Have you ever tried to build a snowman during Christmas? That’s Great! Lets discover more about snowman and learn five stunning facts about snow.
Although snowflakes may look all the same to us, if you were to put them under a microscope you would see that they are actually quite different. Snowflakes form in cold weather when droplets freeze into dust particles. No two snowflakes are the same size, shape and design.
Snowflakes typically have six sides and are formed from about 200 tiny frozen crystals. A snowflake’s shape and design all depends on how quick it falls or what way it falls. The Guinness Book of World Record says the world’s largest snowflake was 15 inches wide! That is about the same length as a bowling pin.
The first thing every person does when enough snow has fallen is go outside and build a snowman. But how long has this activity been going on? We aren’t 100% certain as to when the first snowman was built and who built it but according to Bob Eckstein, author of the book ‘The History of the Snowman’ the act of building snowmen is believed to go back to Mediaeval times.
An illustration of a snowman from a book written in 1380 was found to be the earliest proof of snowman building. The biggest snowman ever built was in America in 2008. The snow-women was over 122 feet tall and was given the name Olympia Snowe.
Animals that live in snowy environments are warm blooded animals. This means that they can make their own body heat even when it is cold outside. They grow warmer fur or feathers and sometimes change colour.
Some animals change colour to camouflage themselves against the snow. Many animals living in Antarctica also have windproof or rainproof fur. Examples of animals that live in snowy environments are arctic hares, arctic foxes, snow leopard, walrus, emperor penguins and polar bears.
When you think of snow your mind will imagine blankets of white snow covering the ground. However, snow is actually translucent or clear. Snow appears whit to the human eye due to how the light reflects off it, similar to how light reflection makes us see plants as green. Snow is sometimes called ‘Powder’.
When rain freezes it turns to ice. When both the earth’s surface and the atmosphere is cold, the water vapour in the clouds turns into tiny ice crystals.
These ice crystals fall from the sky and appear as snow on the ground. Some places have more snow during the year because the air is colder for longer periods of time. Examples of places that get a lot of snow are Alaska, Canada and Japan.
We hope you enjoyed learning more things about snow as much as we loved teaching you about them. Now that you know how majestic the snow is, you can move on to learn about other climate and weather stuff like: Thunder, Thunderstorms, Thunder and Lightning, Rainbows, Lightning, Floods, Earth’s Atmosphere, Hurricanes, Volcanoes, Earthquakes, Tornadoes, Blizzard, Wind and Tsunamis.
You can also check our articles about geography like: Australia, United States, Italy, Giant’s Causeway, Day of the Dead in Mexico, Festivals in Mexico, 8 Amazing Places to Visit in Egypt, Egypt, Festivals in India, Beaches, Oceans, Rocks, Rivers, Mountains, Trees and 1 Interesting Fact about Every Country in Asia.
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