Dozens of straw mats are laid out where domesticated animals can rest. [Photo/IC]

As early as the 1970s, 58 kinds of animals are were found to display abnormal behavior before earthquakes. They included wild and domesticated animals such as cats, dogs, pandas, fish, snakes, rats, ants and bees, according to a survey by the Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Cave animals, such as rats and snakes, are found to be more sensitive than those living above the ground, and smaller ones more sensitive than bigger ones.

Records of quakes show that animals displayed abnormal behavior before they occured. For example, six weeks before the devastating earthquake in Yingkou, Northeast China's Liaoning province, in 1975, snakes in hibernation left their caves and geese kept honking and refusing to enter their nests. Also before the deadly earthquake striking Tangshan, North China's Hebei province, hordes of rats were seen fleeing nests and more than 100 skunks migrating.