The Ark Files - Can you spot the difference ?

Many animals look so much alike that we often get them confused. We know they aren't the same but just can't quite put our finger on what the differences are. Well, help is at hand. Here are a few simple ways to split up some common animal "twins".

Grin and bear it

The easiest way to tell alligators and crocodiles apart is by the shape of their heads and the look of their "smiles". Alligators have a short, broad face, while crocodiles are the ones with the long, narrow snout. In both, when they close their mouth, you are still able to see some teeth - it's which teeth you see that determine what they are. Look at an alligator and you will see only the upper teeth showing - it actually looks like it's grinning at you. In crocodiles you can see both the upper and lower teeth and there is one very large tooth on each side of the bottom jaw left sitting outside the lip making the croc's smile look more like a leer than a grin. It's certainly not quite the "friendly" face of its cousin! Alligators are only found in the south-eastern states of the USA and in the Yangtse River valley in China. But, if you are near the water almost anywhere else in the world, (especially Africa, tropical Asia or Northern Australia), and a "submerged log" suddenly surfaces and blinks two big eyes at you, you'd best bid a hasty retreat. It's much safer to view that crocodile from a distance.

Run rabbit

Rabbits and hares are amongst the most hunted animals on the planet - everything from weasels to bears wants them for dinner. So they are built for speed, with long hind legs and feet, slender bodies and short tails. Put them alongside each other though, and you can see that the rabbit is much more compact. It's built to survive by running through dense, shrubby bush land and darting down into burrows. Hares are much larger and leaner, built for life on the open grasslands, where their only protection is strength and speed. (Think of the difference between a chunky 10-year-old child and a gangly teenager and you will get a good idea of the difference.) Rabbits gather in large communities, whose young, kittens or kits for short, are born in the safety of the burrow and are blind and hairless for their first ten days. Hares are solitary animals, except during the mating season when they get together and compete for mates (becoming as "mad as March hares") and give birth above ground to leverets, which are born almost ready to run.

On the frog and toad

Surprisingly, all toads are, in fact, frogs! But experts can split them into two sub-groups, True Frogs and True Toads, each with its own set of characteristics. Frogs generally have quite thin smooth skin, strong hind legs for hopping, webbed hind feet for swimming, and are never found very far from water. Toads are usually larger then frogs and have dry, almost leathery skin, often covered with lumps and bumps. They're able to travel much further from water than frogs - their stubby bodies and short hind legs mean they are more like sturdy "walkers" than "leap-froggers". Australia's infamous Cane Toad is a pretty good representative of the general toad population. Frogs versus toads - seems a little bit like Cinderella versus the Ugly Sisters!

Pack your woollies

When you want to tell if an animal is an alpaca or a llama, the give-away is size - not only of the entire animal but also the ears. Llamas are 1.2 metres tall at the shoulder and have big, banana-shaped ears, which meet at the tips. Alpacas are about half the size of llamas, with perfectly straight, much smaller ears. These South American animals were both descended from a similar camel-like ancestor, but were domesticated for very different purposes. The tougher llama was bred to carry heavy loads, and is basically the pack-horse of the Andes. The more delicate and timid alpaca was developed to produce copious amounts of luxuriously fine wool for clothing and blankets.

Monkeying around

The easiest way to tell a monkey from an ape is to look for a tail - monkeys have one and apes don't. Monkeys also have narrow pointed chests and hairy noses. Apes, especially orang-utans, chimpanzees and gorillas, are generally larger. They can stand more upright because of the shortened spine and broader pelvis. They also have broader, flatter chests and very flexible shoulders and wrists. What really separates apes from monkeys is brain power - this is especially obvious with our closest evolutionary relative, the chimpanzee. Did you know an ape can recognise itself in a mirror but a monkey can't!