Nature
February and January were introduced into the Roman calendar about 700 BCE when the calendar was extended from ten to twelve months. Before that Romans considered winter a monthless period.
February was named after the Latin word “februa” - which means cleansing or purification, and reflects the purification ritual undertaken before Spring.
The Saxons called February the “sprout-kale” - from the sprouting of cabbage or kale. In Finnish, the month is called “helmikuu”, meaning "month of the pearl" - snow melting on tree branches forms droplets which freeze again resembling pearls of ice. Ukrainians call this month “luty” (fierce), the month of ice and hard frost.
Salt had a huge influence on the development of ancient civilizations because of its ability to preserve food which reduced the people's dependence on the seasonal availability of food and allowed them to travel long distances.
It was a hard-to-obtain highly valued commodity, and some historians believe that Roman soldiers were sometimes paid with salt. The other historians, however, find it a misconception since word salary derives from the Latin salārium, meaning money paid to the soldiers to buy salt.
The word salad is also connected to the salt: it comes from the popular ancient Roman dish herba salata, meaning "salted vegetables".
Most of the turkey feathers produced by the poultry industry are ground up and used as filler for animal feed. Turkey dung is used as a fuel source in special electric power plants.
Brussels sprouts were brought to the US Louisiana by French settlers around 1800. Today about 80% of Brussels sprouts grown in the US goes to the frozen food market.
Parsnip is harvested through winter when the ground freezes over as it needs frost to develop its flavor.
Today, China is the world’s largest producer of potato, while Belarus is the largest consumer of this crop with estimated 180 kg per person, almost half a kilo a day.
Spiders are not insects, but air-breathing arthropods with two body segments and eight legs. So far, about 40,000 species have been discovered, with the smallest one, dwarf spider, being less than 1 mm (about .05’’) in body length, and the largest one, tarantula, with body lengths up to 90 mm (about 3.5’’). In captivity tarantulas can live up to 25 years, but lifespan of most species does not exceed 2 years.
Spiders are predators preying mostly on insects and other spiders, but some large species eat birds and lizards. Spiders have a very narrow gut that can’t cope with solid matter, and because of that they liquidize their food with enzymes.
There are about 20,000 known species of bee, in 9 recognized families.
Colonies of honey bees are long-lasting and may live for many years. The population of a healthy colony in mid-summer can average between 40,000 and 80,000 bees.
The male bees – drones – do not have stingers, and do not forage for nectar or pollen. Their only role is to fertilize a new queen. They die immediately after mating as this process requires from them a fatally convulsive effort. The drones are turned outside in autumn to die since their reproductive role is over.
Queen bee is an adult, fully sexually developed female, the mother of all the bees in the hive. The queens are developed from larvae selected by worker bees and fed only on royal jelly, a substance secreted by the workers that is high in protein, in order to become sexually mature. Adult queens are overweight and unable to fly. The average lifespan of the queen is three to four years.
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