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TACTILE SETAE Tactile setae are long hairs that butterflies and moths use to sense touch. These hairs are attached to nerve cells, and relay information about touch to the insect's brain. Setae grow through holes in the hard, chitinous exoskeleton.

TAPIR A plant-eating, hoofed mammal with a small trunk.

TARANTULA A tarantula is a large, hairy spider.

TARSIER Tarsiers are small mammals with enormous eyes.

TAXON A taxon is category in the classification of living organisms. The taxa (the plural of taxon) in the Linnean system are kingdom, phylum, class, order, family, genus, and species.

TAXONOMY Taxonomy is the science of classifying organisms into groups by structure, origin, common ancestor, etc.

TELEOST FISH (pronounced TEEL-ee-ost) Teleost (meaning "perfect-boned") fish are advanced fish with bones that evolved during the Jurassic period. They are the most abundant fishes today.

TEMPERATE RAINFOREST Temperate rainforests are very wet, ancient forests that rarely freeze or get very hot. Most of the world's temperate rainforests are in the Pacific Northwest of the USA.

TENTACLES Caterpillars have tentacles on their bodies. These fleshy appendages provide sensory information for the caterpillar. They are often mistaken for antennae.

THERAPSID Therapsids are a clade of advanced synapsid animals from the late Permian period. They had teeth that were differentiated into post-canines and incisors. Dominant among the early therapsids were the large dinocephalians. The clade of therapsids includes the mammals, some close relatives, and their recent common ancestors. Fossils of therapsids have been found in the Karroo desert in Africa.

THORACIC LEGS Thoracic legs are the three pairs of jointed legs on the thorax (mid region) of a caterpillar. Each of these legs has a grasping hook at the end.

THORAX The thorax is the chest area of an insect (including butterflies and moths). The thorax is divided into three segments; on each segment is a pair of legs. The four wings of the butterfly (or moth) are also attached to the thorax. The thorax contains the muscles that make the legs and wings move.

THREE-TOED SLOTH The sloth is a slow-moving mammal that lives hanging upside-down from trees.

TIBIA The tibia is the shin bone - the bone in the lower, front part of the leg between the knee and the ankle.

TIGER Tigers are large, fierce Asian cats that have stripes. They live mostly in forests in India, Sumatra, Indochina, and Siberia. Tigers are threatened with extinction due to loss of habitat.

TIGER SWALLOWTAIL BUTTERFLY The tiger swallowtail butterfly (Papilio glaucas) is a strong flier with distinctive yellow and black striped markings on its wings and body (some females are brown or black, mimicking the poisonous pipevine swallowtail). This butterfly has a wingspan of 3.5-6.5 inches (9-16.5 cm) and is found throughout the USA and Canada. The caterpillar is plump and green with yellow eyespots; it looks like bird droppings when young.

TIPITI A tipiti is a flexible braided cylindrical basket made of jacitara palm bark that is used by the Tupis of South America. The tipiti is used to remove the poison liquid from bitter cassava root. The cassava pulp is squeezed in the tipiti until the poisonous liquid is extracted. This process makes the cassava edible.

TOAD Toads are amphibians with poison glands They usually have warty skin.

TOP PREDATOR A top predator is an animal at the top of the food chain, like the jaguar or bald eagle. Top predators have little or no natural enemies.

TOUCAN A rainforest bird with a huge, colorful beak.

TOXIN A toxin is a poison. Some butterflies eat plants that contain toxins in order to poison their predators. Monarchs eat milkweed for its toxic glycosides.

TRANSPIRATION Transpiration is the process in which plants lose water through pores in their leaves (these openings are called stomata). As water is lost from the plant, the plant takes up more water (and minerals) through its roots. The rate of transpiration varies as the conditions of the plant change and is controlled by the opening and closing the stomata.

TREE FERN Tree ferns are tall vascular plants that live in warm climates. These ferns have a clump of fronds on top of a fibrous trunk.

TREE FROG, RED-EYED A small rainforest frog with bright red eyes.

TREE NYMPH BUTTERFLY The tree nymph butterfly, also called the rice paper butterfly, paper kite butterfly, or wood nymph (Idea leuconoe) is a distinctive black and white butterfly. The wingspan is 95 to 110 cm across. The chrysalis is yellow with black markings. It is from Southeast Asia. Classification: superfamily Papilionigiae, family Nymphalidae, subfamily Danainae, Genus Idea, Species I. Leuconoe.

TROPICAL RAINFOREST Tropical rainforests are warm, very wet forests that do not freeze (the temperature remains over 75°F=24°C) and do not get extremely hot. Tropical rainforests cover about 7% of the Earth's surface, in a band around the equator. They are also called equatorial rainforests.

TROPICS The tropics are a 3,000 mile (4800 km) wide band around the equator, between the Tropic of Cancer (23.5° N latitude) and the Tropic of Capricorn (23.5° S latitude).

TURTLE Turtles are anapsids, having no extra holes in the sides of their heads. Turtles evolved during the late Triassic period, roughly 220 million years ago, about the same time the dinosaurs and mammals evolved. Proganochelys is the oldest known turtle.

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