Welcome to Fast Facts with Reasons for Hope, I’m Carl Kerby.
Today, we’re talking about rhinos, and here’s a free tip – if you ever meet one, make sure you stay downwind.
Why?
Glad you asked… rhinos have extremely poor eyesight. It’s so bad that if you were motionless and 100 feet away, it wouldn’t see you! But that’s okay because God designed these near-sighted mammals with excellent hearing. Their cup-shaped ears detect sound very efficiently, and each one rotates to hear equally in all directions. This means they quickly discern the snap of a twig, the warning of an ox pecker, or the satisfied grunts of a calf.
Hearing isn’t their super-sense, though – that would be their amazing sense of smell! If you’re upwind, they can smell you or any perceived threat a half mile away! Each highly sensitive nostril has millions of sensory cells that carry signals to the brain’s largest feature – the olfactory center. So like I said, stay downwind, or there will be trouble!
Join us again next time as we find out how a rhino puts its amazing sense of smell to good use. Until then, stay bold!
Carl Kerby is the founder of Reasons for Hope and co-creator of the DeBunked apologetic video series. His radio feature, Fast Facts, is heard weekly on VCY America, Saturdays at 9:25 AM Central.
