Clara Pennington

I used to think chameleons changed colour to hide. Mostly they do it to talk, and the smallest ones have tongues quicker than a sports car.

A lizard with a third eye on its head, a chin flap for arguments, and a habit of dropping out of trees. Iguanas are stranger than they look.

The fish that leaves home as a fingerling, crosses an ocean, then finds the exact stream it was born in. I still cannot get over it.

They are bears, technically. They just decided meat was too much effort and committed to bamboo for most of their waking lives. Here is what makes a panda tick.

Cows are cleverer and stranger than the cartoons suggest: one stomach with four rooms, real friendships, and a nose as unique as a fingerprint.

Pigs carry a bad name they mostly do not deserve. They play video games, keep tidy, and cannot sweat to save their lives. A quick tour of the cleverest animal on the farm.

Sheep are cleverer than the field lets on: rectangular pupils, a memory for faces, real friendships, and one very famous clone.

Rectangular eyes, a taste for tree bark, and a memory that would shame my Year 4 class. Goats are cleverer than their reputation for eating tin cans suggests.

A quick romp through what makes rabbits odd: back to front digestion, teeth that never quit, and ears that double as radiators. Told the way I tell my Year 4 class.

There are more chickens than any other bird alive, and they are far sharper than the farmyard lets on. Faces, pecking orders, and a dinosaur in the family.

Ducks are built for water in ways that sound made up. Waterproof coats, feet that ignore ice, and a knack for sleeping with one eye on the exit.

Geese have a bad reputation and a brilliant CV: formation flying, lifelong partners, guard duty in ancient Rome, and goslings that adopt the first thing they see.