Tag Archives: plants

Chocolate, you are bitter but I still love you

By Ryan | Published: February 11, 2010

With Valentine’s day coming up, this promises to be a chocolaty weekend. I heart chocolate. But I won’t be blinded by my love… let’s look at the cold, hard, bitter chocolate facts. Theobroma Cacao (more commonly called cocoa) is an evergreen tree native to Central America. They grow to 60 feet tall in the wild, [...]

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FACT: in the US a tomato is legally a vegetable for tax reasons

By Ryan | Published: December 14, 2009

It wasn’t all that long ago that we learned tomatoes (along with peppers, cucumbers, and anything else with seeds) are really a fruit, however that is not true in a United States court of law. In 1883 the US Supreme Court passed a law that classified tomatoes as a vegetable. The reason, of course, was [...]

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FACT: chia pets are very nutritional

By Ryan | Published: December 2, 2009

Ch-ch-ch-chia! The Chia Pet is deeply rooted in the popular culture of North America so much that it is part of the Smithsonian Institutions permanent collection. It started as an authentic bit of Mexican culture before becoming an “As Seen on TV” sensation. It is a small animal figurine made of terra cotta pottery. You [...]

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FACT: koalas sleep a lot and smell like cough drops

By Ryan | Published: October 30, 2009

Koalas, one of those distinctive Australian animals, exclusively eats the leaves of the eucalyptus tree. It eats a lot of them. That tough, poisonous leaf provides the koala with most of their water, and all of the nutrients they need for the day, but just barely. The truth is their diet of choice, much like [...]

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FACT: the only known vegetarian spider lives like a burglar

By Ryan | Published: October 18, 2009

An interesting fact about spiders has recently surfaced… for the first time, they’ve found one that is a herbivore, primarily eating plants. Not only that, the Bagheera kiplingi spider (clearly named by a fan of the Jungle Book story), has chosen a particularly tricky plant to be eating. Any time it wants a snack it [...]

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FACT: pumpkin pie is not made from any old pumpkin

By Ryan | Published: October 13, 2009

Pie is a topic near and dear to my heart. In my eyes (tummy) pumpkin pie ranks right up there along with homemade saskatoon berry pie as being among the best. Turns out it takes a special pumpkin to be transformed into the delicious triangular treat. About 90% of the pumpkin pies found in North [...]

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FACT: autumn leaves only turn red as a last resort

By Ryan | Published: October 3, 2009

It’s now officially chilly around here, so my curiosity turned towards the leaves. Specifically, how and why they change to such lovely colours. Turns out, they don’t really change to yellow and orange so much as let their true colours come through. (That’s your cue, Cyndi!) The green in leaves is due to the presence [...]

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