their prey over distances of up to 1000 metres. They have ultra sensitive receptors in their snout and lateral sensorial system which detect the slightest vibration in water.They also have the reflective mechanism in their eyes which allows them to distinguish objects in dim light.