In places like Arizona and Texas, the seasons donāt change much. Some plants stay green all year round and it doesnāt usually snow. These places have a wet, rainy season during the summer, known as monsoon season.
According to legend,Ā European crops during the Middle Ages were plagued by pests. Farmers began praying to the Blessed Lady, the Virgin Mary. Soon, the farmers started seeing beneficial ladybugs in their fields, and the crops were miraculously saved from the pests. The farmers began calling the red and black beetles "our lady's birds" or lady beetles. In Germany, these insects go by the name Marienkafer, which means "Mary beetles." The seven-spotted lady beetle is believed to be the first one named for the Virgin Mary; the red color is said to represent her cloak, and the black spots her seven sorrows.š
Our amazing planet has been around for quite some time. By researching our planetās rocks, scientists have calculated the Earth to be around 4.5 billion years old!
Like all the planets, Earth orbits (travels around) around the sun. And it does so at some serious speed āā around 30 kilometres per second, in fact! It takes 365 days (one year) for the Earth to complete one full orbit.Ā
Have you ever wondered why we haveĀ different seasons? Weāll tell you āā itās becauseĀ the Earth is tilted 23.4 degreeson its āaxisā,Ā an imaginary line straight through the middle of the planet form theĀ North PoleĀ to theĀ South Pole. This means that different parts of the globe are tilted towards the sun at different times of the year (or at different times during its orbit).
Not only does Earth zoom through space, it also spins on its axis. The result? We have daytime and nighttime! As the planet rotates, the side facing the sun receives daylight and the the other is in darkness.