Antarctica

Relationships in the animal world are not like the human world.

For dogs, ''relationships'' are pack status; they are not friends like we are.

There's alpha (or, occasionally alphas), beta, and then every other dog down to the very last.

With cats, since they are solitary, they do not have more than a respect the elder sort of relationship.

Dogs, horses, and cats may ''love you'' but it is not the same kind of love. Its more like, master or company!

Dogs are showing respect when they are gentle and quiet around you.

Yes, animals show excited, ''they're home!''

But they do not think, ''Oh, my friend is home, I can't wait to go outside,''

''Master's home (or the Toy is home)! What can i do to please master?''

Birds are different, and Reptiles are the same. They have not been made to have these obvious attachments to humans.

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Alpine glaciers and their movement is common in mountainous areas.

Antarctica, however, is covered with an ice sheet, and its glaciers often flow into the sea without the alpine glacier brown or grey colour associated with carving valleys or bowls common in other mountainous areas on earth.

Ninety-eight percent of Antarctica is covered with this ice sheet, so most glaciers flow on top of more stable ice.

The world's second largest continental ice sheet is located in Antarctica, covering about 14 million square kilometers. It is known as the East Antarctic Ice Sheet.

The world's tallest mountain -- Mt Everest at 29,029' (8,848 m) is located in Asia.

The world's largest volcano -- Mauno Loa -- about the size of New Mexico, is located on Hawaii's big island of Hawai'i.

I'm not sure of what fossils were found in Antarctica from all time periods, but I do know that there were a variety of plants and animals there during the Mesozoic. Some of the animals that I will list were found in Australia, which, at this time, was connected to Antarctica and had the same kinds of fauna and flora, as well as climate. Fossils of dinosaurs like Antarctopelta (an ankylosaur), Antarctosaurus (a sauropod), Cryolophosaurus (a theropod), and Leallynasaura (a small, herbivorous, bipedal dinosaur). There were amphibians, including the 16 foot long Koolasuchus, that filled a niche similar to modern crocodillians. In the shallow seas and/or rivers there were also plesiosaurs.

The plants were adapted for a cool climate with cold winters, and included conifers and ferns, as well as mosses and lichens.

If a natural disaster can be, for example, a hurricane, a flood or earthquake: these are not events that occur on Antarctica.

There are blizzards there, and during them, no people are allowed out of doors. Ninety-eight percent of the continent is covered by an ice sheet, so there are no floods. Antarctica is a quiet zone in earthquake language, but ice quakes to occur due to disintegrating ice shelves.

Human dangers do include extreme cold weather incidents, such as frostbite, dropping into a crevasse from which one cannot be rescued, drowning in liquid sea water fully clothed in extreme cold weather gear, and death by hypothermia.

The ocean you reference is properly known as the Southern Ocean. Liquid ocean water there can be as cold as 27 degrees F, because of the high-content of minerals in the water. Otherwise, the sea water is frozen.

Lichens occupy many kinds of habitats, often in extreme environments. In fact, there are three main types of lichen that exist in Antarctica. They are the crustose lichens, foliose lichens, and fruticose lichens.

McMurdo Station in Antarctica covers an area of approximately 252.4 hectares (623 acres) in size. It is the largest research station in Antarctica and can accommodate up to 1,258 individuals in the summer months.

Until they start to break off they move very slowly. Some do not move at all others move as much as 100 feet in a day. (4 feet/hour). The average OS probably around .5 feet/hour, although the variances are great. Some glaciers have multiple speeds. The top may be moving fast while the bottom is still.

An iceberg or ice mountain is a large piece of freshwater ice that has broken off a glacier or an ice shelf and is floating freely in open water. The problem with Icebergs is that they float into shipping lanes and because Ice is frozen water they are almost of the same density as water. This means that the bit that you can see sticking up from the sea surface is only a VERY small bit of the iceberg, (typically only one-tenth of the volume of an iceberg is above water). This means that ships can hit the underwater bit even when they are not close to the visible bit.

Antarctica is as large as USA and Mexico combined. Antarctica is also the coldest continent.

According to USA Today: "The average high temperature for the year in Antarctica is about -49 degrees F, while the average low temperature for the continent is about -56 degrees F."

As well, they state: "July features an average high temperature of -76 degrees and an average low temperature of about -81 degrees F."

Winter begins on June 21 and spring begins on September 21. Since over most of the continent, the first sunrise may be as late as mid-August, that month could be colder than July.

The lines that meet at the North and South Poles are called meridians of longitude. These lines run from the North Pole to the South Pole and are used to measure how far east or west a location is from the Prime Meridian.

There are two main types of seals that live in Antarctica: the Weddell seal and the leopard seal. These seals are well adapted to the extreme cold conditions of Antarctica and can be found along the coastlines and ice floes of the continent.

Antarctica will melt if the temperatures do rise, this will result in a loss of many species of animals and a rise In the sea levels. Global Warming is NO joke, it is serious and is actually happening.

Also, research for finding cures will be eliminated as there won't be enough land to experiment on meaning we might not find better cures for diseases.

(Irrelevant information)The Antarctic ice sheet is getting larger, not smaller. NASA admitted this. So logic says at this rate, it continues to grow.

Antarctica does not get the "Northern Lights (Aurora Borealis)", being at the South Pole, it gets the "Southern Lights" or the Aurora Australis. The source of both the Aurora Australis and Aurora Borealis is the sun. A stream of particles known as the "Solar Wind" spills around the edges of the Earth's magnetic sphere and, when it collides with gases in the ionosphere, the particles glow very spectacularly.

You may be thinking of the Trans-Antarctic Mountains.

Besides Antarctica, large land areas covered with glaciers include Greenland, the Arctic, Iceland, and mountain regions such as the Himalayas, Alps, Andes, and Rocky Mountains. These regions contribute significantly to the Earth's freshwater reserves and play a crucial role in regulating global climate patterns.

Antarctica is the location for the South Pole. There is no continent, only sea water, under the North Pole.

Antarctica is dominated by a polar climate region. This means it is extremely cold, with temperatures often well below freezing, and receives very little precipitation in the form of rain. The continent is also characterized by strong winds and long periods of darkness in winter.

Anything growing on the land, would be growing in an extremely hostile environment in almost permanently sub-zero temperature with no water and no animal or insect means of pollination. Because Antarctica is a "polar" region, there is no precipitation, it has no lakes or rivers and is in fact the driest continent. Average temperatures in the Antarctic interior get down to -70 degrees Celsius during the winter months and -35 degrees Celsius in the warmer months. The coastal temperatures are much warmer with a range of -15 to -32 Celsius in Winter and -5 to +5 Celsius in Summer. The interior of Antarctica is considered the world's driest desert because the extreme cold freezes water vapour out of the air. Annual snowfall on the polar plateau is equivalent to less than 5 cm of rain. Antarctica has some of the strongest winds on earth, with some winds reaching 320 kph.

Under the Antarctic ice, there is a diverse landscape of mountains, valleys, lakes, rivers, and even active volcanoes. In addition to the geology, there is also a rich ecosystem of unique and adapted organisms that thrive in the extreme cold and darkness of this environment. Additionally, there are research stations and scientific facilities that study the continent and its surrounding waters.

By definition, GLOBAL warming happens over the entire planet, so no, there cannot be global warming in any one location or region. However, LOCAL warming is not occurring in Antarctica. Temperatures there are colder than have ever been recorded, and they are STILL going down.