You might be good at multitasking, but you probably aren’t as good as the Alpine swift. The small, swallow-like bird found in Europe and Africa can remain in flight for 200 days while migrating, during which time they eat insects, groom themselves, and even sleep while airborne. Alpine swifts native to Switzerland will fly all the way to Western Africa in order to stay warm during winter, a distance of thousands of miles (and you thought the trip to Florida was long).

All birds migrate.

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Migration comes with no shortage of hazards, and many birds — including ravens, great horned owls, quail, and myriad other species — simply don’t bother. This allows them to save energy, defend their territory, and more easily care for their young.

Weighing in at just one-fifth of a pound, Alpine swifts (Tachymarptis melba) are tiny but mighty. They spend almost their entire lives airborne, although they do roost and breed on cliff faces and other high, rocky areas. And they come from a distinguished family: Scientists have discovered that the closely related common swift (Apus apus) can stay airborne for up to 10 months uninterrupted, now considered the world’s longest continuous flight. Both birds have evolved to adapt to a life in the sky — swifts’ legs tend to be small and clumsy, making the creatures vulnerable to predators while they’re on the ground. Once airborne, though, they can fly fast and free.

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Superman might be the only thing faster than a speeding bullet, but he has some competition from mantis shrimp. Also known as “prawn killers” in Australia, these pint-sized pugilists punch with about the same force as a .22-caliber bullet. At 50 miles an hour, their punches are the fastest in the animal kingdom — and 50 times faster than the blink of an eye. When they decide to clobber their prey, mantis shrimp create 1,500 newtons of force with their claws; even more amazingly, their punches superheat the water around them to a temperature nearly as hot as the surface of the sun. Their clublike claws are coated in impact-resistant nanoparticles that allow the shrimp to punch to their heart’s content.

Mantis shrimp aren’t actually shrimp.

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Despite its name, the mantis shrimp is neither a mantis nor a true shrimp. Members of the order Stomatopoda, they’re more closely related to crabs and lobsters.

Mantis shrimp use their incredible punching skills to both feed on and fight creatures larger than themselves: crabs, mollusks, gastropods, and other ocean dwellers unlucky enough to get in their way. Videos of the phenomenon are as popular as you might imagine, not least because peacock mantis shrimp, perhaps the most famous type, are so visually striking. Not all mantis shrimp punch, however. There are two main types of hunters — smashers and spearers — and only the former engage in high-speed clubbing. Spearers, meanwhile, impale their prey on spiky forelimbs — a slower but presumably no less painful end.

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Among many other astounding capabilities, elephants inherently understand what pointing means. In fact, research suggests they’re among a few animals that understand the action without being trained by humans. A two-month study of 11 pachyderms in Zimbabwe used two buckets, one with fruit in it and one without, to determine whether elephants could understand which was which. A researcher standing between the two buckets used her arm to point toward the bucket of food, and the elephants successfully chose the bucket the researcher pointed toward 67% of the time.

Elephants are afraid of mice.

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Despite what countless cartoons would have you believe, elephants don’t fear mice — but they are afraid of bees.

The study was led by Richard Byrne, a professor at the University of St Andrews in Scotland, who told The Guardian, “Elephant society may have selected for an ability to understand when others are trying to communicate with them, and they are thus able to work out what pointing is about when they see it.” 

Elephants have exceptionally high emotional intelligence, and communication is key to both their social bonds and survival, which may explain why they’re able to understand this gesture most animals are unable to grasp. Byrne has suggested whales and dolphins as other animals that could feasibly understand pointing, though there’s a major hurdle in finding out whether or not that theory holds water: They’re much more difficult to work with than elephants.

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Regardless of where you find them — be it on a beach, along a riverbank, or in a garden — most shells share a common feature: 90% of them coil clockwise and open to the right. Mollusk shells with these right-oriented openings are called “dextral,” while those with left-leaning apertures are designated “sinistral.” (These terms can be applied to right- and left-handed humans, too; remarkably, left-handedness occurs in shells and humans at similar rates, with an estimated 10% to 12% of people worldwide being lefties.) 

Octopuses once had shells.

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The ancestors of octopuses, squid, and other cephalopods once had hard shells. Scientists believe the creatures shed their shells about 160 million to 100 million years ago in an evolutionary change that helped them swim faster, making it easier to catch prey and evade predators.

Some marine life experts believe that just one gene impacts the direction a shell will coil. The rarity of sinistral shells has created a high-priced market for them — they’re so sought-after among collectors that unscrupulous dealers have been known to peddle counterfeits. However, a few species of marine mollusks are predominantly sinistral. The most commonly known is the lightning whelk, a sea snail found in the waters of the Gulf of Mexico. Recognizable by their tapering brown, orange, and cream-colored shells, lightning whelks spend most of their lives submerged in underwater grass beds and at the bottoms of bays, feasting on clams and oysters. Some lighting whelks have reached record lengths of 16 inches — and most of these whoppers have openings pointing toward the left.

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