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TIL Some zoos take donations of Christmas trees to provide enrichment for their animals. Lions are particularly fond of them.

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e0YnD TIL The first native to greet the settlers at Plymouth colony not only spoke English, he boldly walked into their camp to say hello and ask if they had beer. His name was Samoset, and along with Squanto, he spent several years teaching the colonists to farm, hunt and survive in the New World.
lolMG TIL in 1961 a puppy from one of the first dogs to survive a trip into space was given to Carolyn Kennedy as a gift from Nikita Khrushchev
QJWmd TIL 100 years ago Rupert Murdoch's father, a journalist, conspired with anti-Semitic war historian Charles Bean, to convince the Prime Minister of Australia to de-mote Australian General and commander of the Western front John Monash, a man stongly admired by his troops and of Jewish heritage.
Meye7 TIL: Binghamton University researchers have been working on a self-healing concrete that uses a specific type of fungi as a healing agent. When the fungus is mixed with concrete, it lies dormant until cracks appear, when spores germinate, grow and precipitate calcium carbonate to heal the cracks.
BrJAK TIL: That in the 1980s a group of scientist found that male Jewel beetles in Australia were mating with discarded beer bottles as they looked like very sexually attractive females; glossy, dimpled and brown. Afterwards, the beer company changed their bottle design.